Posted on 12/09/2005 5:08:08 PM PST by concretebob
That link was interesting until I got to the WXXA-TV digital video story of a "strange, missile-like, unidentified aerial object" passing near an airliner. What a joke, that's a friggin' bug flying near the camera!
I think that it is good policy to interrupt the terrorists' intent.
I would agree, but I think the American people's right to know the truth of events may be more important.
Why the down play...could be NOT to give terrorist any publicity at all?
Do you think the news medias' advertising departments would like a story that would hurt the profits of some of their biggest customers, the airlines? If people were afraid to fly, the economic ripples would put the economy into another recession
TWA 800 story also had two combat experienced pilots witness the missile attack.
Hey thanks for your service!
Well, of course, one of the knee jerk reactions of any governmental bureaucracy is to cover things up because ordinary people can't be trusted not to panic. But then they should at least stop and think, would it be better to release or conceal this information to achieve the political purposes of our administration?
When clinton was in office, he had the additional reason that it would have been a real bother to have to deal with fantical Arabs. He had other things he was more interested in, like intervening in Haiti and Bosnia to support politically correct groups, and the last thing he wanted to do was get into a war with Islam--especially since he decided that he wanted to fight on the other side, to please his European Socialist friends.
But now the situation is different. Bush does have an interest in fighting the Muslim threat, or at least he did earlier. The press is mostly bent on denying that there is any real threat to our country, except for Arab resentment and European anger that Bush is stirring up by staying in Iraq.
How can you fight a war against Muslim enemies if you hide the fact that it is going on?
Yes, so I recalled. And a ton of other evidence as well, including the stuff the FBI was so anxious to prevent anyone from testing all over the seat covers. The most probable theories were a) that the plane was accidentally shot down in a Navy exercise going on in the area; and b) that it was shot down from a small boat by terrorists.
Frankly, I doubt a). It would seem to provide a more logical reason for covering it up, but I doubt that that many sailors could keep the secret this long. So, the only logical explanation is b).
What several observers said is that if it had been a fuel tank explosion, it would have been orange-red. But it was brilliant white, the color of an ordnance type explosion.
It's noticeable that Boeing was never sued, and nothing much was ever done to fix the combustibility of airplane fuel, which in fact was exceedingly unlikely to explode in the first place. Indeed, Boeing ceased protesting, probably under threat of losing contracts, but they never really admitted any fault.
No, the odds are about 95-5 that it was a terrorist missile (some witnesses say two missiles) that brought it down. There is also some talk that it may have been a Chinese made missile, since evidently China has given these SAMs extended range, but I won't get into that.
I should say that electronics is not my field, which is probably why the army promptly sent me to electronics school and then to the Hawk Missile training program in Huntsville, Alabama.
The army has a habit of putting people in fields other than the ones they might be qualified in. When I showed up for basic training in Fort Dix, it turned out that the Company Clerk couldn't read. Presumably they made him a clerk for that very reason. When it was KP time, he would hold up his list on a clipboard next to our chests, and compare the look of the names on the printed sheet with the names on our nametapes. Worked fine, but a little slow.
That was quite a while ago. Semiconductors and printed circuit boards had been invented, but Hawk missiles and radars still used miniature vaccuum tubes and copper wires, I think because they thought they would stand up better to stress and possible EMP bursts. I remember they were worried about the possibility of hairline cracks in the circuit boards. So we used wires, clips, and solder.
Where I come from, transponders pick up incoming radar and answer it with a return transmission. They don't just transmit all the time. That's what I was suggesting. The return transmission is much brighter than a return echo because it doesn't have to make the round trip. Of course it can also be on a different frequency, and normally contains an ID code of one kind or another. Either IFF or in this case the flight number.
On the other hand, if someone shouts "Fire" in a crowded theater, you should look around, and if you see some smoke, the proper thing to do would be to calm the shouting fellow down to prevent a panic, while you organize an orderly evacuation of the theater.
There is smoke in most of the cases we're talking about here. So somebody ought to at least take the trouble of investigating. And if there is a fire, they should tell people about it in an orderly fashion.
I heard Jack Cashell discuss this on Barabaras Simpson's show on KSFO last weekend. He stated he was initially directed to this incident by inquiries from some Freepers.
This whole thread has degenerated into a urinary dispersal match and that's a shame. The fact is, there is a real discussion to be had about the real possibility of a terrorist missile attack on commercial airliners. It may or may not be the case here but let's at least keep an open mind on BOTH sides of the debate.
And if on inspection it is a smoldering cigar butt, you put it out and let the show go on.
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