BROWN PRESSED DOOMED JET FLIGHT INTO CROATIA, FORMER PARTNER SAYS.

Byline: Philip Shenon The New York Times

Only hours before his death in a plane crash on a storm-swept Croatian mountaintop in April, Commerce Secretary Ron Brown called a former business partner and said he had overruled staff members who were worried that it was dangerous to fly into Croatia because of treacherous weather, the former business partner said Friday.

Nolanda B. Hill, the former business partner and a close friend of Brown, said Brown had decided to take the risk and fly to Dubrovnik, Croatia, because of the importance of the trip, which was intended to encourage U.S. investment in the war-shattered nations of the Balkans.

Hill suggested that Brown had pressured the pilots of the plane and his staff to fly to Croatia despite the stormy weather, a trip that ended with the deaths of Brown and the 34 other people on board the jet, the military version of a Boeing 737.

``I begged him not to go, but he said `no,' '' Hill said of her final conversation with Brown, which she said had taken place over a satellite telephone when Brown was in Tuzla, Bosnia, on April 3, and was only minutes away from boarding the plane for Dubrovnik. ``He never let anything get in his way. He would never let the weather stop him.''

``I know he made that decision - I'm confident he made that decision'' to fly on to Croatia, said Hill, who is writing a book about her long business relationship and friendship with Brown.

She said that while Brown almost certainly had pressured the pilots to fly to Croatia, regardless of the bad weather, she doubted that he would have given a direct order for the pilots to fly to Dubrovnik. That, she said, would not have been the style of Brown, who was admired for skills of persuasion developed over many years as a Washington lawyer and lobbyist.

``His method would not have been to give a direct order,'' she said. ``His would have been to have explained the seriousness of the situation and to implore them that if there was any way to get out, that they should get out.'' If the pilots did anything wrong, she said, ``it was to succumb to the strength of his personal dedication and commitment.''

Hill, who has been under investigation by the Justice Department for her business ties to Brown, said she had decided to speak out about her final conversations with the commerce secretary after learning Thursday that the Air Force had relieved a general and two other senior commanders of their duties in

Germany because they had failed to order safety inspections at Dubrovnik airport that might have prevented the crash.

``I'm furious about that,'' she said. ``These men are being made scapegoats.'' If Brown were alive, she said, ``he would be furious, too. I know he would want to stand up and say, `I made the call, it's my problem, it was my responsibility, it's my fault.' ''

``There was a fatalistic side to Ron,'' she said. ``There was a side to Ron in which he believed that he had lived a charmed and blessed life, and that God protected him because he was there on a mission.''

Brown and Hill, a Washington broadcasting entrepreneur and a Democratic Party fund-raiser, had been co-owners of First International Communications Corp., which had been involved in a variety of business projects.

Brown sold his stake in the company to Hill for more than $300,000 after his selection as commerce secretary.