Iran Admits Shooting Down Civilian Jetliner “By Mistake”
After days of denials, Iran admits its surface-to-air missile took down the Ukrainian passenger airplane
Iran has admitted shooting down the civilian Ukrainian jetliner that crashed on Wednesday near Tehran, killing all of the 176 passengers on board. The Iranian admission comes amid mounting evidence, with U.S., British, and Canadian intelligence confirming that the plane was shot down by an Iranian surface-to-air missile.
The Iranian military blamed the shooting of the airliner on ‘human error,’ Iranian state TV reported, citing an official statement. So far, Tehran had pinned the blame on mechanical fault for the downing of the Boeing 737-800.
Associated Press reported:
Iran announced Saturday that its military “unintentionally” shot down the Ukrainian jetliner that crashed earlier this week, killing all 176 aboard, after the government had repeatedly denied Western accusations that it was responsible.
The plane was shot down early Wednesday, hours after Iran launched a ballistic missile attack on two military bases housing U.S. troops in Iraq in retaliation for the killing of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani in an American airstrike in Baghdad. No one was wounded in the attack on the bases.
A military statement carried by state media said the plane was mistaken for a “hostile target” after it turned toward a “sensitive military center” of the Revolutionary Guard. The military was at its “highest level of readiness,” it said, amid the heightened tensions with the United States.
Still refusing to take the responsibility for the shooting down of the civilian airliner, Iran continued to point fingers at America. On Twitter, Iran’s foreign minister Javad Zarif blamed U.S. “adventurism” for the act.
Tehran’s remarks echo similar sentiments aired by some leading Democrats. Democratic presidential hopeful Pete Buttigieg suggested on Thursday that the U.S. shared the blame for downing of the airliner, tweeting that “[i]nnocent civilians” had been “caught in the middle of an unnecessary and unwanted military tit for tat,” after U.S. eliminated top Iranian terror operative Qassem Soleimani, who according to the Pentagon was planning imminent attacks on U.S. troops and diplomats stationed in Iraq.
Earlier this week, images showed Iranian workers bulldozing and clearing the crash site in an apparent attempt to destroy the evidence. Tehran had announced that it was opening the black boxes recovered from the debris of the plane, but refused to allow U.S. experts to analyse the flight data.
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iranian state TV, citing a military statement, says the country ‘unintentionally’ shot down a Ukrainian jetliner, killing all 176 aboard.
The statement came Saturday morning and blamed “human error” for the shootdown.
— Natasha Bertrand (@NatashaBertrand) January 11, 2020
The U.S., British and other Western intelligence services had concluded that the Ukrainian airliner was shot down by “two Iranian surface-to-air missiles which were launched and detected by satellites just minutes after the airliner took off,” UK’s Daily Mail reported. Tehran had earlier rubbished the Western intelligence findings as ‘big lies.’ The head of Iran’s civil aviation organization dismissed the assertion of Tehran’s involvement in shooting down the civilian airliner as “illogical”. “Scientifically, it is impossible that a missile hit the Ukrainian plane,” he declared on Thursday.
Washington has already announced stern measures against the regime if it were found responsible for the shooting. If evidence showed Iran’s hand in the shooting down of the plane, the U.S. “and the world will take appropriate actions in response,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Friday.
UPDATE:
Only sick and deranged ppl believe Iran shooting down a civilian airliner was the fault of @realDonaldTrump & USA. But Dems running for @POTUS & hate-filled media line up w/ murderous Iranian regime which is all you need to know. Pathetic! https://t.co/42HQ53KYOZ
— Gov. Mike Huckabee (@GovMikeHuckabee) January 11, 2020
Defense expert Riki Ellison: “100 percent certain” the plane brought down by anti-aircraft missile
[Cover image via YouTube]
DONATE
Donations tax deductible
to the full extent allowed by law.
Comments
“I was calibrating the missile’s target lock and my finger slipped.”
Muslim incompetence. “Ahmed, how many times did I tell you, ‘Keep away from the red button’”
Considering Iran’s history of promoting terrorism and killing civilians, why should we believe them, and should we kill 10-100-1000 or maybe even 100,000 of their people for every each of the 176 people who died on that plane. Iran has demonstrated again and again that they are bald faced liars.
Events like this make me wonder why “The Bedford Incident” isn’t in the top-10 films of all time.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0058962/
Twice!
Iran did something (D)s cannot do: blame Iran instead of Trump.
