Iran says it ‘unintentionally’ shot down Ukrainian jetliner

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iranian state TV, citing a military statement, says the country ‘unintentionally ^ | 1/10/2020 | uncredited

[Swarthy Greek Immigrant]

FYI - I said the above as tongue in cheek satire :P

[Desslok]

USS Vincennes was also in an active firefight with Iranian speed boats.

High speed, high pressure environment. Add a flyby of a commercial plane with communication problems and you’ve got a disaster on your hands.

[leakinInTheBlueSea]

Indeed apples/oranges... both tragedies, but seriously... it looks like the Iranians set up under the departure path of the busiest international airport in Iran. The system that has been discussed (Tor-M1)... can be configured with more than one target acquisition radar (TAR) that provides radar coverage to the ground well beyond the missile range. If only a single vehicle/TAR, there are two TAR elevation settings (low/high). If set to low, again, they would track the aircraft from wheels up. If set to high, they would likely have less than 5 seconds from acquisition before the flight was too close to engage. So, either they watched an aircraft depart Khomeini International, pondered shooting it down for a few minutes (waiting for it to get within missile range) and decided to shoot it down, or they were operating the system (a system designed with the explicit purpose to take down aircraft) under the departure path of the nation’s busiest international airport in such a way that every northbound departure would put them in a position to decide in less than 5 seconds whether it was a commercial departure or an enemy aircraft. I find either of these difficult to believe, but find it very easy to believe a regime that has no problem recently killing hundreds of protestors might find a reason it thinks is sufficient to kill 176 more people. Has a passenger list been made available? Either that, or the tor-m1 discussion is off the mark... other systems may allow for the unintentional theory in a more believable way.

[Desslok]

To paraphrase an Air Force General I met years ago...

“Today’s air defense systems are advanced, intuitive, quick and very lethal. They’re so ‘smart’ that it can fool the smartest of leaders into a sense of complacency.”

You would think that since the Iranians were initiating an attack they would of thought of the variables and contingencies such as commercial air traffic.

Either they were just incompetent, had a AD system beyond their skill set or embraced a “fire first ask questions later” mentality. Worse, a “just the cost of doing business” attitude.

If the Iranian gov’t thinks they can just dish out millions in compensation, dismiss various officers and offer an apology they’re going to have rude awakening.