MH17: Russia Claims Ukranian military plane flying nearby before incident

[Libertarian]

Sorry, @Libertarian. Just today (approx. 1700 PDT, 22 July) while I was listening to NPR in the car, and the U.S. is now revealing the intelligence that they have known...United States "spy" satellites DID detect a missile launch in the vicinity.

Why would you be sorry about finding evidence? I'm not. So far I haven't seen any though. Only words. And I really wish that US intelligence had any semblance of a reputation or could be trusted. But they can't. So as it stands we have Russia delivering some real evidence while being called propagandists, and the US, which has been caught lying so often in their recent foreign exploits, delivering only words. It's really sad. They need to put up or shut up at this point. They have been called to the mat by a military superpower that just delivered.

 

[WeedWhacker]

finding evidence? I'm not. So far I haven't seen any though. Only words.

Well....sorry but, that seems to be a personal bias that prefers to ignore facts, in favor of one's beliefs. What a shame.

 

[WeedWhacker]

So far I haven't seen any though.

Do you actually EXPECT that you (or I) will be invited into the White House SitRoom?? DO you think that the ENTIRE military Command Structure of the United States is corrupt?

I mean...come on. In order for that....well....I'd think a LOT of actual Generals and Admirals in the U.S. Military Command structure might wish to take a bit of issue with you........

 

[Pete Tar]

To say you've seen no evidence you have to deliberately ignore all that has been presented so far. No outright proof has been shown yet, but that is not likely until the investigation is finished.
Russia have not provided evidence of a military plane shadowing MH17, they've presented an allegation.

 

[Libertarian]

Well Assad did have nerve gas....so I guess that makes them an even coin toss.

Edit: apparently that is not considered "proof" - which of course it isn't - but it is evidence.

So here's some more evidence.

Yes, you have presented evidence that Syria has chemical weapons. Which the world has known for decades.

And this is proof that the Syrian rebels were launching nerve gas into Syrian villages.

http://www.wnd.com/2013/08/video-shows-rebels-launching-gas-attack-in-syria/

US Intilligence stood up before the world and announced that Assad was using Nerve gas despite concrete evidence directly to the contrary.

If the video of the US sponsored rebels firing Sarin into Syrian villages doesn't close the matter for you, here is a member of a UN commission of inquiry on Syria going on record stating that "According to the testimonies [they] have gathered, the rebels have used chemical weapons, making use of sarin gas."

And here is a report by Richard Lloyd, a former United Nations weapons inspector, and Theodore Postol, a professor of science, technology and national security policy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, questioning the ability of Assad's rocket's to even hit a target as close as the one they were accused of targetting.

I thought this debacle common knowledge...but I guess the MSM didn't really make much of it. They showed bias in not covering this news.

In any event, the whole thing was highly discrediting to the US intelligence community. They can't just stand up and lie any more. They have to prove up their claims.

 

[Libertarian]

Well....sorry but, that seems to be a personal bias that prefers to ignore facts, in favor of one's beliefs. What a shame.

Sorry, did I miss some facts? All I have seen from the US is allegations. I have seen video proof of radar intercepts from Russia's Ministry of Defense though. Please stop referring to allegations by US intelligence which are currently unbacked by substantive evidence as "facts". The factual social media they have referred to is now common knowledge. They have been asked to prove up and have declined at this point. Their history of misrepresentation in Iraq and again in Syria has placed them in disrepute. It is unfortunate but they really need to prove up.

 

[Soulfly]

Sorry, did I miss some facts? All I have seen from the US is allegations. I have seen video proof of radar intercepts from Russia's Ministry of Defense though. Please stop referring to allegations by US intelligence which are currently unbacked by substantive evidence as "facts". The factual social media they have referred to is now common knowledge. They have been asked to prove up and have declined at this point. Their history of misrepresentation in Iraq and again in Syria has placed them in disrepute. It is unfortunate but they really need to prove up.

