Malaysian Airlines MH317

[CCIP]

So, Russian newspaper "Novaya Gazeta" [known for their opposition-minded, anti-Putin stance] have leaked a document today which they allege is a Russian military investigation of the damage sustained by the aircraft.

http://www.novayagazeta.ru/inquests/68332.html (in Russian)

There are two key findings - firstly that the damage was definitely caused by a "Buk-M1" missile (which creates a very specific damage pattern); secondly that the pattern of fragmentation damage suggests that the missile would have had to arrive at a specific angle, from the right and slightly forward and above the aircraft's flight path, and therefore would have been launched from an area further south of the aircraft than some of the previous alleged launch locations. It does not however make any conclusions about who launched it, although it raises many important questions. It does, however, pretty definitively rule out any other weapons that could have been involved, or most of any other launch areas except a relatively small box to the south.

http://i.imgur.com/2TfJs7I.png

http://i.imgur.com/LgI2vJG.png

http://i.imgur.com/3VB0lny.png

[August]

So I guess the anti-American theories of Skybird and Catfish remain just wishful thinking.

[Torplexed]

So I guess the anti-American theories of Skybird and Catfish remain just wishful thinking.

Well, with Skybird they always seemed more anti-Ukrainian theories to me. He seemed to have a pretty strong bias against the current regime in Kiev.

But, as CCIP notes the Russian military don't make any conclusions about who launched it. But, hopefully it will put to rest rumours of Ukrainian SU-25s operating at near orbital altitudes. The SU-25 narrative was a fractured and contradictory mess that featured mystery witnesses, dubious theories, dodgy experts, and fake evidence, not mention the plane's ordinance being used in such a way that it always resembled a strike by a Buk missile rather than an attack by a SU-25. It would be good to see it finally set aside.

[August]

It would be good to see it finally set aside.

That is my wish as well but I fear that the the truth has been obfuscated to the point that I doubt any of it will ever be settled.

[Oberon]

Ah yes, the Su-25 space shuttle...glad to see that one has been given the boot. :haha:

[Torplexed]

That is my wish as well but I fear that the the truth has been obfuscated to the point that I doubt any of it will ever be settled.


JFK, blown away, what else do I have to say?

Yeah, conspiracy theories will always linger even on those rare occasions when you have ironclad proof, because there is always a eager built-in audience for the 'alternative' narrative.

Ah yes, the Su-25 space shuttle...glad to see that one has been given the boot. :haha:

I was waiting for the heavily edited Wikipedia article that stated they could dock with the ISS in a pinch. :)

[CCIP]

And a more skeptical view of the leak (provided by a few Russian opposition gives in the past few days): after months of spin and selling conspiracies, it's likely that the Russian military has realized that with the evidence that it as a Buk at hand, the official EU/Malaysian investigation of the crash was going to release a damning report soon. The leak was likely intentional, to pre-empt official reports and fall back to the next line of defense, retreating from "it wasn't a Buk" to being a jump start in the argument over "whose Buk". It's likely that you'll be seeing a lot of "investigative reporting" from Russian sources trying to establish that the missile was launched from Ukrainian-controlled territory.

On the other hand, one thing this report does seem to point to is that the Russian military must not have had any actual operational control over whoever launched the missile, if they need to commission an internal investigation to figure out what it even was. Considering how sophisticated Russia's air defense forces are, it would be very difficult for one of their units to go rogue and start shooting at airliners, particularly by mistake. The PVO would be very well-aware of everything in that airspace.

[NeonSamurai]

http://i.imgur.com/2TfJs7I.png

http://i.imgur.com/LgI2vJG.png

http://i.imgur.com/3VB0lny.png

I'm not overly familiar with that weapons system, but the originating location makes absolutely no sense to me. The damage is on the opposite side of the plane to the proposed launch location, as to get a damage pattern like that the only point of detonation that makes sense would be to the low front left of the plane (from the pilot's perspective). As just about all ATA/ATG missiles follow a lead (or pure) pursuit course, wouldn't the missile have to have come from the opposite direction to be able to detonate in that location?

[CCIP]

From what I understand that missile is designed to arrive exactly in that way, from the 3/9 o'clock position and slightly above the target. The warhead is set up in a way that most of the explosive force (and shrapnel) is released in a sort of ring pattern, expanding sideways relative to the missile's flight path rather than forward or in a "ball". It's basically intended for kills on maneuvering targets (which will try to defeat the missile by putting it on the beam and pulling high G's), and also to focus the blast and shrapnel in a much smaller area, so it is essentially supposed to "slice" through just part of the target with a lot of fairly small but very high-energy fragments, rather than try to fill it (or the sky in front of it) with shrapnel at lower density and energy. It looks like it did exactly what it was meant to - and that's actually the main reason they conclusively identified the warhead. It was slightly off the 90-degree axis, so rather than going through the fuselage, the "ring" of shrapnel sliced through the cockpit and hit the engine on its way it.

[Mr Quatro]

I don't think God is into shooting down passenger planes to prove His point of don't mess with Israel, but there is a point to be made that the God of Israel was not to pleased with Hamas terror cell groups getting there training in Malaysia.

Hamas terrorists received training in Malaysia and Gaza to infiltrate Israel by air to kidnap and murder Israelis



In 2010, the prisoner was enlisted into a special force sent to Malaysia for parachute training, in preparation for a cross-border kidnapping attack (http://www.idfblog.com/blog/2014/06/16/hamas-kidnappings-constant-threat-israel/) on Israel. He and ten other terrorists from across Gaza spent a week receiving training in Malaysia.
After returning to Gaza, the cell was given additional weapons training. They were warned to maintain secrecy, and not to reveal details of their Malaysian training to anyone

https://www.idfblog.com/blog/2014/07/31/hamas-cell-received-advanced-training-malaysia/

Yes the article was written the end of July last year, but is just now chronicling the actual truth that Hamas is training in Malaysia.

What if MH-370 was an act of God and a sign to leave Israel alone?

I know it sounds strange, but God has a way of getting his message across to His followers and His enemies.

[Jeff-Groves]

https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-z0GmCgM9-gg/TX_JJ6BxXRI/AAAAAAAABvs/AkySA5hi_1s/tin+foil+hat.jpg

[Torplexed]

I know it sounds strange, but God has a way of getting his message across to His followers and His enemies.

By allowing large numbers of innocent Dutch citizens to die apparently. :hmmm:

[NeonSamurai]

From what I understand that missile is designed to arrive exactly in that way, from the 3/9 o'clock position and slightly above the target. The warhead is set up in a way that most of the explosive force (and shrapnel) is released in a sort of ring pattern, expanding sideways relative to the missile's flight path rather than forward or in a "ball". It's basically intended for kills on maneuvering targets (which will try to defeat the missile by putting it on the beam and pulling high G's), and also to focus the blast and shrapnel in a much smaller area, so it is essentially supposed to "slice" through just part of the target with a lot of fairly small but very high-energy fragments, rather than try to fill it (or the sky in front of it) with shrapnel at lower density and energy. It looks like it did exactly what it was meant to - and that's actually the main reason they conclusively identified the warhead. It was slightly off the 90-degree axis, so rather than going through the fuselage, the "ring" of shrapnel sliced through the cockpit and hit the engine on its way it.

It still doesn't make sense though. Due to momentum, the shrapnel ring would travel outward and forwards from the missile. So to get that kind of fragmentation pattern, the missile would have had to been coming in from the front and to the port side of the plane, yet the launch location from that information claims the launcher was the on the starboard side. Which would mean the missile would have had to fly ahead of the target, then turned to intercept head on (a launch profile that makes absolutely no sense for a SAM or AAM missile, as head on is the hardest kind of missile shot to connect with due to relative velocity, plus it would waste a lot of the missile's kinetic energy with all those turns).

I think what is most telling is the semi circle cut into the cockpit, along with the damage to the tail (it is all forwards and on one side), plus the main body and entire starbord side was not damaged. There is no way you could get that fragmentation pattern from a missile coming in from 3 o'clock. A more logical launch point is from a cone about centered on 11 o'clock. Also from digging around for info about the SA-11's warhead. Also in addition to the ring shape, there would also be fragmentation from the head of the missile in the shape of a shotgun blast (but not very powerful, as it is not purpose built to project shrapnel forward). I drew in green what I think would be the likely angle of detonation. The lines represent a very rough direction of travel of the fragments.

http://oi57.tinypic.com/2cprda8.jpg

I'm not sure though if the missile detonated above, center, or below. It could not have been too high or low though, or you would expect to see some fragments hitting the wing on the other side.

This article also talks about the type of fragmentation found and the missile(s) in question.
http://www.whathappenedtoflightmh17.com/a-detailed-description-of-the-buk-sa-11-which-could-have-shot-down-mh17/

A problem though, is that the missile could have been either a BUK-M1 (SA-11) or a BUK-M1-2 (SA-17), as both use the same warhead with the same type of fragments, but one is only in use by Russia (the BUK-M1-2), where as the BUK-M1 is used by both Russia and the Ukraine.

[Betonov]

There's a word miss in missile (Falcon 4 manual), joke aside, missiles are made to detonate near the target, not by impacting.

The missile could have arrived from the right hand side of the plane, had a trajectory that intercepted in the front of the plane, armed itself somewhere near the nose and detonated on the left hand side like in the picture because even a split second means a few metres to a missiles speed.

[NeonSamurai]

No it couldn't have. I am not talking about the missile itself impacting, I am talking about the shrapnel pattern on the plane, and where the missile must have been relative to the plane for the shrapnel to hit the plane in that pattern.

The fragmentation pattern of this missile is ultimately cone shaped, kind of looking like a bullseye from the front with an outer ring of ballistic fragments, and an inner cone of missile bits, and follows along the missiles plane of movement. The reason for this is that the Missile's momentum is added to the momentum generated by the warhead (in this case blasting outwards sideways). Most SAM's tend to be flying at supersonic speeds when they detonate, which carries the shrapnel forward along the path of the missile.

Most modern AAMs and SAMs are designed to detonate before reaching the aircraft because of all this stuff, as the chances of taking down a plane once it has passed is almost nil, as shrapnel does not fly backwards very well when projected from a supersonic missile. You also do not want a wide fragmentation ring because otherwise you risk the cone going around the plane.

P.S. I've been flying Falcon 4.0 on and off since it was released in 1998 (and Falcon 3.0 before it). I remember that quote :)

[Catfish]

Several german pilots were informed and able to see the wreck pieces, they agreed that it most probably has been bullet fire. There is a regular pattern along with typical 'inbent' metal marks.

german:
https://www.freitag.de/autoren/hans-springstein/mh17-von-kampfflugzeug-abgeschossen

english link:
http://www.anderweltonline.com/wissenschaft-und-technik/luftfahrt-2014/shocking-analysis-of-the-shooting-down-of-malaysian-mh17/

" ... Wenige Sekunden später begann dann der direkte Beschuss von rechts hinten, der den Flügel streifte, die vordere Sektion – und hier vor allem das Cockpit – traf und die Piloten sofort tötete. Wie jetzt durch die Untersuchung der Wrackteile belegt ist, fand dieser Beschuss statt mit der zweiläufigen 30-mm-Kanone einer SU 25, Typ GSch-302 /AO-17A, aus einer Entfernung von etwa 500 Metern. Obwohl die Piloten bereits tot waren, ist die B 777 nicht sofort abgestürzt, sondern mit niedriger Geschwindigkeit steuerlos in einer Sinkflugkurve weitergeflogen. Daraufhin erfolgte ein zweiter Anflug der SU 25 und Beschuss der vorderen Sektion von der anderen Seite.
Dieser zweite direkte Angriff führte zum Auseinanderbrechen der Struktur. Das Cockpit und Teile der vorderen Sektion fielen der Schwerkraft folgend nahezu senkrecht zu Boden, während der mittlere und hintere Teil mit dem Flügel erst in etwa 25 Kilometer Entfernung auf dem Boden aufschlug. Um die volle Grausamkeit dieses Massenmordes zu illustrieren stelle ich hier fest, dass die Mehrzahl der Passagiere mit höchster Wahrscheinlichkeit den gesamten Vorgang bei vollem Bewusstsein miterleben mussten. Seit einigen Monaten liegt der Augenzeugenbericht eines Bodenmitarbeiters der ukrainischen Luftwaffe (http://www.anderweltonline.com/wissenschaft-und-technik/luftfahrt-2015/mh-17-und-kein-ende/) vor, der den Piloten der SU 25 nach der Landung als völlig verstört beschreibt. Er hat gestammelt, dass „es das falsche Flugzeug war“. Dazu später mehr. ..."

Another part:

" ...Entry And Exit holes from bullets in the area of the Cockpit. This is not speculation, but analysis of clear facts: the cockpit
shows clear evidence of bullet holes. You can see the entry holes and some exit points. The edges of the bullet holes are bent inwards,
these are much smaller and round in shape. A 30mm calibre. The exit holes are less well formed and the edges are torn outwards.
Furthermore it is visible that the exit holes have torn the double aluminium skin and bent them outwards. That is to say, splinters from
inside the cockpit blew through the outside of the cabin. The open rivets have also been bent outwards….There is only one conclusion one can make, and that is that the aircraft was not hit by a missile. The damage to the aircraft is exclusively in the cockpit area….

Another investigation has found the 30mm bullets that are usually carried by Suchoj Su 25 jets, a type the ukrainian air force is equipped with.

Very interesting is also this:
http://www.anderweltonline.com/wissenschaft-und-technik/luftfahrt-2015/mh-17-und-kein-ende/

Other US investigations say they have identified shrapnels to belong to a Buk missile. They have said this a day after the shotdown, though. Not much evidence then. Now they say it again.

In december, 2014, an ukrainian pilot (a Mr. Woloschin) admitted that he fired his MG "in error". Another said "...it was the wrong jet"



The possibility that the passenger jet has been shot down to discredit Russia, is as possible as the contrary opinion.

I meanwhile refuse to believe any of this propaganda B. :-?

[Betonov]

@ NeonSamurai: I see, I had an image in my head that the warhead throws shrapnel in a circle outward, not forward in a cone shape.

Still, is it possible that the missile exploded in front of the nose on a rght to left path and the shrapnel ''cloud'' moved a little bit to the left until the airliner moved into it with its left wing.

[NeonSamurai]

Several german pilots were informed and able to see the wreck pieces, they agreed that it most probably has been bullet fire. There is a regular pattern along with typical 'inbent' metal marks.


The thing though is that shrapnel would produce the bent-in metal holes. Missiles used against air targets do not generally cause damage from the explosive charge (unless the missile hits the target before detonating).

http://oi61.tinypic.com/zyjag.jpg This is the warhead from a BUK-M1/BUK-M1-2. You can see the shape of the shrapnel in the bottom area. On some of wreckage photographs you can clearly see holes of the same shape as this shrapnel (and almost all the holes are angular).

