Vladimir Putin Owns This: "We have just shot down a plane"

Above, a scene of wreckage and bodies strewn about. Reuters photo.

Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17, a Boeing 777, was shot down by a BUK surface-to-air missile at about 33,000 feet (cruising altitude).

Evidence is mounting that Russian military intelligence and Ukrainian separatists were the culprits.

According to the U.K. Telegraph:

Ukraine's security service released intercepted phone calls that it says show Russian military intelligence admitting they shot down the plane.

In one call, a rebel says, “We have just shot down a plane.”  

The BUK missile used to shoot down the jet is too sophisticated for separatists to soley operate without Russian military assistance.

Sadly, this incident is a reminder of the shoot-down of Korean Airline Flight 007 back on September 1, 1983. The then-Soviet Union first denied shooting down the passenger jet, but later had to admit fault.

President Ronald Reagan went on national television on September 5 and said:

Let me state as plainly as I can: There was absolutely no justification, either legal or moral, for what the Soviets did.

Reagan also said that the shoot-down of KAL007 was "an act of barbarism, born of a society which wantonly disregards individual rights and the value of human life and seeks constantly to expand and dominate other nations."

It appears the Russians haven't either evolved or learned their lesson from the 1983 tragedy.

Whether or not the Russian military fired the missile doesn't matter. They were there under Putin's orders and possibly given to the separatists to use against aircraft.

Russian President Vladimir Putin owns this.

Pilot Who Shot Down Korean Airliner Says He "Performed Duty"

Above, the New York Times headline on the downing of KAL 007.

The Mainichi Shimbun has posted an interesting article on the former Soviet pilot who shot down Korean Air Lines KAL 007 in September 1983.

Here's a snippet from the article:

MYKOP, Russia (Kyodo) -- The former Soviet fighter pilot who shot down a South Korean jumbo jet in 1983, killing 269 people on board, has said he carried out his duty as a military officer but that he has had frequent nightmares about the incident. 

Gennady Osipovich, 69, a former lieutenant colonel, made the comment in a recent interview with Kyodo News in Mykop, capital of southern Russia's Republic of Adygea, where he now lives. 

Osipovich was 38 when he flew one of the 10 Soviet fighters which were scrambled from various air bases in Russian Far East after a Korean Air Lines' Boeing 747 intruded into Soviet airspace over Sakhalin on Sept. 1, 1983.

Congressman Larry McDonald (D-GA), a conservative Democrat (are there any of those around today?), was a passenger aboard KAL 007. He was a member of the national advisory board of Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) and had spoken weeks earlier in Los Angeles at the YAF National Convention at the Bonaventure Hotel. I attended the banquet that McDonald addressed.

To read the full article, go here.

Japanese Airline Passengers Should Be Anxious Over China's Air Defense Zone

Above, looking toward China from Kyushu.  Photo by Armand Vaquer.

China's declaration of an expanded "air defense zone" has stirred up anxieties among civilian airline customers.

According to an article in BusinessMirror.com:

TOKYO—Although she is a seasoned traveler who frequently flies between Tokyo and Hong Kong, Kazuyo Ito confessed to some preflight anxiety as she checked in on Thursday for Japan Airlines Flight 29. 

“It is a little scary,” said the 59-year-old homemaker when asked about China’s threat to stop aircraft that refuse to identify themselves when flying over a large swath of the East China Sea. 

The situation in effect puts airline passengers at the front lines of the dispute over China’s declaration of an air-defense identification zone over islands Japan administers. 

“They wouldn’t do something to a commercial airline,” Ito said uncertainly before turning to her 29-year-old daughter, Kaori, who piped in, with more confidence, “I don’t think it will affect regular passengers like us.”

Oh, no? Just tell that to the passengers of KAL007. That was a Korean Airlines Boeing 747 that was shot down by the Soviets back in the 1980s for straying over Soviet airspace.

The Chinese government is still communist, just like the communists who shot down KAL007.

Japanese airline passengers have every right and reason to be anxious.

To read more, go here.