Yet Iran and Trudeau both pushed blame on Trump. Trudeau was asked in a “news” conference by different reporters if the US is to blame for the shooting down of the plane, Black Face Trudeau hedged a little, but he pretty much said yes.
Iraq is complaining to the UN about being fired upon by Iran (at least that is good).
“The statement came Saturday morning and blamed “human error” for the shootdown.”
Won’t stop Democrat’s from blaming Trump anyway.
A large number of Canadians died when the plane was shot down. And their prime minister blames Trump – not the murderers who killed his citizens.
Looks like he would make a perfect Democratic candidate for president.
But … but … but … Pete told me it’s Trump’s fault.
Not human error, human scum shot the plane down.
I suggest that the error is a cultural one. Somebody had to make a choice between the risk of two errors: Down a commercial aircraft or not down a military aircraft. Obviously, human life in such a culture has little value. That culture carries nicely into the cultural invasion of Europe (why is there a “no-go” zone in Paris?) and the Democrat Party culture in the US (Baltimore, Chicago, etc.) where the obvious solution of arming the good guys is fiercely resisted by the Dems.
The error here is very similar to the Russian downing of KAL007 in 1983. Totalitarian cultures both. And the Dems love totalitarian cultures do they not?
On the other hand, in 1988 the USN Vincennes shot down Iran Air Flight 655. It’s not clear that we can read too much into institutionalized incompetence. In the Vincennes case, it was apparently well-known in some professional Navy circles that Captain Rogers was a swaggering a-hole and an accident waiting to happen, but he was put in command of a dangerous warship despite that.
You leave out the circumstances in place when the Vincennes shot down that plane.
It was a hot war zone, the Iranians sent a commercial airliner out in to the path of a US warship engaged in that hot war zone, with only moments to react.
The Iranians are cold blooded pathological killers. They sent little kids into minefields to blow a path through the field. They sent that airliner into the conflict knowing it likely to get shot down. There was no way to tell what it was, the ID was turned off.
Quit a bit different, Mr. Apologist.
Well, there was also the point that the airliner was screwing with it’s IFF as it entered said hot war zone. Which is a belligerent act.
So, while that time period was marked by a lot of “institutionalized incompetence”, there were a LOT of factors intended to provoke the response that occurred.
The USS Vincennes shoot-down differed greatly from the recent Iranian shoot-down.
In the first place, there was no communication between the USS Vincennes and the Iranian airlines plane.
In the second place, the USS Vincennes had no identification on the Iran Airlines plane.
Third, the Vincennes warned off the Iran Airlines plane several time on multiple frequencies, including the International Emergency frequency and received no response.
Fourth, a Mode II IFF signal was received and recorded by the Vincennes, just after take-off of the Iran airliner. Mode II is a military IFF code.
Fifth, the airport, from which the airliner departed was also used by Iranian military aircraft, including fighter and attack aircraft.
Sixth, the US immediately acknowledged that we had downed the aircraft. A thorough and transparent investigation was conducted and, while the US was found o be at responsible for the shoot-down, there were extensive extenuating circumstances.
The current shoot-down by Iran was totally different. So, far, the only mitigating circumstance, which may apply, is that the air defense command was not notified of the take-off of the Ukraine airliner and overreacted. What made it so bad, from a PR standpoint, was the fact that the Iranian government LIED about it. They owned the incident and should have taken responsibility for it immediately. Also, the Iranian air traffic control should never have authorized the take-off, to begin with. Iran had just launched a missile attack against both Iraqi and US interests and an aerial response should have been anticipated. All civil aircraft should have been grounded until, daylight. No, the Iranians own this one.
The current tagline of liberal apologists is “See, they’re ADMITTING were wrong”.
Yeah, you lying fucks. They’re ‘admitting’ it after they tried to lie for days and cover it up, and are ‘admitting’ it after confronted with overwhelming evidence they did it.
BUT TRUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUMP
Actually, the Lib’s angle on this is exactly what Iran’s angle is.
“Yes, Iran shot down the plane, but they never would have done it if Trump had not blown up a terrorist in another country several days before.”
Iran was caught using dogs to sniff out parts that were from the rockets, and were also caught bulldozing the area, after they said they weren’t going to bulldoze the area. They came clean on that lovely little bit when shown pictures of the bulldozer was taken.
Not to worry though, Trudeau was asked about the US being to blame for the plane being shot down by Iran, and he was pretty much saying yes. Trump’s Force powers over weaker minds, in this case the Iranian operator who targeted and pulled the trigger, are simply amazing.