Plus, aircraft cannons use explosive shells, and fighter pilots are trained to shoot at the main body of an aircraft from the rear (head on gun 'snapshots' are extremely difficult) so you would expect to see damage on the body of the plane.


@ NeonSamurai: I see, I had an image in my head that the warhead throws shrapnel in a circle outward, not forward in a cone shape.

Still, is it possible that the missile exploded in front of the nose on a rght to left path and the shrapnel ''cloud'' moved a little bit to the left until the airliner moved into it with its left wing.

No not really, as the shrapnel pattern doesn't fit that which is the whole point of my initial argument, the missile could not possibly come from that direction, and have it's shrapnel hit in the pattern that it did. It is not physically possible). Also a Boeing 777 cruses at 900kmph, The 9М38 flies at Mach 3, or about 1 kilometer per second.

[Catfish]

^ yes i have seen this, too. But does it explain two separate attacks ? :hmmm:

and this:


http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y174/penaeus/Unbenannt_zpsrrinuwv6.png (http://s5.photobucket.com/user/penaeus/media/Unbenannt_zpsrrinuwv6.png.html)


http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y174/penaeus/csm_topelement_47299592d2_zpsiqoi7kmv.jpg (http://s5.photobucket.com/user/penaeus/media/csm_topelement_47299592d2_zpsiqoi7kmv.jpg.html)


http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y174/penaeus/Objekte-Einschlag-web_zpsmu18kprf.jpg (http://s5.photobucket.com/user/penaeus/media/Objekte-Einschlag-web_zpsmu18kprf.jpg.html)


http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y174/penaeus/csm_MH17_Schusse_Tragflaeche_c5b6a474a4_zpsnfflqfv y.jpg (http://s5.photobucket.com/user/penaeus/media/csm_MH17_Schusse_Tragflaeche_c5b6a474a4_zpsnfflqfv y.jpg.html)


http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y174/penaeus/csm_mh17-einschu__sse_c43fcedbcc_zpsvdxaqh52.jpg (http://s5.photobucket.com/user/penaeus/media/csm_mh17-einschu__sse_c43fcedbcc_zpsvdxaqh52.jpg.html)

[NeonSamurai]

Well that warhead contains 7600 fragments. Plus also don't forget that bits of the head of the missile will also get thrown forwards (the warhead is towards the front middle section of the missile) from the warhead detonating. So you will end up with all sorts of different patterns.

The first photo you posted looks like part of a wing or a tail section, and that fragments hit it at a shallow angle, which caused deflecting tears. The second two photos are the same piece, which would have to come from the cockpit, based on the shape of the window mounts on the top section. The cockpit btw took the brunt of the shrapnel ring at closer range. So it would look like Swiss Cheese, as it probably got hit with about 300-800 fragments. Your forth photo is the first photo you posted, just flipped upside down.

I'm not sure where on the plane that last photo is from, but if i had to guess it is probably from the cockpit (it looks like fuselage skin). If you look closely at the holes, most of them have highly angular shapes, a few are even square, which you could not get from bullet shrapnel .

As for the theory that this was caused by an aircraft cannon (say the GSh-302). You would expect to see some pretty large holes that would match with a 30mm round. Also they found fragments just like the ones from the photo in my last post inside the aircraft (and inside some of the passengers), which clearly identify which sort of missile caused the damage. They have not found any cannon shell fragments. Plus it is clearly obvious that the vast majority of the holes are much smaller than 30mm. As with this high res photo (http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Ds-NGxw20xE/U9bE-COl-_I/AAAAAAAAaUE/QEnG9LVvHLo/s1600/High+Res+MH17.png)

Also check out this link if you want to see what damage looks like from different weapons systems (the 30mm example is not overly accurate as those were DU rounds fired against an armored target).

http://www.whathappenedtoflightmh17.com/what-weapon-could-have-downed-mh17/

[CCIP]

I should say btw that I'm just sort of trying to make sense of the report's logic, NeonSamurai - I'm not enough of an expert to tell if it's right or not, but I agree with you that there's lots of reasons to doubt the veracity of the report. I could still totally see it as a planted leak to advance the Russian side of the argument, now that they've hopelessly had the Su-25 theory shot down (pun maybe intended!)

[Catfish]

... Also check out this link if you want to see what damage looks like from different weapons systems (the 30mm example is not overly accurate as those were DU rounds fired against an armored target). ...Also?
"Not overly accurate", a 30 mm depleted uranium (lmao b.t.w.) bullet, on an armoured target?

What they talk about is a 'normal' 30mm round on a very thin (dur)aluminium sheet..:hmmm:

[NeonSamurai]

I should say btw that I'm just sort of trying to make sense of the report's logic, NeonSamurai - I'm not enough of an expert to tell if it's right or not, but I agree with you that there's lots of reasons to doubt the veracity of the report. I could still totally see it as a planted leak to advance the Russian side of the argument,

Ya, to me the fundamental problem with the report, is that it makes no sense for a missile to have come from the location claimed, as all the damage is on the side opposite to the claimed launch location. That plus the arc cut into the plane's nose from the fragmentation warhead clearly puts the missile detonating between 10-11 o'clock from the plane's perspective (and probably originating from somewhere along that direction or towards the north). It couldn't be an overshot, or how did the tail and elevators get hit.

I'm pretty sure the Russians are doing what ever they can to deflect the incident away from themselves, hence pointing the launch location to the south, when it probably came from the northeast.

now that they've hopelessly had the Su-25 theory shot down (pun maybe intended!)Obviously not everyone agrees :)


Also?
"Not overly accurate", a 30 mm depleted uranium (lmao b.t.w.) bullet, on an armoured target?

What they talk about is a 'normal' 30mm round on a very thin (dur)aluminium sheet..:hmmm:

I posted that to give more an example of what the different weapons systems tend to look like, specifically what the different missile warheads do as far as damage. I looked for an example of damage caused by that specific weapon system (gun+ammo type) on an appropriate target, but came up empty.

The point though is that the size of the holes (entry holes) would not be much different. Unless the ammunition fired is proximity fused, you would expect to see round to oval entry points, and variably shaped exit points.

The damage caused to the plane is not at all consistent with cannon fire from an aircraft. To achieve all the damage caused to all the different points on the aircraft, it would take either multiple aircraft, or multiple passes. Plus like I said before, you would expect most of the damage to be in the main fuselage of the aircraft, towards the tail section. This is because of training (pilots are trained to attack with guns from behind, as head-on snapshots are very difficult and usually miss), and how most modern aircraft gun-sights work.

If you want to know more I suggest you check out 'basic fighter maneuvers', plus stuff on air combat 'snapshots' and 'tracking shots'

[Oberon]

A video of the Dutch Safety Boards investigation into the loss of MH17:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDiLEyT9spI

The Dutch investigation into identifying who fired the missile is still ongoing.

[Jimbuna]

I doubt whoever is responsible will admit it.

[XabbaRus]

What gets on my nerves is trading the BBC have your say and other consent sections on other news sites by people who just see it as black and white. I'll find the links but the issue is also the warhead type. The Iranians use an older warhead of the type that hit MH17, Russia users a newer warhead on the older missile. Therefore it could perhaps put to bed the theory that Russia supplied the Buk to the rebels.

I think ask agree it was shot down by a Buk. I'm of the opinion that it was an accidental shoot down by the rebels at what they thought was a Ukrainian air force transport, given that they had shot them down previously using Buks, and this is backed up by the Ukrainians. I do not think, nor dee the logic in the Russians providing a Buk for the rebels to deliberately take out a civilian airliner. Where is the benefit? However a lot of people like to,shout that and accuse Putin himself of pulling the trigger. Buks had been stolen. Ukr admitted that, but as soon as this happened they changed their tune as the screw up suited their agenda. For Yatsenyuk to say Russia setup the whole thing is ridiculous and downright dangerous. It was a *******up. We will never find out who pulled the trigger but this move to,bring Russia to court is nuts. The only "proof" that Russia supplied the Buk seems to be pedalled by bellingcat. I'm still waiting for the USA and NATO to release the images the allegedly have.

[Oberon]

I agree, I don't think Russia supplied the Buk to deliberately shoot down civilian airliners, that's just SPECTRE level stupidity. Too many James Bond films there.
No, chances are if they did supply it, it was to protect them against Ukrainian aircraft and/or shoot down Ukrainian transports. Of course, poorly trained recruits plus a sophisticated Surface to Air Missile system, it was only a matter of time before someone screwed up.
Alternatively it could possibly have been one taken from the Ukrainians, but I think that they did account for all their SAM systems in the aftermath of the incident, although I may be wrong. Either which way, it was very likely fired by the pro-Russian separatist factions, not the Ukrainians.
Russia has behaved pretty terribly in the aftermath of this incident, first trying to cover things up, then trying to prevent a UN lead investigation, then inventing various ways that the Ukrainians could have done it which doesn't correlate with the evidence presented. I mean, that Frogfoot in space theory which they floated was even discredited by the guy who designed the Su-25! :har:
Now they state that the missile came from a completely different direction to the evidence, travelling over the cockpit from left to right (as the plane faces us) and detonating next to it, which would have produced a much different debris pattern.
Still...we'll never find the people who fired the missile, chances are that they're dead now, 'casualties of war', and any orders or directives would have been burnt or erased.
Chances are when the report is released next year it will blame the Russian seperatists, Russia will deny this, claim the report is based on false evidence and block any attempt to bring justice.
It's dirty, but that's how it is.

[Skybird]

I stick to my open-at-all-directions-attitude on this issue, which always has been two-fold like this: on the one hand reason and probability seem to indicate that the rebels-Buk-accident-scenario is the most likely one, on the other hand the released information from both the official sources as well as "conspiracy-theorists" are all object to heavy interest-driven manipulation (that is true for the Russian as well as the Western official view on things). The report now seems to include - as expected and predicted - several inconsistencies. These may or may not mean something. We do not know.

So:

The rebel-Buk-accidental-misidentification-scenario still is the most likely one (Occam's razor...), but I would keep an open mind at other directions as well. This report by the Dutch now is not a final word, imo. I doubt the public will ever get any final word, proven beyond doubt. All political sides have too much prestige at stake.

This is no pro-Russian stand by me. I just try to stay as objective as I can and try to make sense of the little we know as best as I can.

I wonder however what has come of the German pilot I quoted last year. He has fallen under my radar.

[Bilge_Rat]

The report won't change much at this point.

Interesting that they also blamed Ukraine for not closing their airspace.

[NeonSamurai]

What gets on my nerves is trading the BBC have your say and other consent sections on other news sites by people who just see it as black and white. I'll find the links but the issue is also the warhead type. The Iranians use an older warhead of the type that hit MH17, Russia users a newer warhead on the older missile. Therefore it could perhaps put to bed the theory that Russia supplied the Buk to the rebels.

I think ask agree it was shot down by a Buk. I'm of the opinion that it was an accidental shoot down by the rebels at what they thought was a Ukrainian air force transport, given that they had shot them down previously using Buks, and this is backed up by the Ukrainians. I do not think, nor dee the logic in the Russians providing a Buk for the rebels to deliberately take out a civilian airliner. Where is the benefit? However a lot of people like to,shout that and accuse Putin himself of pulling the trigger. Buks had been stolen. Ukr admitted that, but as soon as this happened they changed their tune as the screw up suited their agenda. For Yatsenyuk to say Russia setup the whole thing is ridiculous and downright dangerous. It was a *******up. We will never find out who pulled the trigger but this move to,bring Russia to court is nuts. The only "proof" that Russia supplied the Buk seems to be pedalled by bellingcat. I'm still waiting for the USA and NATO to release the images the allegedly have.

The thing though is as far as I am aware it couldn't have come from the Iranians, as they don't even have the SA-11 (Syria does though), and only Russia has the SA-17. The thing though is that Russia has been doing its damnedest to cloud the issue and point the finger everywhere else, including that report of theirs where they put the missile coming from a direction it couldn't possibly have come from, or the other theory Oberon mentioned. I think it is pretty damn certain Russia was quietly supplying the 'rebels', many of whom were likely Russian troops, which in part was to distract the public from their annexing the Crimea, though they probably hoped they could flip the rest of the Ukraine too via a civil war.

Now did Russia set up the jetliner shoot-down incident on purpose? Not very likely, though not impossible either. Lets be honest here, all of the superpowers have done some pretty awful things in the name of their regimes, be it the USA, Russia, France, etc., including pulling stunts like that with the hopes of framing the other side. But from the evidence available, the rocket was launched from the rebel side, and it would have come from Russia directly, as the rebels would not have started with such equipment (they pretty much materialized out of thin air), and no other country would have been in the position to get it into the Ukraine.

Otherwise I agree with Oberon's post.

[ikalugin]

A video of the Dutch Safety Boards investigation into the loss of MH17:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDiLEyT9spI

The Dutch investigation into identifying who fired the missile is still ongoing.
This video here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKAXKwnUTg0
May also be of interest.

Long story cut short, Almaz-Antey claim that:
- the weapon use was the old 9M38 round, no longer in service due to the end of life for the round (25 years, last missile made in 1986), the missiles in Russian inventory were dismantled, the fate of Ukrainian rounds is not known to Almaz-Antey, though the Ukrainian side did initiate negotiations in 2005 to prolongate the life of the 9M38 missiles in it's inventory.
- the missile approach direction was from the side, rather than from the front of the aircraft (due to the way fragments penetrated the internal bulkheads and how the left engine was dammaged), thus the probable launch area was different to the one originally claimed (snezhnoe).
- Almaz-Antey has conducted full sized experiments with both the warhead and the representative missile, to prove that their version (with a different missile approach vector) was correct and that the Dutch version was incorrect.

[Nippelspanner]

This video here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKAXKwnUTg0
May also be of interest.

Long story cut short, Almaz-Antey claim that:
- the weapon use was the old 9M38 round, no longer in service due to the end of life for the round (25 years, last missile made in 1986), the missiles in Russian inventory were dismantled, the fate of Ukrainian rounds is not known to Almaz-Antey, though the Ukrainian side did initiate negotiations in 2005 to prolongate the life of the 9M38 missiles in it's inventory.
- the missile approach direction was from the side, rather than from the front of the aircraft (due to the way fragments penetrated the internal bulkheads and how the left engine was dammaged), thus the probable launch area was different to the one originally claimed (snezhnoe).
- Almaz-Antey has conducted full sized experiments with both the warhead and the representative missile, to prove that their version (with a different missile approach vector) was correct and that the Dutch version was incorrect.
Really?
RT?
...
Until now I thought you're simply very..."patriotic".
I had no idea however that you are indeed nothing but a nationalist.

