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The closest track moving at a speed realistic for a surfaced sub (other than the 30knot track) is roughly 8 miles away.

Wrong. The very tracks that Irvine refers to are about 2 miles from the crash and travel 14-17 knots. This is from the NTSB's report, and the text on the chart is in the NTSB's report. The tracks are marked by the arrows toward the top, center of the graphic. The crash/debris zone is in the circled area, upper right corner.

So in fact Beers first story passes your truth test.

With all due respect, you don't understand the radar data plot you've posted. The times listed with the radar plots correspond to clock times. The last secondary radar hits (transponder signals represented by the dots connected with red lines) from TWA800 occurred at 2031:12, and that time is used to represent the initial explosions in TWA 800. The 14-17 knot track is over 5 miles away from TWA 800 at that time, and is still showing up on radar 16 minutes later (47:29) when it is approximately 2 miles away from where TWA 800 initially exploded. Now SubMareneer said it takes a couple minutes for the Trepang to crash dive, but I don't think he meant 16. So no, Beers' first story absolutely does not pass the truth test.