Home / Full timeline / Robert O. Goodman, Jr., a Black Navy lieutenant, is welcomed by President Ronald Reagan and others at the White House after having been freed from captivity in Syria.
Robert O. Goodman, Jr., a Black Navy lieutenant, is welcomed by President Ronald Reagan and others at the White House after having been freed from captivity in Syria.
1984 (Jan 4)
Robert O. Goodman, Jr., a Black Navy lieutenant, was welcomed by President Ronald Reagan and others at the White House after having been freed from captivity in Syria. The release was negotiated by the Black American Democratic presidential candidate Jesse L. Jackson. At the White House, Reagan declared, “this is a homecoming, and a very happy and welcomed one.... We are very proud of him.” Goodman had served a month as a prisoner in Syria after an A-6E Intruder jet, on which he was serving as bombardier-navigator, was shot down during an American air strike against Syrian anti-aircraft positions in Lebanon on December 4, 1983. The pilot of the plane, Mark Lange, was killed in the attack. Goodman's release was made possible by "a moral appeal” that candidate Jackson, also a national civil rights leader, made to Syrian President Hafez Assad. Jackson's intervention into the realms of American foreign policy had been the subject of both praise and criticism, yet President Reagan said following Goodman's release, "you don't quarrel with success.”
References:
- • Hornsby, Alton. Chronology of African-American History: Significant Events and People from 1619 to the Present. Detroit: Gale Research, 1995.