For those who are not so familiar with this propaganda network:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RT_%28TV_network%29
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/RT
http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/oct/30/rt-russia-todays-six-most-memorable-moment (http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/oct/30/rt-russia-todays-six-most-memorable-moments)

[Oberon]

Bah, RT doesn't hold a candle to Pravda or Izvestia... :O:

But yes, I must add my scepticism to Antays report, given Russias less than straight-forward stance on the matter of the incident.
That being said, the type of missile which detonated is an interesting point to examine, we can conclude in both reports that it is an older model of 9M317 (oddly prophetic when you look a the title of this thread) but honestly I'd be surprised if Russia didn't have some older models knocking around which were off the records, I mean Russia doesn't throw anything away, so it stands to reason that there could well be an older Buk system which was deemed expendable and thus given to the pro-Russian separatists along with minimal training.
Disaster soon followed. :dead:

I think if one was to assign any blame anywhere it would be to the separatists who fired the weapon, but you'll never find them. Russia has covered any tracks there are between it and weaponry that the pro-separatists suddenly materialise with, so there'll be nothing doing there. So chances are the report will point the finger at the pro-Russian separatists and there'll be lots of talk about proceedings at the Hague, but nothing will happen. I mean let's face it, no-one was ever punished for KAL007.

[Bilge_Rat]

I mean let's face it, no-one was ever punished for KAL007.


...or Iran Air Flight 655. In fact, the crew received medals...

Bottom line, Russia will never accept being treated differently than the USA, so no one will be punished.

[NeonSamurai]

This video here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKAXKwnUTg0
May also be of interest.

Long story cut short, Almaz-Antey claim that:
- the weapon use was the old 9M38 round, no longer in service due to the end of life for the round (25 years, last missile made in 1986), the missiles in Russian inventory were dismantled, the fate of Ukrainian rounds is not known to Almaz-Antey, though the Ukrainian side did initiate negotiations in 2005 to prolongate the life of the 9M38 missiles in it's inventory.
- the missile approach direction was from the side, rather than from the front of the aircraft (due to the way fragments penetrated the internal bulkheads and how the left engine was dammaged), thus the probable launch area was different to the one originally claimed (snezhnoe).
- Almaz-Antey has conducted full sized experiments with both the warhead and the representative missile, to prove that their version (with a different missile approach vector) was correct and that the Dutch version was incorrect.

Not to gang up on you, but...

First of all it doesn't matter a whole lot what missile it was, it matters what warhead it was carrying. The fragmentation pattern matched the 9N314 warhead, not the older 9N310 used in the early version 9M38 Missile. The 9N310's shrapnel was formulation has only cubes, and the damage on the aircraft shows clear butterfly shaped impressions (and they found butterfly shaped fragments in the wreckage), which only could have come from the 9N314 warhead. The 9N314 is used in later productions of the 9M38 missile, and the 9M38M1, and possibly the 9M318 which has an unknown warhead type (it is believed that it too can mount the 9N314 warhead as well). Russia has in service the later 9M38 missiles with the 9N314 warhead, along with the 9M38M1 and the 9M318.

The missile came from the front left from the perspective of the pilots, the damage done to the plane makes it patently clear, even if the estimated angle of impact is off a bit, it still would have had to come from the left hand side of the aircraft, which means the missile was fired from somewhere to the north west, which was territory held by the 'rebels' no matter how the details are massaged.

Ya I'm sure he did, but it doesn't matter, as unless he fired those missiles at a similar aircraft going the same speed and same altitude and hit at about the same angle, his experiments are nothing but worthless propaganda. The shrapnel pattern of the a static warhead will be totally different to one flying at supersonic speeds, due to momentum. If he can't even identify the right warhead, he has no hope at all of properly replicating the blast.

The whole article is absurd and yet another attempt (adding to a pretty long list now) of Russia's (Putin's really) attempts to cloud things. It's a shame, as cold war version 2.0 has started it seems (or perhaps it never quite ended).

That being said, the type of missile which detonated is an interesting point to examine, we can conclude in both reports that it is an older model of 9M317 (oddly prophetic when you look a the title of this thread).

Umm, the 9M317 is Russia's brand spanking new missile type for the Buk-2 launcher, there are no older versions ;)

I think if one was to assign any blame anywhere it would be to the separatists who fired the weapon, but you'll never find them. Russia has covered any tracks there are between it and weaponry that the pro-separatists suddenly materialise with, so there'll be nothing doing there. So chances are the report will point the finger at the pro-Russian separatists and there'll be lots of talk about proceedings at the Hague, but nothing will happen. I mean let's face it, no-one was ever punished for KAL007.Well other than relations between Russia and the West continuing to deteriorate, unfortunately. Otherwise ya... It is a real shame that Russia has gone back to a fascist/communist like dictatorship. Who knows how long it will take for the people to try to free themselves again.

[XabbaRus]

The thing though is as far as I am aware it couldn't have come from the Iranians, as they don't even have the SA-11 (Syria does though), and only Russia has the SA-17. The thing though is that Russia has been doing its damnedest to cloud the issue and point the finger everywhere else, including that report of theirs where they put the missile coming from a direction it couldn't possibly have come from, or the other theory Oberon mentioned. I think it is pretty damn certain Russia was quietly supplying the 'rebels', many of whom were likely Russian troops, which in part was to distract the public from their annexing the Crimea, though they probably hoped they could flip the rest of the Ukraine too via a civil war.

Now did Russia set up the jetliner shoot-down incident on purpose? Not very likely, though not impossible either. Lets be honest here, all of the superpowers have done some pretty awful things in the name of their regimes, be it the USA, Russia, France, etc., including pulling stunts like that with the hopes of framing the other side. But from the evidence available, the rocket was launched from the rebel side, and it would have come from Russia directly, as the rebels would not have started with such equipment (they pretty much materialized out of thin air), and no other country would have been in the position to get it into the Ukraine.

Otherwise I agree with Oberon's post.

That was a typo, meant to be Russian not Iranian. I don't doubt the rebels shot MH17 down by accident. I just don't think the missile system came from Russia shot it down then went back over the border. The rebels had these systems prior to the shoot down, they had used them against Ukrainian transports. Systems stolen from bases rebels had captured.

[ikalugin]

As a declaimer, I have used almaz-antey as interesting material to consider, especially as it disputes the missile orientation in regard to the aircraft by examining internal dammage paterns.
For example should the fragments be found in the passengers bodies or luggage, it would validate their theory.

RT was used as it was the readily availiable media that streamed the conference, I do not watch it, or any Russian TV channels for that matter otherwise. Maybe because I dont have a TV.

In the future, please criticise the arguments rather my humble person or the media I have used to present the material with.

I would write a detailed repply to any constructive arguments later.

[Nippelspanner]

In the future, please criticise the arguments rather my humble person or the media I have used to present the material with.
Huh?

Yeah I do criticize this "media" (propaganda, actually) whenever someone brings it up.
You must be very well aware of what exactly RT is, so don't play dumb here.
From all the possible sources, you - the one who constantly defends his motherland on the virtual battlefield - uses RT as a source.

1+1 still equals 2 in my books, sorry.

[ikalugin]

Did RT in any way shape or form alter the original press conference footage? If no, how does the media used to provide video conference materials matter?

If you have arguments against the almaz antey materials themselves criticise them, not the media used, as otherwise you fall to a logical falacy of attacking the media, rather than the arguments presented in the conference.

[ikalugin]

The report won't change much at this point.

Interesting that they also blamed Ukraine for not closing their airspace.
Sad, but true. The public opinion is already formed and the reports wont change it.

@NeonSamurai (http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/member.php?u=210491)
First of all, you should watch the video, as it explains all of those things. Here I would attempt to explain the stated Almaz-Antey position, the way I understand it.

Almaz-Antey specifically states than 9M38 life, with all extension was set to 25 years, with the last missiles produced in 1986 this means that the last missiles in Russian inventory were taken out of service in 2011. Now, those missiles could have went elsewhere post 2011, but they were not in service by that point and were going through scrapping.

The impact from the alternative direction (the one considered within the Almaz-Antey theory) would provide same external dammage patern, but would also explain the way internal structure of the aircraft, namely the frames, as well the dammage to the engine.
To prove this theory and to disprove the common one (with head on missile approach) Almaz-Antey had conducted both simulations and life fire tests.

The experiment itself was made in a such way, that the position of the missile and the aircraft would create a result that is representative of the fragment's performance under moving conditions. The method of the experiment is explained in the video, please criticise it directly.

I hope you would now watch the video and make detailed and constructive criticism, rather than bashing the arguments, attacking the source rather than the arguments and using ad Nazium.

[XabbaRus]

What I find interesting about the whole coverage of the MH17 shoot down from the very beginning is the lack of official evidence concerning the supply of the Buk system from Russia to the rebel and back. I distinctly remember the US, I think it was Kerry state they had satellite images of the missile being fired, but they have never released them. The same concerning the Buk on the ground. All investigations that get quoted in the western press all seem to rely for a greater or lesser extent on bellingcat. He seems to be the go to boy now. Given I'd imagine the Ukrainian / Russian border is one of the most surveyed by recon says right now I'd be more happy to see their images rather than the geolocated stuff a former WoW player has come up with.

[Nippelspanner]

I distinctly remember the US, I think it was Kerry state they had satellite images of the missile being fired, but they have never released them.
Well, American intelligence services...
They also found lots and lots of proof for all dem WMD in Iraq in 2002. :D

[Oberon]

Umm, the 9M317 is Russia's brand spanking new missile type for the Buk-2 launcher, there are no older versions ;)

Ah...balls, I meant the 9M38. Too many numbers and letters. :haha: :/\\!!

[Catfish]

Well, American intelligence services...
They also found lots and lots of proof for all dem WMD in Iraq in 2002. :D

Yes, but then they know exactly what WE do or write :yeah:
Which can be an advantage, i recently crashed my hard drive and i wonder.. maybe if i shape a polite question... :06:

[Betonov]

Ah...balls, I meant the 9M38. Too many numbers and letters. :haha: :/\\!!

I don't even know the difference between buk-1 and buk-2 except that buk-2 might be a newer model.

[Oberon]

I don't even know the difference between buk-1 and buk-2 except that buk-2 might be a newer model.

I believe the primary differences are in how they go boom and where they go boom.

[Betonov]

Ah, buk-1 goes boom in the air and buk-2 goes boom somewhere in the air :doh:

[Frömmler Vogel]

Despite the denials of the rebels and Russia, the fact remains that the rebels claimed to have shot down a Ukrainian transport plane in the hour or do immediately after the crash and only when the identity of the aircraft was realised was this claim retracted and is now being decried as a fake by the rebel leaders.

Additionally the constant interference running by the Russians on this and the number of times their story has changed just add to the suspicion of involvement, even if it was simply a misidentified target that caused this sorry mess.

I'm seeing what looks like a duck, what sounds like a duck and most likely is a duck. Sorry Donetsk, but you're denials seem hollow.

Ukraine's pro-Russian rebels reject Dutch MH17 report - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34530906

[ikalugin]

Despite the denials of the rebels and Russia, the fact remains that the rebels claimed to have shot down a Ukrainian transport plane in the hour or do immediately after the crash and only when the identity of the aircraft was realised was this claim retracted and is now being decried as a fake by the rebel leaders.

Additionally the constant interference running by the Russians on this and the number of times their story has changed just add to the suspicion of involvement, even if it was simply a misidentified target that caused this sorry mess.

I'm seeing what looks like a duck, what sounds like a duck and most likely is a duck. Sorry Donetsk, but you're denials seem hollow.

Ukraine's pro-Russian rebels reject Dutch MH17 report - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34530906
This "fact" is actually, again, false, because the so called rebel reports came from a facebook fanpage, ie not actual rebels but pro rebel groups on the internet.

What actual interference did we conduct? We have provided all the required materials, regarding the possible BUK rounds used, as well their warheads.

[XabbaRus]

I think Russia is trying to extricate itself from the situation. The shoot down and support of the rebels is an extreme embarrassment so they are trying to cover themselves. I'm sure the Kremlin know the rebels shot it down, I think it is the accusation of Russia supplying the Buk in question that has caused the various stories. I stand by the opinion it was a stolen Buk. The problem though was the likes of Strelkov and others connected to the Kremlin were on the scene. I wonder if there hadn't been this accusation if Russia's reaction would have been different. I'm wondering if there is going to be a few deals cut soon regarding Syria and the Ukraine situation.

Seriously though I think Yatsenyuk should shut up.

[ikalugin]

His mouth earned him his first billion USD. Maybe it would earn him a second, who knows.

[Bilge_Rat]

All investigations that get quoted in the western press all seem to rely for a greater or lesser extent on bellingcat. He seems to be the go to boy now.

well, apparently Bellingcat is using suspect and amateurish methods.


SPIEGEL ONLINE: Bellingcat made headlines around the world this week when it claimed on Sunday night it had proven that Russia's Defense Ministry conducted forensic manipulations (https://www.bellingcat.com/resources/how-tos/2015/05/31/how-to-find-historical-imagery-of-russias-faked-satellite-photos/). The allegation is focused on images of the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines Flt. MH17 in eastern Ukraine last spring.

Kriese: The term "forensic analysis" is not a protected one. From the perspective of forensics, the Bellingcat approach is not very robust. The core of what they are doing is based on so-called Error Level Analysis (ELA). The method is subjective and not based entirely on science. This is why there is not a single scientific paper that addresses it.


SPIEGEL ONLINE: What's the hitch?

Kriese: Forensic scientists use computer procedures that allow for the clearest possible conclusions: Has it been manipulated -- yes or no? Contrary to what Bellingcat claims, Error Level Analysis does not provide clear results. The conclusion is always based on the perspective of humans, on their interpretation.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: What does the method entail?

Kriese: It attempts to determine compression artifacts. Those are the small deviations created when a photo is saved in JPG format -- differences from the original. It is possible to depict them in color. But: The final decision on whether a manipulation has occured or not is then still a personal decision made by the viewer. One has to decide whether variations should be attributed to manipulations or are they normal and could be attributed to clouds, for example?

SPIEGEL ONLINE: Do you consider the Russian satellite images to have been manipulation?

Kriese: That's not the right question. We are not talking about satellite images here. We only know the version published by Moscow. That is a satellite image that has been prepared for use in a presentation.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: Bellingcat has come to the conclusion that they were edited using Photoshop.

Kriese: That's an erroneous interpretation. They claim that the metadata shows that the images were processed using Photoshop. Based on that they are concluding it was the clouds that were likely added in order to conceal something. The truth is that the indication of Photoshop in the metadata doesn't prove anything. Of course the Russians had to use some sort of program in order to process the satellite image for the presentation. They added frames and text blocks in order to explain it to the public. The artifacts which have been identified could be a product of that -- or also a product of saving multiple times in JPG format.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: Bellingcat says its findings are based on the use of the analysis tool FotoForensic.com, a website.

Kriese: And its founder Neal Krawetz also distanced himself from Bellingcat's conclusions on Twitter. He described it as a good example of "how to not do image analysis." What Bellingcat is doing is nothing more than reading tea leaves. Error Level Analysis is a method used by hobbyists.




SPIEGEL ONLINE: Satellite images are often used as proof of events in the Ukraine crisis, even by NATO. Are they even meaningful?

