Given that an ICBM launch is subject to so many fail-safes that an accidental launch is presumably all-but-impossible, what we are left with is that what everyone saw, is exactly what everyone was supposed to see.
In other words, this time, and this location, for this event, were deliberately chosen to be witnessed by a huge number of people.
Why, of course, is another question. But complex answers are often revealed in steps.
So: This missile launch was supposed to be publically witnessed, and it was.
Whether or not it achieved it's goal is another thing. Where is it? And why, after making such a deliberate spectacle of it, is it now being denied as even being a missile?
Seems like it started out according to plan, and then something went wrong. Now, the spin is being spun. So what was the original intent? And what went wrong?
Nothing went wrong. It was an airplane. Now we know.