Why exactly does the U. S. need to prove anything? This country is not involved in this, except to try and help out. We are not required to show prove of anyone's guilt or innocence.

 

[Pete Tar]

Why don't you hold Russia's history of truth-telling to the same standard then?
http://www.stopfake.org/en/russia-s-top-lies-about-ukraine-part-1/

 

[WeedWhacker]

Syria

WHY is "Syria" in this thread???

 

[Libertarian]

WHY is "Syria" in this thread???

I mentioned the US lying about WMD's in Iraq and Syria and that this lying is why them just standing up and making unsubstantiated claims is insufficient. @MikeC appeared not to know that the US had lied in Syria despite it being pretty much common knowedge at this point...so I quickly showed him the proof. Sorry for the sideline. The bottom line is that the US needs to put up or shut up. And y'all need to stop referring to unsubstantiated claims made by the US administration as anything but unsubstantiated claims.

 

[Libertarian]

Why exactly does the U. S. need to prove anything? This country is not involved in this, except to try and help out. We are not required to show prove of anyone's guilt or innocence.

Why don't you hold Russia's history of truth-telling to the same standard then?
http://www.stopfake.org/en/russia-s-top-lies-about-ukraine-part-1/

To adopt @Soulfly's parlance, Why exactly does Russia need to prove anything? This country is not involved in this, except to try and help out. They are not required to show proof of anyone's guilt or innocence.

Except that it's a proxy war involving both the US and Russia.

And the reason I'm not all over Russia is that the US has that base covered. Yet currently they are not showing any proof. And unfortunately their recent actions lend themselves to "want of verification".

 

[Soulfly]

To adopt @Soulfly's parlance, Why exactly does Russia need to prove anything? This country is not involved in this, except to try and help out. They are not required to show proof of anyone's guilt or innocence.

Except that it's a proxy war involving both the US and Russia.

And the reason I'm not all over Russia is that the US has that base covered. Yet currently they are not showing any proof. And unfortunately their recent actions lend themselves to "want of verification".

I guess what I was getting at is, why are you trying to blame the U. S. ? Do you think they had a hand in this?

 

[Soulfly]

Why exactly does Russia need to prove anything? This country is not involved in this, except to try and help out.

Pretty much the whole of western civilization is blaming Russia ( in some fashion) for this, that makes them involved. No on is blaming the U. S. well except biased CTers.

 

[Pete Tar]

To adopt @Soulfly's parlance, Why exactly does Russia need to prove anything? This country is not involved in this, except to try and help out. They are not required to show proof of anyone's guilt or innocence.

So why do you give their evidence that Ukraine was behind this more credence than that showing the rebels were, given their established pattern of lies about Ukraine?

And y'all need to stop referring to unsubstantiated claims made by the US administration as anything but unsubstantiated claims.

Maybe some examples of this if we need to stop doing it so much?

 

[David Coulter]

So now the US is saying that its' only evidence is youtube clips and social media posts.

As others pointed out the spokesperson was very careful with what she said, and she she clearly alluded to other sources. You obviously would like the US to disclose everything but there is no way that will happen in order to protect "sources and methods". The woman in the video would definitely not have a security clearance and so could not possibly explain all of the assets that were used.

 

[David Coulter]

The actual video of radar is here - see 11 minutes for the identification of a 2nd contact on same location as MH17:

The "second" contact appears at almost the exact time that MH17 was hit. I agree with MikeC in that it appears to be a debris cloud or the tail section fluttering straight down. Note that the "target" is not moving laterally in relation to the blue lines which are the border with Russia and eventually just disappears. There is no way a fighter would be able to do that.

 

[WeedWhacker]

I mentioned the US lying about WMD's in Iraq and Syria

I do not recall any "lying" about 'WMDs' in Syria....ever.

EDIT: There is reality, and there is falling into a hole of (so-called) "conspiracy theory".