Kriese: It is easy to claim to amateurs that one can see this or that. But just think about the US images of the alleged poison gas facilities in the Middle East. There's a similar point at Bellingcat: In one of the photos, a growing spot can be seen. It's allegedly an oil puddle next to a vehicle. But does one consider that to be plausible? I think it depends on whether a person wants to believe it or not.



http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/expert-criticizes-allegations-of-russian-mh17-manipulation-a-1037125.html

That article came out in june and Bellingcat is still using the same method and making the same claims. The media likes them because they appear to offer solid "proof".

[mapuc]

This "fact" is actually, again, false, because the so called rebel reports came from a facebook fanpage, ie not actual rebels but pro rebel groups on the internet.

What actual interference did we conduct? We have provided all the required materials, regarding the possible BUK rounds used, as well their warheads.


I seem to recall a scene where an some officer is sitting behind a desk and some other are sitting infront of the desk and I seem to recall how they talked about having shot down a transporter plan. This was shown on Danish, Swedish and on German TV days after the MH317 was shot down.

So this Facebook thing must be something that came after.

Markus

[Frömmler Vogel]

This "fact" is actually, again, false, because the so called rebel reports came from a facebook fanpage, ie not actual rebels but pro rebel groups on the internet.

What actual interference did we conduct? We have provided all the required materials, regarding the possible BUK rounds used, as well their warheads.
Nice try, but not "just a Facebook post". http://mobile.news.com.au/world/europe/russian-rebels-are-likely-responsible-for-shooting-down-malaysia-airlines-flight-mh17-over-the-ukraine/story-fnh81p7g-1226992928465

Of course this will be the Ukrainians making up an interception to point the finger at the rebels for their own dastardly deed. Where did the fanboys get their information?

Russian veto in UN Security Council = No interference? Stories about Ukrainian aircraft shooting down the plane = No interference? Etc. Etc.

Quack quack...

[mapuc]

Lets make a recap(or what you say in English) and write what we know for sure=100 %.

So what do we really know ?

Markus

[ikalugin]

Nice try, but not "just a Facebook post". http://mobile.news.com.au/world/europe/russian-rebels-are-likely-responsible-for-shooting-down-malaysia-airlines-flight-mh17-over-the-ukraine/story-fnh81p7g-1226992928465

Of course this will be the Ukrainians making up an interception to point the finger at the rebels for their own dastardly deed. Where did the fanboys get their information?

Russian veto in UN Security Council = No interference? Stories about Ukrainian aircraft shooting down the plane = No interference? Etc. Etc.

Quack quack...
Same as most of social media, rumourint.

Russian veto on what, the investigation, or attempts to press trial before investigation is finished?

[Frömmler Vogel]

Same as most of social media, rumourint.

Russian veto on what, the investigation, or attempts to press trial before investigation is finished?
Didn't read the full article did you?

So Igor the "defence minister" creates "rumors" on social media then tries to delete them?

The VK social networking page of Igor Strelkov - “defence minister” of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic - first announced: “We just downed an An-26 near (the town of) Torez.”

On the veto : http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-33710088

Your use of "we" in this thread shows a strong identification with the Russian Government. :hmmm:

[Dmitry Markov]

What's wrong with Igor's identification? ;-) Since we live in Russia should we identificate ourselves with some other country?

[Dmitry Markov]

I hardly have a right to comment this question 'cause I didn't go vote during either Presidential or Duma elections :oops: Which I must admit now was absolutely wrong on my side. 'Cause if I did go , it would have given me a full right to say "WE" speaking of RF government decisions.
Nevertheless I say "WE" too - consider this as an emotional movement ;-)

On the veto - can't see any difference in your article with what Igor have said - we vetoed a tribunal that was to have place B e f o r e an investigation results.

[ikalugin]

The social media account allegedly used by Strelkov was actually a fan group account, not used by the Strelkov (aka Girkin) himself. The only official and confirmed internet presense Strelkov (aka Girkin) ever had was on a certain internet forum.

Regarding veto - as I have said, we have vetoed the attempt to pass tribunal and thus prosecution before the investigation results were in. If anything western attempts to pass such prosecution before the results of investigation were in, bypassing the normal and due procedure and going straight to trial are undermining the rule of law in Europe.

As to "we" I have never hidden my affiliation to the existing Russian elites.

[Frömmler Vogel]

Quack quack...

[Jimbuna]

Quack quack...

Feel free to debate and disagree should you feel the need but please refrain from posting veiled comments that could be perceived as insults and or name calling.

[XabbaRus]

At this time it suits the current Ukrainian government to find anything it can fire back at Russia. I'm not saying they (Ukrainians) shot MH17 down.

What I am saying though is that the Ukrainian defense minister has repeatedly said there are thousands of Russian troops in eastern Ukraine, but apart from some "geolocated" pictures on bellingcat we have yet to see definitive proof.

Again I'm not denying the presence of Russian forces of some kind in the Donbass region just not the numbers claimed by Western and Ukrainian sources.

[Betonov]

According to RT the missile came from the backyard of the presidential palace in Kiev and according to Fox news the missiles was shoulder fired from the roof of the Kremlin by Putin himself.

[ikalugin]

Interestingly, from what I have heard, Ukrainian media has altered the translation of the Dutch conference. The altered translation explicitely allocated the responsibility for the incident onto the separatists.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBdBYsXIGV0

[Frömmler Vogel]

Feel free to debate and disagree should you feel the need but please refrain from posting veiled comments that could be perceived as insults and or name calling.

It was no veiled comment. It was the thing that walks and looks and sounds like a duck making the noise that a duck makes.

All I'm saying is the Russian comments have not convinced me that the duck I can see if not a duck. It'd that's so wrong then why does freedom of speech exist?

[mapuc]

I try to find the head and the tail in this terrible story, only thing I see is accusation and counter-accusation flying around.

Here is what I know

Last summer an airline was shot down by some SAM-system(BUK 1 to 3(one of these)) It came from somewhere in the eastern Ukraine which was under the control of Separatist who is supported by Russia.

That's what I know.

This is what I don't know

1. Who fired or gave the order to fire the SAM ?
2. Came this SAM system from Russia or was it Stolen from the Ukrainian military ?
3. Was it well educated who was in charge this day and time of launch or was it just some ordinary people who sad there ?

Markus

[Oberon]

It came from somewhere in the eastern Ukraine which was under the control of Separatist who is supported by Russia.



Actually that's the key difference between the two reports, see below:

http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/624/cpsprodpb/6125/production/_86096842_mh17_missile_launch_locations_624.jpg

The Russian report says the missile was fired from Zaroshchenske which (unsurprisingly) is in Ukrainian hands which means the missile would have approached the aircraft from around the 4 o clock position, passed above or below it and the exploded on the 10 o clock position.
The Dutch report indicates a broader area which was in rebel held hands and states that the missile approached the aircraft from an approximate 12-2 o clock position and detonated next to the cockpit at a 10 o clock position.

[mapuc]

Then this is not sure either.

What is sure in this case ?

Markus

[Oberon]

Then this is not sure either.

What is sure in this case ?

Markus

A missile of some sort hit MH17 and it was distributed across the Ukrainian landscape killing 298 people.

[Frömmler Vogel]

That and both sides are blaming each other.

[XabbaRus]

We will never know. Too many agendas.
Though as I said Kerry did say they have a satellite image showing the missile launch but it has never been shown.

The Buk missile as I understand it is supposed to fly up and dive down on its target so it could conceivably have arrived from a 4 o' clock direction dived on MH17 and exploded at a 10 o'clock position. I'm just playing devils advocate here.

It is interesting to note that the Dutch investigation's area is far broader than either that of the Russian's or Ukrainian's.

[ikalugin]

The other factor many appear to forget - at that point in time there was an intermingling of forces, so the parties responsible may not be as clear cut for both possible launch areas.

[Jimbuna]

I can't say I'm surprised at the outcome of the investigation.

MH17 missile 'came from Russia', Dutch-led investigators say

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-37495067

[Catfish]

I can't say I'm surprised at the outcome of the investigation. [...]

True, but this is nothing new.
They have already argued it came from a russian-controlled area months before, without ever giving evidence. Where is the new evidence where it started, and that it really was a Buk missile?

The moment of publishing this... makes me think of Syria and diversion.

But then i am probably spoiled by all those desinformation lies, by all sides.

[kraznyi_oktjabr]

Yle our public broadcaster told yesterday (and our government confirmed) that according to De Telegraaf Dutch investigators have been conducting missile experiments in Finland. As far as I know no one has yet told why here, but we recently retired Buk missile system which is very close to what is currently used by Russian military. (That system was delivered to Finland in 1996 as debt repayment.) According to Yle those experiments providded evidence of exact type of missile used to shoot down MH17.

[Nippelspanner]

True, but this is nothing new.
They have already argued it came from a russian-controlled area months before, without ever giving evidence. Where is the new evidence where it started, and that it really was a Buk missile?

The moment of publishing this... makes me think of Syria and diversion.

But then i am probably spoiled by all those desinformation lies, by all sides.
If not a Buk, what else though?

[Aktungbby]

True, but this is nothing new.
They have already argued it came from a russian-controlled area months before, without ever giving evidence. Where is the new evidence where it started, and that it really was a Buk missile?

The moment of publishing this... makes me think of Syria and diversion.

But then i am probably spoiled by all those desinformation lies, by all sides.
U are simply disPUTIN' the facts comrade!:O: We shoot down Iranian air liners (USS Vincennes); they shoot down Dutch airliners ie we BUK one they BUK two and that's why we're called 'superpowers':k_confused: Move along quietly now; nuthin' of interest here-it's an insurance matter...

[XabbaRus]

No surprises there then. But still who are these witnesses? Who was doing the wire taps. If you read the Guardian newspaper website, you would think that the Dutch investigation based a lot of their conclusion on Bellingcat and "open sourced" intelligence.

Why would Russia send a BUK system in with a Russian crew, risking detection, to shoot down an airliner and then run it back into Russia? That is the bit I don't get. That a BUK shot it down I don't dispute, that it was Russian crewed no I'm not convinced and I don't care what Eliot Higgins and Bellingcat writes.

[kraznyi_oktjabr]

Why would Russia send a BUK system in with a Russian crew, risking detection, to shoot down an airliner and then run it back into Russia? That is the bit I don't get. That a BUK shot it down I don't dispute, that it was Russian crewed no I'm not convinced and I don't care what Eliot Higgins and Bellingcat writes.Someone correct me if I remember wrong, but I remember reading tweet from separatist leader celebrating shoot down of Ukrainian military transport (Antonov if I remember correctly). When it turned out that there was no military aircraft down, but an airliner that tweet was deleted.

[Nippelspanner]

Why would Russia send a BUK system in with a Russian crew, risking detection, to shoot down an airliner and then run it back into Russia? That is the bit I don't get. That a BUK shot it down I don't dispute, that it was Russian crewed no I'm not convinced and I don't care what Eliot Higgins and Bellingcat writes.
But who says the MH17 was targeted on purpose?
It might have been an accident. The radar can't identify the plane, it can just tell 'something's there'. My guess is someone just got trigger happy.
That a passenger jet crashed, quickly spread, so I'd figure they quickly pulled the Buk out of the area again to cover the mishap up.

It was send their due to enemy jets appearing in the area, wasn't it?
I didn't follow the whole mess very much, but that's what I collected.

'Proof' looks different though.

[kraznyi_oktjabr]

I found Yle's article about separatist messages. It is in Finnish and I'm at the moment too busy to translate it (sauna shift) but here it is: http://yle.fi/uutiset/3-7362851

P.S. Original claim was shoot down of Antonov An-26 transport aircraft

[Skybird]

The scenario described in this report, always was the most likely scenario: both regarding the real events, and regarding what such a report would show up to be like even if reality would have been different.

So, we should take it as such - the most likely, the most probable scenario of all stories told. Questions remain, and all sides have an interest to get their wanted view of things believed .

Beyond all and every doubt this report is not, it seems. But the same is true for any other alternative claim: the Russians', the separatists', the pro-Western Ukrainians'. The grey world of intel agencies and political powerplays heavily interfere.

For myself, I conclude today: I know that I do know nothing about this incident for sure.

[HunterICX]

Now to put the last nail in the coffin, Ukraine your radar data of that day please.....

Ukraine...hello?

Well..then Russia...how about yours, you teased some 2 days ago but haven't given jit acces to that raw data.

and thus all that remains is vague information and pointing fingers on both sides but after all this time we know from this report what we already knew the first day that it was fired from a BUK system but who...still remains to be seen if you ask me.

NOTE: I love the typo in all the articles like that of the BBC (I sure hope it is) that they tell it's a 9M83 Missile fired from a buk which can't be because the 9M83 is a missile fired from the S-300 family of long range SAM.

:haha:

[XabbaRus]

But who says the MH17 was targeted on purpose?
It might have been an accident. The radar can't identify the plane, it can just tell 'something's there'. My guess is someone just got trigger happy.
That a passenger jet crashed, quickly spread, so I'd figure they quickly pulled the Buk out of the area again to cover the mishap up.

It was send their due to enemy jets appearing in the area, wasn't it?
I didn't follow the whole mess very much, but that's what I collected.

'Proof' looks different though.

That was not what I meant. I don't think for one moment MH17 was targeted deliberately. What I'm saying is why would the Russians risk getting themselves conclusively caught supplying and operating such a system whether they hit an airliner or not? It's one thing to supply a system but so overtly? With a full crew too? They way the report reads however is that Russia supplied the system, they accidentally shot down the airliner then went home. If it hadn't been an airliner would they have gone home? Would the sensible thing have been to have left the SAM system in place and have the Russian crew change uniforms and ex filtrate quietly.

Given the height it was flying and direction I'm o the opinion they thought it was a Ukrainian air force transport. Also a lot has been made of the rebels being pushed back and losing ground to the Ukrainian government forces until the miraculous save by Russia. However most of that information seems to come back to bellingcat quoted in the media.

I would like to see the US radar evidence which they claim to have but haven't shown. I would also like to know who theses hundreds of witnesses they interviewed are. That aspect seems to have been lifted from bellingcat.

[Nippelspanner]

Just found this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sf6gJ8NDhYA

Just notice the comments and down-votes.
Looks like the RT-staff is doing double shifts...

[Bilge_Rat]

Just found this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sf6gJ8NDhYA

Just notice the comments and down-votes.
Looks like the RT-staff is doing double shifts...

very well done video, I was impressed until 6:32 when it turned out one of their key piece of evidence of the location of the BUK was a photo which has been pretty much discredited as being a fake:

https://7mei.nl/2015/05/18/mh17-buk-launch-photos-are-cheats/

The problem with the investigation is that it has been political from the beginning.

There are two suspects, Russia and Ukraine.

Ukraine is part of the investigation, it has supplied the tapes, photos and witnesses. Why is a suspect part of the investigation? Is it not reasonable to assume Ukraine will conceal any evidence which could implicate it?