I think they are still lying and that they shot the plane down intentionally. I also think that we should punish them. How about severing all their internet connections?
I wonder if the Iranians (with pressure from the MSM/DNC axis) will pull a Ralph Northam and suddenly withdraw their confession.
Some people did something.
These butchers should not rest easy. Not with PDJT in command.
Hopefully other terminations are pending.
No worries, the terrorist sympathizers in the Democrat party will continue to blame the United States and cover for the Iranians.
One of DJT’s most powerful statements during the press conference was that Iran shot it down, probably by accident. His voice was clear, and low-key. He offered no condemnation nor exaggeration.
“If you can keep your head when all about you
are losing theirs and blaming it on you…. ”
R. Kipling
Unintentionally but deliberately. J.L.Austin, “Three Ways of Spilling Ink,” which investigates “intentionally,” “on purpose,” and “deliberately.”
Amusing examples for the possible combinations.
Brilliant!
Will someone please forward this to the nitwit from Indiana running for President?
Democrats remain in morning for noted Iranian post Soleimani.
Poet for fucks sake!
Were there any important people on board? Maybe shooting A plane down wasn’t the mistake but hitting the wrong plane? One thing I find difficult to believe is that they didn’t know it was a civilian passenger plane. Was it’s trajectory indicating a threat? And as far as I know, the Russians are not turning over the black box so we have no record of flight communications.
I would be looking for the flight manifest.
If you read the post, you’ll see they’re saying it turned toward a “sensitive Revolutionary Guard site”.
And it’s not the Russians withholding the black box, but the Iranians.
It was reported that Iran turned the black box over to the Russians.
I’m not finding that anywhere. Last I saw they were refusing to hand them over to anyone. Do you have a link?
Are these the same Russians currently at war with The Ukraine? We know that the missile came from a Russian built launcher. The remaining questions are 1) accident caused by incompetence, 2) backdoor software initiated targeting and launch, 3) deliberate launch following receipt of threats/beaucoup dineros. Russia can score a backdoor victory here and get none of the blame.
not even close comparison to USS Vincennes incident
was no attempt by us navy to deflect/deny responsibility for the downing of the aircraft in that incident
between iff ” malfunction ” and communication ” break-downs ” with aircraft destroyed, no way the crew of that aircraft were without fault/complicity(either deliberate or otherwise)
no way a responsible pilot in a hot air balloon would approach a combatant warship let alone in a flying bus with a few hundred souls sitting behind them
Iran is big on Traditional Muslim Justice. What would be the punishment for ‘accidentially’ killing over a hundred people?
As I’ve said elsewhere, the real question is: Did the AA launch personnel make it to Evin prison that night, or did the site commander simply shoot them on the spot?
Either way, I guarantee Evin prison had at least a couple new prisoners that next morning.
US adventurism
Yes, it’s “adventurism” when we bag a terrorist operating in our war zone, outside of his own country, who is leading attacks on our sovereign soil, with a single shot, and then don’t even invade their airspace to smack their missile launchers committing an act of war against TWO sovereign nations.
Yeah, that’s exactly the definition of “adventurism” Webster meant to write in his dictionary………
*EYEROLL*
Tehran’s remarks echo similar sentiments aired by some leading Democrats.
So, were they reading from the same talking points? Or did one ‘inspire’ the other? And if the latter, who inspired whom?
Is it worse that our Dems would get their talking points from the Iranian regime? Or that the Iranians would lift theirs?
….Pete Buttigieg suggested on Thursday that the U.S. shared the blame for downing of the airliner….
Up yours, Butt-boy!
There have been reports of many arrests from within the IRG searching for the informant that triggered Soleimani. Could it be that the main perpetrator was on that plane escaping Iran? Several other civilian airliners had taken off before and after that one so why that particular jet? It was also determined that the route that the Ukrainian jet was following the proscribed route of departure that it was supposed to be on and the same route used by all of the other jets. This stinks and any update will be slow in coming.
Hassan Rouhani
✔
@HassanRouhani
Those who refer to the number 52 should also remember the number 290. #IR655
Never threaten the Iranian nation.
This leaves little doubt it was intentional.
Apparently you are unaware that Iran can be eradicated. Be careful.
Sand + heat = glass
Let me clarify:
Hassan Rouhani made this very plain twitter statement.
Just scroll down th January 6th, and the relevance is difficult to deny.
He threatened to own an Airliner.
https://twitter.com/HassanRouhani
Darn it… Down an airliner…