Everyone has a choice....to choose cognitive, or to choose "follow".

Good luck.

 

[David Coulter]

To adopt @Soulfly's parlance, Why exactly does Russia need to prove anything? This country is not involved in this, except to try and help out. They are not required to show proof of anyone's guilt or innocence.

Except that it's a proxy war involving both the US and Russia.

And the reason I'm not all over Russia is that the US has that base covered. Yet currently they are not showing any proof. And unfortunately their recent actions lend themselves to "want of verification".

"Proof" is a complicated concept. We generally collect evidence that leads to a conclusion that will satisfy a "reasonable man". One can always argue that something is not really proof. For example, the news footage of a Vietnamese general executing a suspected Vietcong on the street - one could argue it was an elaborately staged Hollywood special effect.

In the case of MH17, the short term events leading to it breaking up and crashing occurred over dozens of kilometers over a period of several minutes. The long term events occurred over days and 100's of kilometers (movement of materiel and people in and out of the area). The evidence will thus be disjointed in space and time and needs to be compiled into a coherent picture. But a lot of the pieces of the circumstantial puzzle exist.

Yes, the US has not released the actual radar, heat, and satellite imagery - yet. Release of anything that could reveal sources and methods will take time. US intel personnel will have to thoroughly review what is shown and determine what must be redacted. Satellite imagery, for one, is not that simple. Satellites don't just sit above one place on the planet. The question is whether there was an NRO or commercial satellite that happened to be looking at the location of the incident during an orbital pass that happened to coincide with the incident. It is more likely that the imagery will show movement of the BUKs and determine where they came from and where they went to.

You argue that Russia has disclosed everything. The "content" of the Russian presentation was mostly presentation of theories followed by rhetorical questions. The radar showed what happened, MH17 was within a group of 3 commercial flights and broke up in mid-flight - that is all it showed. As noted above, the "fighter" theory is complete nonsense as the fighter target showed no lateral movement and quickly disappeared, planes can't do that. The "fighter" was just part of MH17 falling to the ground.

 

[Trailspotter]

BBC Russian Service published a video (in Russian) from their correspondent in the area. They identified and visited the location where the smoke trail, allegedly from the SAM that brought down MH17, was photographed. They failed to find any evidence or witnesses of BUK being deployed in that area and suggested possible alternative explanations of the smoke origin (there are a current battlefield and a coal mine in the vicinity). The correspondent interviewed several local witnesses of the military planes flying at the crash time and filmed a house destroyed allegedly by the bomb dropped from the Ukrainian plane, with killing 11 people. A separatist leader at the site claimed that the Ukrainian bombers regularly used overflying civil planes for cover and he would try to shot the bombers down if he had such a capability.

EDIT: By now BBC Russian apparently have removed the above video reportage. It was at:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/russian/multimedia/2014/07/140722_v_mh17_buk_hunt.shtml

Perhaps, the reason for this removal was that the journalist called rebels 'public militia', as the Russian state media do, and not the 'pro-Russian separatists', as accepted by the BBC.

PS A copy of the removed video is currently available on youtube:

 

[Jason]

I think it's also important to point out that it would be nearly impossible for the Ukranian government to have made this mistake since ATC was tracking this plane across the entire country. So the claims that they mistook it for Putin's plane (when he was in Russia) or that one of their fighter jets accidentally shot it down are absurd. I could understand a mistake like that happening if a plane was just entering their country from the Russian border, but not a plane that flew clear across the entirety of their country..

 

[MikeC]

To adopt @Soulfly's parlance, Why exactly does Russia need to prove anything?

they have put forth theories about what happened - so it is up to them to provide the evidence that supports those theories - just like everyone else needs to put forth the evidence to support THEIR theories.

This country is not involved in this, except to try and help out.

Patent nonsense - and evidence that the only person applying 2 standards on here is you.