Russia and Ukraine both have BUKs. There was one held by the separatists, but Ukraine has 72. Where were they that day? no one knows, Ukraine has never said. Would it not be important to know where the UKR BUKs were located just to make sure it was not the UKR that fired the SAM?

Immediately after the shootdown, Kerry stated the U.S. had satellite images proving the SAM came from a Russian BUK. These images have never been released and as far as I can tell, the investigation team has not seen them either. Why? Do they even exist?

[Bilge_Rat]

again another problem with the video is that to get to the claimed launch site, the Volvo transporting the BUK has to go straight from Donetsk to Torez.

problem is, on that route in july 2014, there was a bridge that was TOO LOW for the Volvo to go under....duh:

http://kremlintroll.nl/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/drawing.jpg

https://static.panoramio.com.storage.googleapis.com/photos/large/56263827.jpg

http://kremlintroll.nl/?p=605

[Jimbuna]

MH17 missile owned by Russian brigade, investigators say.

The missile that downed a Malaysia Airlines flight over eastern Ukraine in 2014 belonged to a Russian brigade, international investigators say.

For the first time, the Dutch-led team said the missile came from a Russian brigade based in the city of Kursk.

But on Thursday Wilbert Paulissen, a Dutch official from the Joint Investigation Team (JIT), told reporters: "All the vehicles in a convoy carrying the missile were part of the Russian armed forces."

He said investigators had traced the convoy to Russia's 53rd brigade.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-44235402

[Jimbuna]

Four charged with shooting down MH17 plane.

Four men have been charged with murder over the downing of a Malaysia Airlines jet in eastern Ukraine in 2014, killing 298 passengers and crew.

Dutch investigators have accused three Russians, Igor Girkin, Sergey Dubinskiy and Oleg Pulatov, and Ukrainian Leonid Kharchenko of involvement.

Passenger flight MH17 was en route from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur when it was shot down over conflict-hit Ukraine.

A court case is scheduled to begin in the Netherlands on 9 March 2020.

International arrest warrants have been issued for the four men.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-48691488

[STEED]

I see no hope they will appear in court.

[ikalugin]

It appears that they did not charge anyone who was in Russian service at the time or since then.

[Jimbuna]

I see no hope they will appear in court.

Well, when it is in the constitutions of both Russia and the Ukraine that people can't be extradited to foreign countries I think that has always been considered a given, hence the fact the Dutch have already stated they will probably not bother seeking extradition and commence the trial in their absence.

[Skybird]

While some people may tend to focus on the moral justice argument and how great it is that the small, tiny Netherlands dare to confront big, powerful Russia, I think the Netherlands go for high risk here. Charging the four suspects, in absence, for murder, means they have to prove that the intentional and explicit decision was made and carried out to bring down this plane and intentionally, explicitly killing these people aboard. Because the intention to kill these now dead victims is what separates murder from any form of accident or misjudgement in whatever a sense (mistaking this wrong plane for a valid target: another plane). And I think it will be terribly hard to prove this intention. It already starts with the question for the motive. Cui bono? Ironcially, the answer to this question would be: the Ukraine. Neither the rebels nor Russia could have had an interest for the PR desaster this incident meant for them - but the Ukraine.

The likelihood is quite high that either they must give up these charges, letting the state attorney looking bad then, or that they must construct a fictional case to work beyond the impossibility to prove by evidence the intention that MH317 indeed was the target and was decided on to be shot down, and then again the Netherlands and the attorney would look bad.

So I wonder whether they maybe have bitten off more than they could chew here - just so to feel morally good themselves. And that the Russians will not cooperate in any way, can be taken for granted.

[Catfish]

^ oh i am sure the near-deaths of former russian spies in the Uk just happened by accident. Of course other people could have come in contact with those substances, but i guess this can be condoned as collateral damage.
Just like with the plane. Because shooting at something you cannot exactly be sure of, is "accepting errors". "Billigend in Kauf nehmen", i could not translate this properly.

I do not think that the shooting down of a civilian airliner was executed with willful intent, so it is not murder but rather homicide. I think the dead people of flight MH17 would not care much about pettifoggery though.

But how about shooting down the right plane, the Antonov, then? Was that a legitimate target, for Russia?
Russia is still intervening militarily, in the Ukraina.
"In December 2015, Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin admitted that Russian military intelligence officers were operating in Ukraine, insisting though that they were not the same as regular troops. Currently, 7% of Ukraine's territory is under occupation."
I am not sure whether war is declared, so is the death of people in this interval of time murder, homicide or legitimate killing in a war?

B.t.w. Netherlands, Belgium or Russia - international law should always stand above brute force regardless of the nation's size. Should. :03:

[Skybird]

Forgotten to take your pills today? Cool down. Breathe. Relax.

And then, with a calmer mind, be thankful for living in a law culture where guilt is not proven by just claiming it, but needs to be proven.

I may be a repetitive offender, but once again I say: understand what I actually have written, not what you think your third eye can identify between the lines.

And then answer the obvious questions. Who benefits from shooting down intentionally MH317. The rebels? Russia? The West? The Ukraine?

Is it reasonable to assume that this and right this plane was targetted and decided on to be shot down? Did somebody on the ground wish these people, and no other people, being dead? Considering the fallout? In what way would Russia or the rebels benfit from this? The global PR payd off badly for them. I fail to see any gainm for them

Its a war down there. Shots get fired, targets get identified, moves trigger counter-moves, people die. Often innocent one sget into the firing line. And mistake shappen. Like in casde of the jumbojet shot down by the Sowjets ov er Sachalin. Or the airliner shot dopwn over the strait of Hormuz by the US navy. Where these killings indeed murder? In my understanding of what defines "murder", the intention to indeed kill this and no other victim, the detemrination to form an according plan and carry it out, is the criterionn. In Germna law, until today this is the difference between "Mord" und "Totschlag" or "Unfall mjit Todesfolge". The firts ione is inetionally, dertah was planned to be broght upomn the victim, the other two cases are unplanned circumstances getting out of control for a mutlitude of different reasons possible: empotional arousal, drugs, accident, chain of unfortunate events, whatever.

If you want to sentence the four identified indiviuduals for"murder", you have to porove that5 they wanted to kill the peopole aboard MH317 - these people, and no toher ones.

And while think about how you could achieve that, do yourself a favour: leave mepotions out of it. Emotions and vague feeling of what is right anhd what is wrong, have no place at court proceedings. Its about bureaucratic formalization, and evidence - or absence of evidence. Talking by own repeated experience. Law, and courts, are not about "justice". I say again: its about a formalized bureaucratic procedure. Its often not satisfying, I agree. But the alternative indeed is: suspect found guilty by merely claiming the suspect guilty, that is enough Do you want that? Be careful with a too easy answer.


It probbaly was a fault, an error, an accident with the kind of consequenes accidents in wars tend to have: lethal ones. I have no clue what went wrong, but I tend to think that probably several things came together, especially in the chain of command. You can agree or disagree with the motives of both sides in this war. But the definition of murder still stands. As long as you cannot present evidence for the intention to get right this plane killed and nothing else as a target, this incident is as much a case of mass murder as was the shooting down of the airliner in the Strait of Hormuz, or the Sachalin incident.

[ikalugin]

While some people may tend to focus on the moral justice argument and how great it is that the small, tiny Netherlands dare to confront big, powerful Russia, I think the Netherlands go for high risk here. Charging the four suspects, in absence, for murder, means they have to prove that the intentional and explicit decision was made and carried out to bring down this plane and intentionally, explicitly killing these people aboard. Because the intention to kill these now dead victims is what separates murder from any form of accident or misjudgement in whatever a sense (mistaking this wrong plane for a valid target: another plane). And I think it will be terribly hard to prove this intention. It already starts with the question for the motive. Cui bono? Ironcially, the answer to this question would be: the Ukraine. Neither the rebels nor Russia could have had an interest for the PR desaster this incident meant for them - but the Ukraine.

The likelihood is quite high that either they must give up these charges, letting the state attorney looking bad then, or that they must construct a fictional case to work beyond the impossibility to prove by evidence the intention that MH317 indeed was the target and was decided on to be shot down, and then again the Netherlands and the attorney would look bad.

So I wonder whether they maybe have bitten off more than they could chew here - just so to feel morally good themselves. And that the Russians will not cooperate in any way, can be taken for granted.
My opinion is that they are already building a fictional political case. That said - the choice of those 4 persons is interesting, as they do not seem to expose Russian authorities.

[ikalugin]

But how about shooting down the right plane, the Antonov, then? Was that a legitimate target, for Russia?
Russia is still intervening militarily, in the Ukraina.
"In December 2015, Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin admitted that Russian military intelligence officers were operating in Ukraine, insisting though that they were not the same as regular troops. Currently, 7% of Ukraine's territory is under occupation."
I am not sure whether war is declared, so is the death of people in this interval of time murder, homicide or legitimate killing in a war?

B.t.w. Netherlands, Belgium or Russia - international law should always stand above brute force regardless of the nation's size. Should. :03:
While Ukrainian official narrative is that it is at war with Russia, there is no formal declaration of war and near peace time relations (trade, travel, etc) are maintained. The narrative is there to mobilise the Ukrainian population away from the obvious systematic failures of Ukrainian leadership. Poroshenko tried to pull the wartime declaration through to get through the elections but failed.

I would also say that while there is a degree of foreighn (and not just Russian) intervention the war could be summarised as a civil war in Ukraine and has local roots.

As to who has shot down the airliner - my opinion is that it was the Kiev loyalists, but again that was due to operator error, much like the 00s shot down over the Black Sea.

[Skybird]

In the Eastern Ukraine, it is war for sure, no matter bureaucratic subtleties. Tanks blow uo, artillery strikes, villages get set ablazed, bombs get dropped, machine cannons fire, trenches are dug out, helicopter and fighters fly and fire, fighters die, civilians die - cant get any more war-like than this. - Heck, the Germans until the turnover from defence minister Jung to Guttenberg insisted that it was not a war what they had in Afghanistan. Formalities, and a tuning of the public's perception of reality.

Russia since the little green men has done what it can to confuse perception of its involvement and being able to FORMALLY deny any responsibility. That black ops and military operations in the grey twilight zone start with formally disconnecting the troops from their nation's and governments' responsibility, is not really the first time ever being heard of. It follows the scheme of bucaneers and privateers. It is clear who gives orders to the affected units and names.


Nebelkerzen.

[ikalugin]

My point is that while various Russian state and non state actors participated in various ways during the conflict it is still a civil war inside Ukraine caused by internal issues and mostly fought by Ukrainians.

A classical example of this would be the civil war in Spain where plenty of foreign powers participated but it is still called a civil war.

[Skybird]

It started with the Crimean peninsula, and that was not a civil war, but an invasion by an external power sending anonymous troops without emblems and badges on their uniforms. Still they were Russian commandos for sure, with or without Russian uniforms.


A trick.


That I understand Russia's strong traditional, historical and geopolitical interest and claim in the Crimean peninsula, does not mean that I do not take the operation for what it was. I just recognize the fact that there is nothing the West can do about it. Russia will not give it up - period. The Eastern Ukraine trouble is a stirring in the hot pot to keep the Ukraine weakened and to remind the West of what could happen if once again it dares to move NATO onto Russian borders like in the early 00-years. It is not just a civil war there - it is a Russian proxy war.

[Catfish]

[...] the conflict it is still a civil war inside Ukraine caused by internal issues and Ukrainians. [...]
Of course, i take it Putin/Russia just had a friendly conversation before he seized the Crimea and Sevastopol :03:
https://www.rferl.org/a/from-not-us-to-why-hide-it-how-russia-denied-its-crimea-invasion-then-admitted-it/29791806.html


A classical example of this would be the civil war in Spain where plenty of foreign powers participated but it is still called a civil war.Which foreign power attacked and occupied any part of Spain back then?

[Jimbuna]

Which foreign power attacked and occupied any part of Spain back then?

None as far as I'm aware but in the final months of 1936 saw the arrival of foreign troops, International Brigades joining the Republicans and Italian CTV, German Legion Condor and Portuguese Viriatos joining the Nationalists.

All invited and welcomed by either side of the conflict.

[ikalugin]

It started with the Crimean peninsula, and that was not a civil war, but an invasion by an external power sending anonymous troops without emblems and badges on their uniforms. Still they were Russian commandos for sure, with or without Russian uniforms. Crimean and Donbas situations were significantly different in nature.


Even if we assume that Crimea was exclusively caused by external factors (which considering their vote and the previous separatism attempts is questionable) the Donbas was not - the bulk of people fighting in Donbas were (and are) locals and/or non state actors and are there due to local (Ukrainian) or personal (ie personal agenda for non state actors) reasons.


Which foreign power attacked and occupied any part of Spain back then? As a nuanced observer I separate Crimea and Donbas.



Donbas follows the same patern as the war in Spain did. You could easily find examples of where territory was occupied by foreighn powers during civil wars - ie during Russian Civil war not only were there many cases of separatism (some were maintained post civil war - Finland and Poland, etc), but there was plenty of outright foreighn occupation ie in the North and in the East.

[Catfish]

None as far as I'm aware but in the final months of 1936 saw the arrival of foreign troops, International Brigades joining the Republicans and Italian CTV, German Legion Condor and Portuguese Viriatos joining the Nationalists.

All invited and welcomed by either side of the conflict.
Certainly right.. Adolf Galland wrote an excellent book also describing what happened in Spain.

However none of the foreign powers involved were in the game to grab land. In the Ukraina Russia certainly was, one of the reasons being the Black Sea harbour of Sevastopol.

Even if the US had managed to keep or convert the whole of Ukraina to the West, and/or the EU to join them, none of them would have actually occupied and kept whole regions, and certainly not by concealed military.

I can understand Putin strategically so to speak and all that, but it does not change one yota from being a war.

[ikalugin]

If it is a war, why does Ukraine maintain peacetime relations (trade, travel etc) with Russia?
If this is a war between Russia and Ukraine, why are militias in Donbas formed from the locals who are fighting for local problems?
Were there any significant political disagreements between eastern and western regions of Ukraine pre 2014?
Would Crimea vote the same way as it did historically in 2014 and 1991 if it was allowed?

You really should be asking questions why you bundle Crimea and Donbas together and buying the un-nuanced Ukrainian "war with Russia" narrative non critically.


As to the annexation - if EU is moving towards being a federative government with their legislative, executive and judicial branches, armed forces and treasury, foreighn policy and so on and so forth, then a colour revolution sponsored by EU (and other parties) followed by an attempt to join EU is annexation by the EU via a coup.

[Catfish]

[...] You really should be asking questions why you bundle Crimea and Donbas together and buying the un-nuanced Ukrainian "war with Russia" narrative non critically. [...]

Maybe because up to 2014 and under international right the Ukraina was one state/nation/country, and the Crimea region belonged to it?
Just because one group of people wants to become citizens of another state does not include any right for them to do so. And it certainly does not allow foreign nation to interfere, and send "helpers".

