This world is going mad with hatred

[Marc Montgomery]

I could very easily be wrong.. but i think in this case it may be a simple case of a trigger happy bunch of zealots who thought it was a Ukrainian military transport... low intelligence madmen with access to highly deadly weapons.

We may never know, the recorders have been taken..there are reports of looting of bodies, and locals apparently were taking parts of the plane for the metal..making it difficult if not impossible to see what happened to the plane itself.

madmen and human vultures. 290 totally innocent people, some of the finest researchers into HIV...tourists, workers, sons daugters fathers mothers, friends....I cannot imagine the sorrow of the families.

[Tony Wheeler]

Certainly it was a case of misidentification Marc, however the weapon system deployed is considered by experts to be far too sophisticated for unqualified rebels to operate. It's largely on that basis, plus its immediate removal to Russia, that accusations are being levelled at the Russian military, for having either fired the missile themselves or trained the rebels who did. Of course, if we cast our minds back to the Iranian airliner shot down by the US Navy, after misidentifying an A300 Airbus as an attacking F-14 Tomcat, it's pretty clear that even the best trained military using state of the art equipment are not immune to such errors.

Personally I blame the airline industry in this case, because it's to them we entrust our lives, not the countries over which they fly us. Everyone knows this route should have been closed months ago, rather than just issue warnings, and airlines like MAS who ignored those warnings are to be despised IMO. They put profit ahead of safety to fly the shortest route and rolled the dice with passenger's lives. Perhaps I'm naive, but I find it astounding they'd fly over an active war zone with a declared no-fly zone up to 32000 feet and consider themselves safe. In any case the proof is in the pudding, and MH17 was the third aircraft shot down in the region that week.

[rob love]

Everybody is tired of war at this point, after treading water in the middle east for the last decade and then some. As well, you don't poke a very large bear. My assumption is that the US (and others) currently have heavy economic sanctions on Russia at this point, so what further can be done? Putin is certainly painting himself (and the rest of the world) into a corner.

[Marc Montgomery]

Well, we both may be right Tony to a greater or lesser extent, certainly many or most of the "rebels" would have had soviet-russian military training, and perhaps many quite recently.. but what no one seems to have asked is where these so-called "rebels" suddenly get their hands on so many weapons from light to heavy and such sophisticated weaponry.

and Rob I agree that many are tired of hearing about and getting involved in often (usually?) unresolvable conflicts- treading water- around the world. I dont know to what extent sanctions will actually hurt Russia as much of its economy is self sustaining internal trade and with former satellites.. Also Europe desperately needs Russian gas and oil and so is leary of poking the bear.

This latest horror however brings what most of the world wishes to classify as a regional affair (and more or less ignore), into an international one. It escalates it, but to what extent- i sure dont know- but the consequences of international intervention are so dangerous that in spite of the horror, probably are limited to a little sabre rattling... It might stop any (theoretical) Russian plan to expand operations into other areas.

Canada has sent six CF-18 to Romania, now Latvia..and 120 RCR,, not sure how much that worries Russia.

[Tony Wheeler]

Originally Posted by Marc Montgomery

what no one seems to have asked is where these so-called "rebels" suddenly get their hands on so many weapons from light to heavy and such sophisticated weaponry.

I believe it's mostly captured Ukrainian Army equipment Marc, and the mobile AA systems were from a captured Ukrainian Air Force base in Donetsk about three weeks ago. However they're getting pretty desperate now, they raided the Donetsk museum for a T54.

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