 

[MikeC]

I mentioned the US lying about WMD's in Iraq and Syria and that this lying is why them just standing up and making unsubstantiated claims is insufficient. @MikeC appeared not to know that the US had lied in Syria despite it being pretty much common knowedge at this point...so I quickly showed him the proof.

no, you didn't.

 

[Pete Tar]

...so I quickly showed him the proof.

no, you didn't.

Large off-topic potential here, if you want to pursue this point @Libertarian start a new thread.

 

[MikeC]

It's already covered https://www.metabunk.org/threads/po...ebels-claims-about-chemical-weapons-use.2331/

 

[Pete Tar]

Russians Scramble To Edit Wikipedia So The Kremlin's Claims Make Sense

As we reported earlier, the Kremlin now says that flight MH17 was "tailed" by a Ukrainian military Su-25 aircraft during much of its flight over Ukraine. As we pointed out, this claim may be physically impossible since Russia says that the Su-25 was consistently between 3 and 5 kilometers away from MH17, but the Su-25 can't fly high enough to have this claim make any sense.

Well, today the Su-25 has been given some significant upgrades -- at least on Wikipedia. Several IP addresses that track back to central Moscow appear to have edited the maximum altitude of the Su-25 from 7 kilometers to 10 kilometers to match the flight path of MH17.

http://pressimus.com/Interpreter_Mag/press/3486

 

[Libertarian]

I do not recall any "lying" about 'WMDs' in Syria....ever.
EDIT: There is reality, and there is falling into a hole of (so-called) "conspiracy theory".
Everyone has a choice....to choose cognitive, or to choose "follow".
Good luck.

I suppose you didn't follow what happened in Syria then. If you watched anything about Syria on the MSM, you watched the US lying through their teeth about it and blindly blaming Assad for what their sponsored terrorist allies were doing there. But let's not diverge into Syria again. The video of Al Queda terrorists doing what the US said Assad did is sufficient to close the debate anyhow.
I don't know why you would chose "follow" instead of "cognitive" though. I love to think about what I'm told and asses whether it is true on the merits.

 

[Libertarian]

The "fighter" was just part of MH17 falling to the ground.

This is an interesting theory. Is there evidence to this effect?

I think it's also important to point out that it would be nearly impossible for the Ukranian government to have made this mistake since ATC was tracking this plane across the entire country.

Kiev has seized the ATC tapes and have refused to release them. I wonder why these records are being hidden. What are your thoughts on Kiev refusing to release the ATC records?

 

[Jason]

I suppose you didn't follow what happened in Syria then. If you watched anything about Syria on the MSM, you watched the US lying through their teeth about it and blindly blaming Assad for what their sponsored terrorist allies were doing there. But let's not diverge into Syria again. The video of Al Queda terrorists doing what the US said Assad did is sufficient to close the debate anyhow.
I don't know why you would chose "follow" instead of "cognitive" though. I love to think about what I'm told and asses whether it is true on the merits.

Do you have something against the United States? It seems like you trust every other country over the US. Why?

 

[Pete Tar]

This is an interesting theory. Is there evidence to this effect?

What exact evidence links the unidentified blip on the radar screen to being a Ukranian military jet at all? The russians have just basically gone, "here's an unidentified mark we picked up at the moment of impact, and by the way the Ukranian military have su-25's", and people are saying Russia has confirmed the plane was being trailed by an SU-25, with no evidence at all pointing to that.

 

[Pete Tar]

Kiev has seized the ATC tapes and have refused to release them.

Reference of refusal to release?

 

[MikeC]

Kiev has seized the ATC tapes and have refused to release them. I wonder why these records are being hidden. What are your thoughts on Kiev refusing to release the ATC records?

This is normal practice for aircraft accident investigation around the world. The tapes will be released to an appropriate investigating body.