If german Bavaria wanted to become a part of Austria, held a referndum without allowance of Berlin and then even voted 90 percent to leave, this means nothing.
If Austria would then send concealed military to help them, and just annex the county from Germany, there would be some certain direct response.

Also, i do not really believe in russian 'elections' or 'votes" as long as your "civilian society" does not exist, and this russian "federation" (lol) is rather guided by a one-man dictatorship.

"The final date and ballot choices were set only ten days before the plebiscite was held. Before, during and after the plebiscite was proclaimed, the Crimean peninsula was host to Russian soldiers who managed to oversee public buildings [I]and Ukrainian military installations. The official result from the Autonomous Republic of Crimea was a 96.77 percent vote for integration of the region into the Russian Federation with an 83.1 percent voter turnout."

How utterly.. believable :shucks:

[...] As to the annexation - if EU is moving towards being a federative government with their legislative, executive and judicial branches, armed forces and treasury, foreighn policy and so on and so forth, then a colour revolution sponsored by EU (and other parties) followed by an attempt to join EU is annexation by the EU via a coup.The EU has no collective armed forces, and most legislative, executive end judicial branches depend on every single nation, with different laws. There is no president alone deciding as well, it is about consent, elections and votes. Real ones. Let us not discuss possible russian or whatever influence on western elections for now.

[ikalugin]

So when NATO bombs Kosovo and then Kosovo is in the process of being annexed by the EU it is ok?

That is an uninformed position to have, not only the 2014 referendum results are supported by varied polling, they are also supported by historical precedent such as the 1991 referendum and are explained by the broad long term disdain of Kiev for the region and the selective abuse of ethnic minorities there.
Compare and contrast with the 2014 Maidan which was an un-democratic armed and violent take over in Kiev preceded by the same sort of events happening in the western and central regions of Ukraine.

EU does have armed forces under CSDP. As BREXIT and recent legislation within EU shows member states no longer have any degree of real sovereignity. Moreover one of the key reasons for BREXIT was that the EU leadership is not accountable to the people of the member states, so EU is even worse than Russia as it has an unaccountable and unelected tyranical executive and rubber stamp powerless legislative.

[ikalugin]

Example of western reporting on polling:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2015/03/20/one-year-after-russia-annexed-crimea-locals-prefer-moscow-to-kiev/#3d7522ce510d

[Skybird]

If german Bavaria wanted to become a part of Austria, held a referndum without allowance of Berlin and then even voted 90 percent to leave, this means nothing.


It would mean EVERYTHING. You imply that a syndicate of any sort has the right to subjugate people to its rulership and that the so owned subjects have no right not wanting to be governed by it. But that is a violation of two of the three essential human rights. Its also a fallback into the formal reality of the darkest medieval, and ancient times.


Any law, or constituion, that rejects a local, regional population the right to freely decide whether it wants to continue a partnership or not, is invalid in itslf, by itself.

Becasue if people living in a reigon cannot voluntarily deicde ton it,, but get forced to stay in, they are beign woned then, and de facto are seen as the other'S property.

We call that slave owning.

If -bavaria thus would vote in a referendum to leave the federal republic system, then other federal states - namely those who get passively subsidized by Bavaria so far - have no claim for the bavarians that they are not allowed to leave. Any according law and constitutional paragraph must be seen as invalid in itself and as a violation of human rights.

Partnership, alliances, must be voluntarily. Where they are not, it is about conquest, dictatorship, and subjugation. Every partnership, every alliance in principle can be cancelled, no matter whether any rule or treaty say that cancellation is explcitly ruled out. Such a regulation is just the self-justification of the supressor, the slave owner.

Thats what nationalists and career potlicians f today and the eU do not understand, becasue it psut the very fundament fotheir powers and priviliges into question. It would make potlicians fear the people and force them to follow the demands of the people. But i insist on that givenrments must be afraid of the people, and must see themseves as the servants of the people, not the people being servants to the government. People'S interest go first. Parties' interests should not just go last, but should not even exist, for parties themselves should not even exist. Becasuewhere thexy exist, they do so at the explicit cost of putting their interests above that of the people.


No man and no poeple lives for the sake of another man or another people, and no man and no people has any right to demand that other men or other people live for the sake of the first. Its not just about humand rights, most profound basic human rights, about freedom - but also dignity.

[ikalugin]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DpW9yaSXiI
Interesting military video.

[Catfish]

So when NATO bombs Kosovo and then Kosovo is in the process of being annexed by the EU it is ok?

How can a trade union "annex" anything? Each nation has its sovereignty, but the EU as an international intergovernmental body has not, it is no state or nation. And. it. has. no. own. army. The armies exercise together, as a test for defense against aggressive invasions, maybe you can tell who would be the most likely candidate?

"uninformed" lol, maybe if you ask Putin?
Polls prior to the vote had resulted in two-thirds majorities against a spin-off.
According to the OSCE Chairman, the referendum was not constitutional and therefore illegal. Both preparation and implementation were even less in line with international standards than in the referendum in Crimea.
Sorry, no real referendum, no free election, results tampered with and absolutely no credibility.

"no longer have any degree of real sovereignity"
"EU leadership is not accountable to the people of the member states"
"EU is even worse than Russia"
"unaccountable and unelected tyranical executive"

Either you got your hands on "The Sun" or other Rupert Murdoch media, or there must be interesting things to smoke, in Russia :hmmm:
I guess someone like Farage would even agree with you, since it suits his own tales and lies.
Don't feed the trolls.

[ikalugin]

If it is a federative (or confederative for that matter) government it can annex states.

As BREXIT shows the states no longer have sovereignity as they cannot exercise their right to leave.

The new forces are under the command of the EU body, this is a fairly standard way to form armed forces historically.

The western powers in Europe, especially those in NATO are by far more agressive (we can count from the number of wars of agression they fought) and revisionist (we can count from the number of regime and border changes they have enacted post cold war).

Which is why Russia and Russian allies need strong internal (to fight against subversion, look at for example how Yeltsin got his 2nd term) and external (to deter agression, particularly in the form of a Lybia or Kosovo style air campaign) security. And that is what we exercise against (for example within Zapad-2017).

I am can ask atleast one person on this image:
http://static.kremlin.ru/media/events/photos/big/nUBmQvPnzhHUblH0IQC2BUJITAezVO8r.jpg
who happened to be one of the decisionmakers (with Putin) during the Crimea crisis. So in a way, yes I do have a degree of the internal knowledge of the conflict, not that this matters, as any normal observer could generate a nuanced view of the conflict, which began with the 2nd regime change operation in Ukraine, then lead to Crimean referendum and the separate uprising in Donbas, which was carried out by local and non state-actors and were caused by internal Ukrainian problems.

Yet the polls resulted in the majority, which supports the referendum result and does not even require a nuanced understanding of how referendum went (ie how different ethnic groups participated in it). And as we have seen in Kosovo, etc, the referendum does not have to be legal within the country, due to the duality of the international legal system. Not that this stops the West from applying double standards when it suits them.

Well, what I have said is true, would you like me to present evidence towards the points I have made.

[ikalugin]

A note of warning - if you disregard the internal causes of the Crimean or Donbas events, the internal causes behind Trump or BREXIT, you are in danger of being blinded by your ideology of the internal problems your country may have and thus unable to fix them.


Which is incidentally why in long term the witch hunts and paranoia may actually be in Russian interests, as they preclude western states from fixing their real problems by making their discussion un-patriotic and otherwise politically incorrect.

[Catfish]

^ yes of course, and if may return this warning:
What seems to work, or is claimed to be better is often just a lie. And if you begin to believe this lie you may be in for a hard awakening.
Don't let yourself be fooled by russian propaganda. And maybe alone in your appartment, with no diversion you may calmly ask yourself why Putin's way of ruling should be superior to other nations and supported by you, honestly.

I admit that dictatorships like China, Russia and recently now Turkey have faster ways to achieve a lot of goals because you do not have to ask anyone beforehand or succumb to ridiculous laws protecting individuals, or individuality or freedom per se, but unfortunately after all this has been always done on the back of the people those one-man-shows claimed to "work" for.


@Skybird, so you are a Reichsbürger? :doh:

The Grundgesetz - Germany's constitutional law - does not allow for individual states to break away. "In the Federal Republic of Germany, which is a nation-state based on the constituent power of the German people, states are not masters of the constitution", the court wrote in the decision.
There is no room under the constitution for individual states to attempt to secede because it violates the constitutional order.
So, no Bayxit for you.

Of course there's the "Bayern party":
"The fight for Bavarian independence will not be decided by a court, but rather by the will of the Bavarians," the party wrote on Facebook and Twitter in response to the ruling. In a separate post, they also promised a continued fight for their state’s freedom.
"The Bavarian Party is happy to see in celebration of the New Year that efforts for self determination are growing across Europe… The Bavarian Party will be working towards this with all of its strength in the New Year."

I wish them all the best. Because frankly, i would have aplauded to re-erect the former soviet wall between Bavaria and the rest of Germany :haha:

They at least outran a referendum though.. how undemocratic:
"Rather than putting the petition to a referendum, Bavaria’s state premier, Markus Söder, announced it would simply be written into law, passing through parliament"
And this is what it is about: Save the bees! https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/03/bavaria-bees-farming-petition-conservation-nature

[August]

Not that this has anything to do with the Russians shooting down yet another civilian airliner but I have to wonder about these local independence movements.

Take the Bavaria example, erm, for example, what happens if opposition to independence is concentrated geographically and who draws the boundaries?
If Middle Franconia or even just the citizens of Nuremburg and Ansbach lean (90%) toward remaining a part of Germany does the Bavarian independence movement accept the geographic split or hole it would create in their new country in order for them to get the same right to self determination the Bavarians are demanding for themselves or would they crush these counter revolutionaries like has almost always happened in these situations.

[ikalugin]

@Catfish (http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/member.php?u=210095) I have demonstrated the ways the EU is less democratic than Russia, for example Russian parliament can propose legislation and the Russian executive is directly elected by the people (though ofc you are going to claim that our elections are illegitimate and we cannot elected our own leaders).
That said making the leap that I support the specific configuration of the status quo that we have is building a strawman.


As to our laws - EU is moving towards more of the same, with the politically driven censorship, political imprisonment and so on and so forth.


@August (http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/member.php?u=215890) That is an excelent question, as it shows further dissonance between the two core principles of international law.

[Skybird]

@Skybird, so you are a Reichsbürger? :doh:#

Idiot. Whenever you think it pleases you, you come with some stupid, offensive babbling like this. Idiot...!


The Grundgesetz - Germany's constitutional law - does not allow for individual states to break away. "In the Federal Republic of Germany, which is a nation-state based on the constituent power of the German people, states are not masters of the constitution", the court wrote in the decision.
There is no room under the constitution for individual states to attempt to secede because it violates the constitutional order.
So, no Bayxit for you.
Now you sound like some of the Spanish ultrannationalist almost fascist hardliners in madrid who also claim that Catalonya's people are not allowed to seek freedom from Madrid - because Madrid has given itself a rule saying that ther eis no right not to be governed by Madrid.

Bulls#!t. Reminds of the Selbstermächtigungsgesetz of the Nazis.



Of course there's the "Bayern party":
"The fight for Bavarian independence will not be decided by a court, but rather by the will of the Bavarians," the party wrote on Facebook and Twitter in response to the ruling. In a separate post, they also promised a continued fight for their state’s freedom.
"The Bavarian Party is happy to see in celebration of the New Year that efforts for self determination are growing across Europe… The Bavarian Party will be working towards this with all of its strength in the New Year."

I wish them all the best. Because frankly, i would have aplauded to re-erect the former soviet wall between Bavaria and the rest of Germany :haha:

They at least outran a referendum though.. how undemocratic:
"Rather than putting the petition to a referendum, Bavaria’s state premier, Markus Söder, announced it would simply be written into law, passing through parliament"
And this is what it is about: Save the bees! https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/03/bavaria-bees-farming-petition-conservation-nature

It is always amazing how willingly self-proclaimed social justice fighters and socialists and communists and EU-fans fall back to totalitarian dictatorial rules if these only are aiming at boxing through their matching political worldviews, whereas any resistence to them of even much lesser violence and brutality get brandmarked as the most offensive of crimes. In the end these progressive ideologies claiming to mean it oh so well, alsways want just one thing, and this one thing before any other: they want to command and control people and crack down on everybody as hard as possible who does resist to their claim for having power over him.



The whole civil society and its debates i8s infested by this visurs. It even has conquered debate about ecology, climate, and gender madness syndrome.


And that is what makes this fight so bitter and brutally sooner or later again. Becasue it is not just a disput eoiver agmentds, but it is about claimng the absolute, total power and command and the complete subjugation of the other. Just that those only defending their natural right for freedom, indeed want just this: their freedom. Their natural birth right.

Nobody has a claim for the freedom of others. Nobody has the claim that others only exist to be obedient to his demands and worldviews. Nobody gets biorn and by this circumstance owes to others, may it be few or many. Man is no property, and is nobody else's property.

And the "constitution" in germany? Merkel violates it notoriously, for exmaple since 2015 over mass migration issues, becasue she feels like it - an appeal to cheap emotions is her only justification for violating the Basic Law. And the Grundgesetz also ruled that in case of reunification of germany a new constitution for the whole of Germany should be drafted, since the Grundgesetz, the Basic Law, only was meant as a provisorium for as long as the split in germany existed. But doing so would have cut the power of federal minister presidents of the federal states, and since they did not want to see their power cut, they all united and boycotted the constitutional demand to form a new constitution that then actualy would have been called that: not just a Basic Law, but a constitution.

Formally, Germany has no constitution, and since 30 years runs its polices and institutions on illegal fundaments. A historic fact that is almost forgotten and certainly does not get taught in state schools. The existence of the modern german state rests on an illegal fundament.

Freedom becomes not illegal just because a Basic Law or a constitution rules so. Thats why Madrid has no claim against the catalunyans, and thats why Berlin woudl have no claim against bavarians if the latter would vote for their independence. One can desire to have an agreement on any form of formalization for a possible future secession process by somebody, but even if this formalization gets not inked on paper, there is no argument for claiming that people have no right to be free from another people'S claim over them. That is just a crime, and I claim people even have the right to resist to it with force and the use of weapons, if this right is withheld from them. Anglosaxons, namely the British these days, with their much stronger tradition of liberalism and libertarianism and freedom than it was ever present in continental Europe, seem to understand this easier, and thats why London "allowed" the scottish referendum, and that also is why the politlical caste so desperately tries to hide their attempt of stealing the Brexit from the referendum voters. Its also the reason why Brussel does not understand why Britain should be allowed to leave from the EU's regime of destroying freedoms and liberty. That is becasue on the continent, freedom and liberty never have had an as strong lobby anyway. Raise the red flag again, and soon people rally around it and agree to impose totalitarian command over and draconian penalty against everbyody not marching to the drums of the socialist collective. The tradition of freedom and liberty - speaks English, not German or French. In this feature, the anglosaxon cultural heritage is far superior to that of the continental powers, especially France and Germany. And the Germans do not know what to do with freedom anyway, I think. If they do not get commanded around, they miss something in their lives.

https://www.cuncti.net/politik/1127-die-eu-hat-ein-demokratieproblem

[August]

@August (http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/member.php?u=215890) That is an excelent question, as it shows further dissonance between the two core principles of international law.


