By Jim Brown
March 11, 2002

(AgapePress) - The U.S. Navy pilot whose crew was captured by the communist Chinese last April says his faith in God helped him get through the eleven days of interrogation.

Lt. Shane Osborn says some details of the interrogation have never come out in the mainstream press. After a Chinese fighter jet deliberately hit Osborne's plane over the South China Sea last April, Osborn courageously managed to get his crippled reconnaissance plane to an emergency landing off Hainan Island, saving the lives of all 24 U.S. military personnel aboard.

Once the collision took place, Osborn thought for sure that he and his crew would not survive. But he says several factors contributed to the successful landing -- "and the biggest one would be a strong belief in God and knowing that He helped me," he says. "It was not a one-man show. I had another pilot up there, and an engineer."

The pilot says other factors played a part in the successful outcome of the incident. "Another [factor] would be Navy training," Osborn says. "We train for years and years -- the best training in the world. And it costs a lot of money to train us, but it paid off that day. And then a sense of 'fight' inside of me [that] no matter what happened, not to give up."

Osborn says during the interrogation, they were not beaten by the Chinese -- but his interrogators did not allow him much sleep. "Every once in a while, I'd get an hour or two [of sleep]," he says, "but for the most part they would wake me up and keep me awake, interrogate me through the night for six or seven hours at a time. I was in that room a lot."

He says their captivity was not the "vacation" a lot of people thought they had. "Sleep deprivation and isolation from my crew, once I wouldn't cooperate with them ... took its toll for awhile there, but the important thing was protecting the crew and getting us all home and returning with our honor," Osborn says, "and we did that."

Osborn, who just returned from flying combat missions in Afghanistan, is the author of a new book entitled Born to Fly.

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