ICAO Annex 13 section 5.12 (e) refers:

Non-disclosure of records
The State conducting the investigation of an accident or incident shall not make the following records available for purposes other than accident or incident investigation, unless the appropriate authority for the administration of justice in that State determines that their disclosure outweighs the adverse domestic and international impact such action may have on that or any future investigations:
a) all statements taken from persons by the investigation authorities in the course of their investigation;
b) all communications between persons having been involved in the operation of the aircraft;
c) medical or private information regarding persons involved in the accident or incident;
d) cockpit voice recordings and transcripts from such recordings;
e) recordings and transcriptions of recordings from air traffic control units;
f) cockpit airborne image recordings and any part or transcripts from such recordings; and
g) opinions expressed in the analysis of information, including flight recorder information.

taken from the New Zealand CAA website

 

[Libertarian]

Do you have something against the United States? It seems like you trust every other country over the US. Why?

It's nothing against the United States. I just don't trust serial liars.

Perhaps the reason that Kiev is not releasing the ATC records and the US is with-holding sattelite imagery is that Ukraine did it. Here is Robert Parry reporting that he is "told that some CIA analysts cite U.S. satellite reconnaissance photos suggesting that the anti-aircraft missile that brought down Flight 17 was fired by Ukrainian troops from a government battery, not by ethnic Russian rebels."

http://consortiumnews.com/2014/07/19/airline-horror-spurs-new-rush-to-judgment/

That the US' ally may be guilty of this crime and this is why neither the US nor its' ally have released any of the evidence in their possession is not beyond possibility. The US and Kiev can clear the air on this easily by doing the right thing and assisting the investigation.

 

[MikeC]

This is an interesting theory. Is there evidence to this effect?

Yes - the video of the ATC radar plots supplied by Russia contains 3 obvious pieces of evidence that this is likely wreckage and not another aircraft:

1/ there is no 2nd plot until the MH17 plot starts losing speed and altitude and veers off course - consistent with there being nothing to plot before whatever caused the aircraft to change speed/altitude/heading.
2/ the 2nd plot does not move very far from its initial position - consistent with something descending more or less straight down
3/ the 2nd plot only descends on that one spot - see item 2.

 

[SR1419]

Why won't the US participate in the investigation and help get to the bottom of this?

They are:

The FBI and National Transportation Safety Board will send investigators to Ukraine to assist in the probe of the Malaysia Airlines downing

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/uk...-investigators-ukraine-site-jet-crash-n159341

 

[Mick West]

Digression on evidence, MSM, etc moved to:
https://www.metabunk.org/threads/mh17-believability-of-evidence-from-us-and-russian-sources.4008/

 

[Libertarian]

the video of the ATC radar plots supplied by Russia contains 3 obvious pieces of evidence that this is likely wreckage and not another aircraft

Your points are interesting, but the Russian Ministry of Defense has concluded that the radar plots are evidence of another aircraft, and have requested the US to supply evidence to the contrary if they have it. I assume that the Russian Ministry of Defense has technicians capable of reading radar plots.

The video containing the Russian Ministry of Defense's conclusions regarding the evidence they supplied to the international community is in post 16.

I think we need to acknowledge the technical capabilities of the Russian Ministry of Defense rather than just saying "propaganda". The US has this capability but has thus far declined to step up. I am frustrated by this. It is causing us to waste a lot of our time on conjecture.

 

[MikeC]

Your points are interesting, but the Russian Ministry of Defense has concluded that the radar plots are evidence of another aircraft, and have requested the US to supply evidence to the contrary if they have it. I assume that the Russian Ministry of Defense has technicians capable of reading radar plots.

I am sure they are.

I am also sure that the Ministry is perfectly capable of ignoring the obvious and saying what suits their purposes. The competence of Russian technicians is of no consequence here - the evidence is simple, requires no great technical expertise, and you can simply follow the Russian explanation and say at several points "that is not what your picture shows".

The video containing the Russian Ministry of Defense's conclusions regarding the evidence they supplied to the international community is in post 16.