Well I don't know about international law but reading this debate I am struck that while nations are seen by some as artificial and illegitimate constructs they bandy about equally artificial constructs themselves as if they were any more legitimate.

When you come right down to it terms like "Bavarian" or "Catalonian" mean exactly the same thing as "Germany" or "Spain" but just on a smaller scale, and the question is how small do these invented territorial subdivisions have to go before the dissenting voices within their boundaries can be legitimately ignored when it comes to things like national independence referendums?

[Skybird]

On Kosovo, Europe sholuld have left it to stoipping he Serbian aggression. Instead the EU believed it to be a brilliant idea to extradite ther Sebrian population in Kosovo and replace it with a mass migration movement from Albania. 90% of the people living inKosovo today who have Albanian roots, have freshly arrived after the NATO bombings of Kosovo, and where no former inhabitants of that place. 90%...! The facts that the eU founds its arugments on why it it does in Kosovo what it doe sin Kosovo - has been fabricated and produced by the EU itself.



It is a stupid policy. Ignroing Serbian histor'Y hiostoric ties to the place remind sof the West ignoraring of storng Russian ties to the crimean region. The damn arroganc eof the eU: to think it can alter, delete, replace hostircally grown feelöings of idnetity an own history and rpalc eit at arvbitarry will with an artifical surrogate form the eU's social engineering laboratories.



Kosovo hangs on th drip, and I see it never becomneing a truly independent state with an independent economy and and independent basis for existencde. It will remain to be a cripple, an artificially created hollow torso of a state, a saddening carricature of a sovereign nation, it will consume foreign money, and will give nothing in return, because there is nothing it can give in return. But hey, we now get Albania as NATO member in the forseeable future, isnt that reat? Albania...! That makes the alliance strong and meaningful again. The whole operation Kosovo by the EU, meant to demonstrate how superior the planning results of this formidable block are and how well it means with Islam, is a desaster. And a smoldering centre of future crisis and war in Europe's underbelly. I am with the Serbs on this issue now - or referring to that US analyst I once read who some years after the war said: "We have bombed the wrong side."

[Skybird]

Well I don't know about international law but reading this debate I am struck that while nations are seen by some as artificial and illegitimate constructs they bandy about equally artificial constructs themselves as if they were any more legitimate.

When you come right down to it terms like "Bavarian" or "Catalonian" mean exactly the same thing as "Germany" or "Spain" but just on a smaller scale, and the question is how small do these invented territorial subdivisions have to go before the dissenting voices within their boundaries can be legitimately ignored when it comes to things like national independence referendums?
In principle as small as it gets by itself. City states. Happened to be the rule in ancient Greece - the claimed cradle of democracy. Nedless to say, that easy it was not, sinc eonly 5-15% of the poulaiton of a Greek polis actually held the status of citizens, but i explained all that before, and repeatedly so.


The more important and relevant question is how to keep big players from eating smaller ones. That is the one question I so far have not heard a convincing answer to, nor do I claim that I have one. Hoppe, Brennan, and others, tried to give answers, yes - but they are not realistic, in my opinion, are too much trusting in optimism and ignoring unplessant, hostile realities.


But that is also part of the truth I say: that if a people deciding to spolit away from a bigger union, mustknow that it then has to live by its own ability, ahs to come zup itself for the costs - and must by itself be able and strong enough to keep the sharks away. And I always said that. I said the Scottish are aelcome to fall out fo the Engolish union if theyx want - but they shall not expect that the eU embraces them with open arms (it would, but I am against it). The Catalunyans are free to end their union with the Spaniards, but they have no claim that Europe then must come up for their financial bills. Desriing Brexit is perfecly legaöl and fine, and I amk against the attempts of the EU to turn it into a punishment of these impertinent rebels darign to put their desire for sovereignty over the demand of Brussole to rule over them. The eu should soberly deal with them on a trade agreement basis, and dismiss all the attached, non-economic stuff - yeS: but beyond that, it either nwill work for the UK late roin, or not. And if Bavaria would vote to drop out of the federal structure oif germany, ti must care itself then to come up with its costs, eo9cnomic needfs, and protection.


You cannot claim to be sovreign and indeoendent if you depend on others and accept your sovereiongty suspended over economic and finciaol needs. Eiether oyu are independent, or you are not. Just claiming to be, but needing the bother to pays your bills - that is not what independence and sovereignty means.



In other words: it is about strength. And not every social, cultural, ethnic entity indeed is strong enough ti beocme truly independent and sovereign. Size has somethign to do with it, whether that is plltially ocrrect or not to point out. Its reality.



What is just not legitimate is that one group says because it benefits from living in a union with another group, the other group has no right to leave that union. If the latter wnats to leave, the first group only may seek to make the union more attroacve to stay in or to make itself more attraicve as a partner. That way the first group can and is allowed to try convincing the other to stay. But it has no claim to demand that, command that, even to use force to enforce that. That is nothing else but conquest, subjugation, imperialsim.

[Catfish]

@Catfish (http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/member.php?u=210095) I have demonstrated the ways the EU is less democratic than Russia [...]
Maybe this is how it is made to be heard, but we know how it really is, don't we?
As to our laws - EU is moving towards more of the same, with the politically driven censorship, political imprisonment and so on and so forth.
Nonsense. Political prisoners? What do they tell you in Russia? :haha:
"Political driven censorship": While i personally think that e.g. climate change is a reality, there are millions who plain deny it, but no one is telling them to shut up, let alone by force or censorship. That most of the media jump thisor that train mostly depends on their political stance or also on plain stupidity but hey, they are all there and can be read and listened to.

All have their say and there is a lot of discussion, often disrespectful, and this can be seen everywhere. This is why it is much harder in a democracy to rule and make laws, you have to discuss and convince others, there is no going it alone. Or if you may soon stumble, e.g. by the weight of public opinion.
It is also more difficult in a democracy to refute/disprove any lie or accusation, because this takes more effort and time than to invent those accusations. Something the german AfD has developed to perfection, to paralyze other parties and the government.

Still, a bit different in Russia:
If you call Putin a dimwit you are at least fined, because you do not criticize the leader. Lèse-majesty. If you write like Mrs Politovskaya about state crime, state terrorism and have evidence for the leader ignoring law and constitution you may suddenly suffer an "accident". If you become a rich 'oligarch' who thn has additionla political influence, you go to jail. At least.
I have to seee this in any of the EU states yet.

Also: No criticism of the government allowed, in Russia:
https://www.npr.org/2019/03/18/704600310/russia-criminalizes-the-spread-of-online-news-which-disrespects-the-government?t=1561217817999

[Bilge_Rat]

Well I don't know about international law but reading this debate I am struck that while nations are seen by some as artificial and illegitimate constructs they bandy about equally artificial constructs themselves as if they were any more legitimate.

When you come right down to it terms like "Bavarian" or "Catalonian" mean exactly the same thing as "Germany" or "Spain" but just on a smaller scale, and the question is how small do these invented territorial subdivisions have to go before the dissenting voices within their boundaries can be legitimately ignored when it comes to things like national independence referendums?

If you want to look at a real world example, you can look at the 1980 and 1995 Quebec independence referendums.

They were in many ways illegal since the Canadian constitution has no provision dealing with a province breaking away. However, in practice there was no way to stop the province from holding the vote, unless you follow the Spanish example, impose martial law and arrest the whole bunch, but the thinking was that this would backfire and increase support.

If the referendums had won a province wide majority, yes there were groups ready to have other refefendums to have their regions remain in Canada, which would have been a nightmare.

In the end, both votes failed so we dodged the bullet.

[ikalugin]

Nonsense. Political prisoners?People get arrested for misgendering others on social media.
People get sentenced with prison time over jokes.
There is massive politically driven censorship in tech companies that is driven by pure ideology rather than scientific theory such as the climate change. Ie:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=re9Xp6cdkro


You should really try to see a log in your own eye before trying to find a log elsewhere. If you can't, well, then you are a useful idiot for us, so I guess I am well off either way.

[Catfish]

"Project Veritas" eh?
Always nice to use latin words, makes it look so scientific and well researched. But no:
https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/project-veritas/

[Veritas] " ... created by James Edward O’Keefe III who is an American conservative political activist. He produces secretly recorded undercover audio and video encounters, some selectively edited to imply its subjects said things they did not, with figures and workers in academic, governmental and social service organizations, purporting to show abusive or allegedly illegal behavior by employees and/or representatives of those organizations. Project Veritas primarily targets liberals and liberal organizations."

"Often his information is debunked, but it is too late as the information has already been watched by thousands or more."
Classic troll. Steam roll everyone with claims that cannot be debunked as fast as you create new lies. See Farage and the like.

"People get arrested for misgendering others on social media.
People get sentenced with prison time over jokes."Evidence please.

And what has this Google and "tech companies" thing to do with arresting people, because of political reasons, in the EU?

[ikalugin]

Heh, because you know, they make that allegation without breakdown of analasys under their own methodology or evidence. But sure, it is easy to disregard sources for them being, ehem, inconvenient. Especially when investigative journalists are going against the leftists who run the tech monopolies.
I would suggest watching the video and, say, following the examples they provide to see for yourself if google search warps reality to suit a political agenda.


Evidence please.People get arrested for misgendering others on social media.
People get sentenced with prison time over jokes.A lady being arrested over misgendering a person on twitter:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/02/10/police-wasting-time-arresting-twitter-transphobes-could-tackling/
A comedian being sentenced for prison time over a joke uploaded to his small youtube channel:
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/count-dankula-freedom-of-speech-comedy-joke-iran-offended-a8270631.html
There are many other such cases that do not make the news.

There is also a degree of censorship, both external (users being unpersoned by paralel action of social media companies) and internal (people not speaking their mind out of fear). A good article on topic:
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/07/1984-george-orwell/590638/


And what has this Google and "tech companies" thing to do with arresting people, because of political reasons, in the EU?It is indeed a separate but related issue, where the west is actually growing tyranical corporate leftist institutions in addition to the state institutions. The censorship is mostly done by those private platforms, but it is done pre-emptively, ahead of being censored under the new hate speach laws.
In UK for example you can be convicted with jail time for anything that is "grossly offensive" with what is "grossly offensive" being left to discretion of the judge.

[Catfish]

"The Atlantic" article about Orwell, 1984 and our current times is indeed very good, but it points at a completely other direction than you want me to see (8or so i think?)

"The warnings were justified, but their emphasis on the mechanisms of earlier dictatorships drew attention away from the heart of the malignancy—not the state, but the individual. The crucial issue was not that Trump might abolish democracy but that Americans had put him in a position to try. Unfreedom today is voluntary. It comes from the bottom up."

"We are living with a new kind of regime that didn’t exist in Orwell’s time. It combines hard nationalism—the diversion of frustration and cynicism into xenophobia and hatred—with soft distraction and confusion: a blend of Orwell and Huxley, cruelty and entertainment.
The state of mind that the Party enforces through terror in 1984, where truth becomes so unstable that it ceases to exist, we now induce in ourselves. Totalitarian propaganda unifies control over all information, until reality is what the Party says it is—the goal of Newspeak is to impoverish language so that politically incorrect thoughts are no longer possible. Today the problem is too much information from too many sources, with a resulting plague of fragmentation and division—not excessive authority but its disappearance, which leaves ordinary people to work out the facts for themselves, at the mercy of their own prejudices and delusions."

"During the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign, propagandists at a Russian troll farm used social media to disseminate a meme: “ ‘The People Will Believe What the Media Tells Them They Believe.’ — George Orwell.” But Orwell never said this. The moral authority of his name was stolen and turned into a lie toward that most Orwellian end: the destruction of belief in truth.
The Russians needed partners in this effort and found them by the millions, especially among America’s non-elites. In 1984, working-class people are called “proles,” and Winston believes they’re the only hope for the future. As Lynskey points out, Orwell didn’t foresee “that the common man and woman would embrace doublethink as enthusiastically as the intellectuals and, without the need for terror or torture, would choose to believe that two plus two was whatever they wanted it to be.”"

Very much to the point. The threat is not a left-wing regime like in 1984 though, but the left is delusional in thinking they can stand up against bullying and fake news while hemselves sticking to facts, reality and truth. This is a post-factual time. Insisting on facts and trying to debunk every new lie will not help them.

[August]

Always nice to use latin words, makes it look so scientific and well researched. But no:
https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/project-veritas/



And your so called fact checker is to be believed?


MediaBIasFactCheck.com describes itself as “the most comprehensive media bias resource in the Internet.” The site is owned by Dave Van Zandt from North Carolina, who offers no biographical information about himself aside from the following: “Dave has been freelancing for 25+ years for a variety of print and web mediums (sic), with a focus on media bias and the role of media in politics. Dave is a registered Non-Affiliated voter who values evidence based reporting” and, “Dave Van Zandt obtained a Communications Degree before pursuing a higher degree in the sciences. Dave currently works full time in the health care industry. Dave has spent more than 20 years as an arm chair researcher on media bias and its role in political influence.” WND was unable to locate a single article with Van Zandt’s byline. Ironically, the “fact checker” fails to establish his own credibility by disclosing his qualifications and training in evaluating news sources.
Asked for information concerning his expertise in the field of journalism and evaluating news sources, Van Zandt told WND: “I am not a journalist and just a person who is interested in how media bias impacts politics. You will find zero claims of expertise on the website.”
Concerning his purported “25+ years” of experience writing for print and web media, he said: “I am not sure why the 25+ years is still on the website. That was removed a year ago when I first started the website. All of the writing I did was small print news zines from the ’90s. I felt that what I wrote in the ’90s is not related to what I am doing today so I removed it. Again, I am not a journalist. I simply have a background in communications and more importantly science where I learned to value evidence over all else. Through this I also became interested in research of all kinds, especially media bias, which is difficult to measure and is subjective to a degree.”




Read more at https://www.wnd.com/2017/02/phony-baloney-the-9-fakest-fake-news-checkers/#EfW5Ik0m2po1bcoe.99

[Catfish]

"WND" is World net daily.com ok. I guess you can find all there, from Obama being the antichrist to Clinton murders, to whatnot.

https://www.salon.com/2018/02/12/pioneers-of-fake-news-can-worldnetdaily-be-saved/

https://realorsatire.com/wnd-com/

But i don't need that. I can directly say that all media are leaning towards one or another political direction and this is perfectly ok. But there are some who clutch at every straw to promote hate and divisiveness, and you can easily spot them.

