Charges Against B-52 Pilot: A Case Without Heroes

There are no heroes in the case of 1st Lt. Kelly Flinn, the Air Force pilot facing a court-martial for a number of alleged crimes. Among those crimes, adultery is the most sensational, though not, in terms of its consequences for her future, the most serious.

By the manner of its investigation the Air Force has left itself open to accusations that it has chosen to prosecute its only woman B-52 pilot with a zeal that it seldom summons when going after wayward male officers. On her part Flinn has adopted the role of a naive, love-struck victim who fell prey to a smooth-talking married man, the husband of an Air Force enlistee. That woman, now divorced, accuses Flinn of having sex with her husband within days after meeting him at a Minot, N.D., air base.

Flinn is seeking to resign from the Air Force without standing trial. If that is allowed, her discharge will be honorable and her life will be untainted by any criminal conviction. That request has been bucked up the chain of command to Air Force Secretary Sheila Widnall. The secretary has not lacked for gratuitous advice on what she should do, with Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott chiming in with his belief that Flinn has been “badly abused” by the Air Force and at a minimum deserves an honorable discharge. One man’s opinion, perhaps. But in this instance the man has plenty of influence over such things as military promotions and budgets, a point not lost on the Air Force.

The sympathy Lott expresses for Flinn, even while acknowledging he is unfamiliar with the details of her case, seems to echo much public opinion. But there is more to this increasingly embarrassing story than the sense that Flinn is being unfairly prosecuted for sexual misconduct that in others might be overlooked.

When the adultery accusation was being investigated Flinn did two things that led to the charges that now vastly complicate her quest for an honorable discharge. As she admits, she lied to her superiors about the nature of her relationship with a married man and she disobeyed a direct order to stay away from her lover.

It’s possible, maybe even likely, that the adultery charge might have been quietly finessed; certainly that has happened often enough in other cases. But lying to superiors and disobeying a direct order are--in the Air Force’s view--sins of a far greater magnitude. On these counts the military tends to be inflexible, harsh and unforgiving, which is not always the same thing as being just. No matter how it is decided, this is not a case that will have a satisfactory outcome.