I think we need to acknowledge the technical capabilities of the Russian Ministry of Defense rather than just saying "propaganda".

I didn't "just" say propaganda - I gave very specific and check-able reasons why I think it is propaganda - it's not something I plucked out of my posterior!

I have never said anything about the competence or otherwise of Russian technicians - it is completely irrelevant to looking at the plot and seeing for yourself what it does show. There is NOTHING on it to say "Ukrainian military aircraft" at all - NOTHING....except the Russians repeating several times "the Ukrainian aircraft" or words to that effect. There are 3 aspects of it that shout out to me "wreckage" - the preponderance of the evidence is what makes the Russian conclusions propaganda.

I do not think the Russian defence ministry conclusions have come from their technicians.

The US has this capability but has thus far declined to step up. I am frustrated by this. It is causing us to waste a lot of our time on conjecture.

I don't believe you would believe the US information anyway....judging from your posts on here.

 

[TEEJ]

I assume that the Russian Ministry of Defense has technicians capable of reading radar plots.

The video containing the Russian Ministry of Defense's conclusions regarding the evidence they supplied to the international community is in post 16.

I think we need to acknowledge the technical capabilities of the Russian Ministry of Defense rather than just saying "propaganda". .

Yes they do have experts but as has already been pointed out was the Russian MH17 brief a spin? You seriously have to question these 'experts' if they can't even find the location of the Buk video with missing missiles. This is Russian Military intelligence we are talking about here so why did they present in the brief the location as being filmed in Ukrainian controlled territory? The filming location has since been proved to have been in Luhansk which was a separatist controlled area.

From the brief

The Russians claimed that all their evidence from the brief will be turned over to the investigation so it will be interesting to see what develops when international radar experts examine it?

 

[Pete Tar]

new topic
https://www.metabunk.org/threads/claims-ukranian-military-using-civilian-planes-as-cover.4009/

 

[mennie]

We can say that the Russians gave us a nice peace of information here, something the Ukrainians or Americans have not given.
But it is not without a reason that Russia gives this information.

I have looked at the video in detail, the video I used is this one (because it is the first one I saw):


What do we see in the image below.

Flights:
- SIA351, Singapore Airlines Flight 351 from Copenhagen to Singapore.
- SQ 3416, Air India Flight 113 from Delhi to Birmingham.
- MAS17, MH17 / Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur.

We see the following data with each flight:
- Flight identification (I assume sent from the aircraft's transponder, doesn't change during flight, so not updated regularly).
- Flight level (I assume sent from the aircraft's transponder, updated regularly).
- Type of Aircraft (I assume sent from the aircraft's transponder, doesn't change during flight, so not updated regularly).
- Speed (I assume this is the speed calculated by the radar station, from the distance travelled between measurements).

We see three aircraft during the entire video, we don't see for example any Su-25 escort.

As described in the video, the airplane starts to reduce speed abruptly. But the height given here is still the same.

Now the speed is reducing even more, and we have lost the altitude data which I assume is because of transponder failure.
But the flight is still tracked by the radar and speed is still being displayed and updated.

Now the radar sees a new object.
The narrator says it is at the point of Boeing crash.
"It's quite possible that the aircraft has no secondary detection system mounted on it, which is pretty typical for military aircraft."
The narrator is also seems to be saying that this radar at this distance only detects objects above 5km.

And now the narrator says the aircraft is flying in the area and monitoring the situation.

Well my question is why does it not have any characteristics of an aircraft, we know it is not sending any transponder data, but the image doesn't even show ANY speed or direction.
Why is it only there AFTER the crash? And where does it go eventually?
I think it could be anything that basically reflects radar.
It seems to me to have all the flight characteristics of falling debris, and none of a jet fighter.

In the beginning of the video they show a nice presentation, and some data of the supposed Su-25.
But as shown there is no radar proof of any other aircraft being in the area.