[Bilge_Rat]

Not sure where this thread is going but "mediabiasfactcheck" is a left-wing activist who attacks conservative media while pretending to be a "neutral" fact checker. His methods were uncovered 1 or 2 years ago?

He has no credibility.

[Dowly]

So, all these (https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/left/) sites they list as being "moderately to strongly biased toward liberal causes" actually aren't? Or are they only credible when it suits you?

[ikalugin]

@Catfish (https://www.subsim.com/radioroom/member.php?u=210095)
By selectively citing that article you create an impression that you are selectively reading it. In particular this statement:
Very much to the point. The threat is not a left-wing regime like in 1984 though, but the left is delusional in thinking they can stand up against bullying and fake news while hemselves sticking to facts, reality and truth. This is a post-factual time. Insisting on facts and trying to debunk every new lie will not help them. is troubling as in addition to the concerns over the right wing movement which you have cited there are concerns about the left wing movement, for example:
We stagger under the daily load of doublethink pouring from Trump, his enablers in the Inner Party, his mouthpieces in the Ministry of Truth, and his fanatical supporters among the proles. Spotting doublethink in ourselves is much harder. “To see what is in front of one’s nose needs a constant struggle,” Orwell wrote (https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwell/essays-and-other-works/in-front-of-your-nose/). In front of my nose, in the world of enlightened and progressive people where I live and work, a different sort of doublethink has become pervasive. It’s not the claim that true is fake or that two plus two makes five. Progressive doublethink—which has grown worse in reaction to the right-wing kind—creates a more insidious unreality because it operates in the name of all that is good. Its key word is justice—a word no one should want to live without. But today the demand for justice forces you to accept contradictions that are the essence of doublethink.For example, many on the left now share an unacknowledged but common assumption that a good work of art is made of good politics and that good politics is a matter of identity. The progressive view of a book or play depends on its political stance, and its stance—even its subject matter—is scrutinized in light of the group affiliation of the artist: Personal identity plus political position equals aesthetic value. This confusion of categories guides judgments all across the worlds of media, the arts, and education, from movie reviews to grant committees. Some people who register the assumption as doublethink might be privately troubled, but they don’t say so publicly. Then self-censorship turns into self-deception, until the recognition itself disappears—a lie you accept becomes a lie you forget. In this way, intelligent people do the work of eliminating their own unorthodoxy without the Thought Police.
Orthodoxy is also enforced by social pressure, nowhere more intensely than on Twitter, where the specter of being shamed or “canceled” produces conformity as much as the prospect of adding to your tribe of followers does. This pressure can be more powerful than a party or state, because it speaks in the name of the people and in the language of moral outrage, against which there is, in a way, no defense. Certain commissars with large followings patrol the precincts of social media and punish thought criminals, but most progressives assent without difficulty to the stifling consensus of the moment and the intolerance it breeds—not out of fear, but because they want to be counted on the side of justice.
This willing constriction of intellectual freedom will do lasting damage. It corrupts the ability to think clearly, and it undermines both culture and progress. Good art doesn’t come from wokeness, and social problems starved of debate can’t find real solutions. “Nothing is gained by teaching a parrot a new word,” Orwell wrote in 1946. “What is needed is the right to print what one believes to be true, without having to fear bullying or blackmail from any side.” Not much has changed since the 1940s. The will to power still passes through hatred on the right and virtue on the left. (emphasis mine)
And I have quite clearly have been discussing them and such the apparent ignorance of that part of the article does not bode well.



I am more concerned about the left wing movement than I am about the right wing movement as the left wing currently controls both the means of spreading information (censorship and social pressure in tech companies that leads to both speech and thought policing) and the state regulation of said means (hate speach legislation that leads to arrests and convictions based on speach that does not fit the ideology), the academia/education (where people are expelled for non PC statements even if they are supported by data, not to mention the self censorship that is happening).

[Catfish]

@Ikalugin you are right, the 'left' (whatever you mean by it because in the US some of the right wing is already regarded as being 'left') certainly does not do itself a favour in underestimating the 'right', or schmoozing with delusional hope and waiting for better times.

I am more concerned about the left wing movement than I am about the right wing movement as the left wing currently controls both the means of spreading information (censorship and social pressure in tech companies that leads to both speech and thought policing) and the state regulation of said means (hate speach legislation that leads to arrests and convictions based on speach that does not fit the ideology), the academia/education (where people are expelled for non PC statements even if they are supported by data, not to mention the self censorship that is happening).I wonder about several things here. The "left wing movement" as you describe it.. most of the US mdia are still leaning to the right, you cannot describe them as left just because they criticize Trump.

I can understand that anything hampering the big bad US is good for Russia, so you supported Trump because he is divisive and radicalising.
But at the same time, there is danger ahead that the next president will be even more right and hawkish, but if he will be only a bit more intelligent that would really bear some threat for Russia. After the radicalising before and during Trump it all can become much worse.
https://www.salon.com/2019/03/09/can-america-recover-from-trump-a-radicalized-right-wing-suggests-dangers-ahead/

So, why exactly would Russia be against the left. In former time the latter did all to encourage them, help them, insert spies and so forth.
But now you are afraid of the left, and supported Trump. Because he can be led by the nose? It is easier to spy?
Is the american 'left' so much more threatening, to Putin? Is the far right more to his liking?


Or in other words, are you warning the left to be not so delusional and think wrong, or are you promoting Trump because he's easy meat for Putin?

[mapuc]

Remember: If a claim is consistent with a person's personal conviction
- this claim is completely correct, otherwise not.

Markus

[Skybird]

Remember: If a claim is consistent with a person's personal conviction
- this claim is completely correct, otherwise not.

Markus


...???


:stare: :stare: :stare:


You must be kidding - or is something getting lost in translation?

[ikalugin]

@Catfish (https://www.subsim.com/radioroom/member.php?u=210095)
It is actually the other way round - because of the left control of information and buble generation, a perception is created that the centrists are right wingers and leftists are centrists. If you look at the shift of values within democratic and republican parties (as one of the indicators) you would notice that it is the democratic party that shifted left, not republicans that shifted right.

If you sit in a left echo chamber that is growing more radical by the day then even center-left people (ie Tim Pool) would look like crazy alt-righters. Incidentally due to those effects even people who are labeled "right" may actually be center-left people. You can see that creep left here:
https://wentworthreportdotcom.files.wordpress.com/2019/01/us-democrats-republican-spectrum.jpg
Same applies to media, even in the big cable networks the only center-right network is Fox news.

This breeds my personal concern that the modern left would destroy the west, as I would personally feel emotionally sad if such a great civilisation was to die in my lifetime. This concern however does not exist on the national level, as left eroding western competetive advantages may actually be beneficial to Russia.
Trump collusion is actually a good example - the broad left movement is overblowing that event (which was at best carried out by several resource poor non-state actors at the much lower scale than organic operations by other actors, including tech companies themselves) and is now not only wasting their national resources and disrupting political processes, but also destroying any constructive discussions on why Trump (or BREXIT) happened, are used to justify rejection of existance of principled opposition to the left ideas and then justifying unpersoning them.

[Skybird]

Putting it here, not to launch a new topic on it.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-48755606


The Ukrainian and Baltic fury is undersatandable, and valid. The Germans and French argue the decison give srussians a chanc eof last hope when appealing to the court, but the truth is that thr reds in the German coalition are traditionally extremely russophile (the blacks as well...) and that it ios not noble motives pushign this decision, but the fear to lose the Russian payments forever. In other words: its about money.

( Israel hopefully observes this decision with two open eyes, being the notorious receivers of European claims how befriended and close Europe and Israel are. )

If I were the Ukraine or the Baltic states, i would withdraw from the organisation before the end of this month and stop any further payments to it immediately.


Another point victory for Putin. The Europeans are so disgusting in their endless weakness and indifference.

[ikalugin]

@skybird

Apart from the money considerations (we do not plan to be a part of organisation and pay for membership if we have no voice in it), it is also about retaining instruments of influence over Russia, such as the courts. If Russia leaves the council of Europe it would leave the jurisdiction of say relevant human rights courts such as the ECHR, which were used a number of times to pressure the Russian state.

As to Ukraine and Baltics - they have been using the council of Europe to push their own agenda. If we for example take Minsk accords, Ukraine managed to not only sabotage their execution, but push documents through council of Europe blaming Russia for that. The length of this crisis precludes post-crisis analasys in the west, like they managed to do post 080808 war and the Ukrainian narrative dominates. As such it makes good sense for the old europe to protect their interests.

[Catfish]

[...] Another point victory for Putin. The Europeans are so disgusting in their endless weakness and indifference.

Unfortunately yes, and Russia keeps attacking all the time.. we should not think anything has changed, or that they would clearly admit their real intention.
What has changed is their attitude of doing it all publicly, even risking compromising it. It is much more open now, and more violent.
They are convinced enough it does not even matter anymore with the Chaos in the US and its international retreat.
Regarding Europe it still does a bit better despite brexit, it is at constant alert though.

https://i.imgur.com/aFCttzum.jpg

[Skybird]

@skybird

Apart from the money considerations (we do not plan to be a part of organisation and pay for membership if we have no voice in it), it is also about retaining instruments of influence over Russia, such as the courts. If Russia leaves the council of Europe it would leave the jurisdiction of say relevant human rights courts such as the ECHR, which were used a number of times to pressure the Russian state.
I dont buy it. Its more than just coincidental that France, Spain, Germany and others give Russia its will just days before the long absence from the institution and the payment obligation would lead to the legal consequences of ending Russia'S membership permanently (there is some 2-year- limit rule, and Russia has suspended its payments almost 2 years ago now) - and so would also end its financial contributions in the years to come which make for 7% of the total annual budget, and its its outstanding membership payments, of the past 2 years would be lost as well. Also, it paves the way for mulling an easing of the sanctions. You see, Europeans companies want to do business with Russia again.


Its not as if I ever believed the sanctions would work the way it was hoped, or that I think the general Western stand on Russia since the 00-years is founded on intelligence and strength. Its a pityful attempt by the EU to be perceived as a strong global player while reality is that neither America nor China nor Russia take Europe especially serious, due to its internal rifts and weaknesses and growing problems, and weak military. What makes me sick is the Western self-betrayal in all this: to claim one were so seriously dedicated to the noble and the true motives in all the completely story - and then horse-trading all that away so easily when it comes to money. I just dispise weakness and corruptness.



The EU tries to egg-dance back and forth between Ukraine, and Russia, wnating to pelase bothg and not loosing any of the two. That cannot lead to anything else but ridicule, acchieveing not evben one of the two wanted things. Putin on the other hand acts much more focussed, determined, and with a stronger sense of reality. Practically all his foreign political operaitosn and adventures, Syria, Crimean peninsula, Eastern Ukraine, allienace with China, work out the way he wanted, and got him what he wan ted - and he will keep what he took. The fabulous EU, however, reminds of a hysteric hen-house, and tumbles towards the next catastrophic systemic financial disaster. But still boast with wanting to give a compass to the world... A mouse that tries to roar. Putin did not care. China stayed unimpressed. And then came Trump. :haha:

[ikalugin]

My point is that in addition to the money there are other considerations.


Such as maintaining ways to pressure Russia via the courts and getting control over the runaway influence Ukraine&co hold over that institution.

[Catfish]

We are way OT.. recent posts should be moved to a to be created "Russian politics" thread?

[Jimbuna]

Agreed, this thread is supposed to be about Malaysian Airlines MH317.

[ikalugin]

We are way OT.. recent posts should be moved to a to be created "Russian politics" thread?
I am not sure if there are Russians other than me on this forum. So it would be populated by misinformed foreighners.

[Jimbuna]

I am not sure if there are Russians other than me on this forum. So it would be populated by misinformed foreighners.

I believe you are incorrect but can't say for sure what the actual number is so might I suggest you or someone else create a thread for the purpose of carrying the above discussion onward.

[Catfish]

I am not sure if there are Russians other than me on this forum. So it would be populated by misinformed foreighners.


That is the whole idea of political threads.. and you will then have to sort out those.. misinformations. Why not turn the tables. :03:

I did not have much knowledge about British or US politics (nor do i now ahem), but we all chime in to ask, claim and discuss, it is a good thing to learn more about other countries; much better than reading tabloid media or Facebook anyway.

[Dmitry Markov]

ikalugin you can count on me - I am Russian as well :-) Pioneer's honest word.

[u crank]

I am not sure if there are Russians other than me on this forum. So it would be populated by misinformed foreighners.

:har:

That hasn't stop you and others from posting on the US and UK political threads.:03:

[Jimbuna]

Sorted: https://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?p=2615839#post2615839

[Bilge_Rat]

In case anyone missed it, one of the key suspects in the shoot down has been released by Ukraine over the objection of the Netherlands and handed back to Russia as part of the prisoner swap.

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2019/09/09/for-russia-the-exchange-of-a-key-figure-in-the-mh17-crash-could-be-quick-fix-that-backfires-a67207

The chances that anyone will ever stand trial for this is becoming ever more remote.

[Dargo]

Today marks the 10th anniversary of passenger flight MH17 getting shot down in Ukraine. The Netherlands will commemorate the disaster and the 298 people killed in various ways. The official commemoration will be held at the National MH17 monument in Vijfhuizen Park near Schiphol. Flags are hanging at half-mast in many municipalities. The national commemoration in Vijfhuizen will start at 2:00 p.m. on Wednesday. About 1,500 people will attend, including the loved ones of the victims, King Willem-Alexander, various Dutch Cabinet members like Prime Minister Dick Schoof, and representatives from Malaysia, Australia, the United Kingdom, Belgium and Ukraine. The names of all 298 victims will be read, followed by two minutes of silence.

Earlier this year, the Court of Audit reported that the Netherlands had, thus far, spent 166 million euros on the aftermath of the MH17 disaster. This includes expenditure on crisis management, repatriation of the victims, the investigation into the perpetrators, and bringing them to justice, among many other things.

https://i.postimg.cc/90Y7w3BG/MH17.png
If the truth comes out, I might be able to move forward a bit…But it won’t bring my daughters back. The hole they left behind gets bigger and bigger - the wound doesn’t heal, the wound lies open and I don’t think it will ever close.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CImFlhuSn40

[Jimbuna]

Malaysia Airline crash: Newcastle fans on passenger list

Two Newcastle United fans going to the club's pre-season tour were on a flight that crashed in Ukraine.

John Alder and Liam Sweeney, 28, were on the passenger list for flight MH17, Malaysia Airlines confirmed.

The Boeing 777 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur crashed on Thursday with 298 people on board.

Newcastle United and manager Alan Pardew have paid tribute to the fans. The names of other British people on the flight are starting to emerge.

They include Ben Pocock, from Bristol, who was studying at Loughborough University, and Richard Mayne, a Leeds University student from Leicestershire.

Flight MH17 came down 50km from the Russia-Ukraine border.

The two fans were travelling to New Zealand to see their team play.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-tyne-28363591

[Shadowblade]

I remember that very well, caused by separatist Buk SAM.