Quote from: AliceApocalypse on Jul 18, 2014, 07:31:32 PM
I doubt Putin woke up one morning and thought, "I think I will take the Ukraine." The pro Russian separatists have probably been preparing and arming from Russia for some time.
Putin wants the USSR back or at least assets in the former USSR. He already blitzed Georgia, and if Ukraine falls to a government supplied movement that can later be annexed into Russia so be it.
The USA does the same thing, we are just more subvert about it.
Quote from: The Eighth Passenger on Jul 18, 2014, 08:44:52 PM
Quote from: Kimarhi on Jul 18, 2014, 07:23:00 PM
Surface to air missile systems aren't that unusual to have. We supplied the afghan mujahedeen with plenty of stingers in Afghanistan back when our mutual enemy was Russia.
Something the US government certainly came to regret Hahaha!
But there's a big difference between manpads and the advanced radar guided missiles that was used in this case. Stingers and SA-7's cannot reach the cruise altitudes of commercial liners. Lots of commercial flights regularly fly over Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran with no problems at all. The shoulder launched manpad missiles are also considerably smaller and less damaging/destructive to aircraft and are easily fooled with decoy flares.
Radar guided systems such as the SA-11 or SA-17's used in this case are typically only used by sovereign nation states. They cost a lot of money and it takes a lot of time and effort to train an efficient crew. It's not something one simply gives to irregular's like the Stingers. Don't know what Russia was thinking if they did indeed supply and train the rebels - it just beggars belief.
A passenger plane isn't going to have decoy flares.
And that's why I said whatever the Russian equiv is to the Green Berets used the weapon system. When the whole conflict started there were numerous reports of how the separatist were being instructed by foreign military members from Russia. Not that hard to figure out. If Russia gives Ukraine a little push over the edge and the government that replaces Ukraine is a puppet government of Russia it seems like a pretty simple explanation as to why they would do it.
Kind of like America setting up democracies in the middle east in the hopes that they will rebel against hardline muslim jihadist rule to break any sort of mass organization in that region.
Occam's razor, simplest explanation is the best explanation.
