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Ukrainian military acknowledges it may have shot down flight MH17

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A Buk surface-to-air missile Photo: AP

by Systematic

An anonymous source in one of Ukraine’s security agencies said that the Malaysian Boeing was shot down as a result of an unauthorized Ukrainian Buk-M1 launch.

RIA Novosti reports citing a source in a Ukrainian security agency that the MH17 catastrophe may have been the result of an unanticipated situation during the training of one of Ukraine’s air defense units.

The anonymous source states the following: “On July 17 2014, the commander of the 156th Anti-Aircraft Missile Regiment was instructed to conduct missile crew training on providing coverage for Ukrainian ground forces in the suburbs of Donetsk, which entailed deploying the battalions, training target acquisition and tracking procedures, and carry out a simulated destruction of an aerial target using Buk-M1 missiles.” He said that battery commanders were issued launch keys, however, there were no plans to launch an actual 9M38M1 missile.

The training exercise involved two Su-25 aircraft, their task was to conduct aerial reconnaissance and designated training targets in the vicinity of Ukrainian troop concentration to the West of Donetsk.

The source: “After one of the aircraft entered Buk detection zone, it began to be tracked by a missile crew located near Zaroshchenskoye. In all likelihood, due to a tragic coincidence the flight paths of the Malaysian Boeing and the Su-25 coincided and, in spite of the altitude difference, were indicated on the Buk radar as a single target which proved fatal for the Boeing. If two targets are located on the same azimuth from the launch vehicle, the tracking system automatically shifts to the one which represents the largest radar target.”

SBU is trying to establish why the unauthorized launch took place. The source does not possess information about the course of that investigation.

We should note that the scenario described above is consistent with the results of the recent investigation conducted by Almaz-Antey. According to Russian experts, the Boeing was shot down by a 9M38M1 missile launched by a Buk-M1 system located near the village of Zaroshchenskoye which was under Ukrainian control.

Netherlands are conducting the main investigation of the July 17 catastrophe. The majority of victims were citizens of that country. Final results are expected in October. […]

Read in full Ukrainian military acknowledges it may have shot down flight MH17 at Fort Russ


The OffGuardian source in Moscow who alerted us to this story had the following comments to make on it:

[…] The leak comes as Kiev has been besieged by right-wing paramilitaries, who have road-blocked the city on all highways in and out. The fall of the Poroshenko regime is being widely predicted in the media. The leak is being interpreted as attempts by Ukraine’s top brass to dump blame for the cover-up on the outgoing regime, and win favour with whatever government replaces them.

Ukraine has consistently refused to supply information from its Air Traffic Controllers (who are in the pay of Ukrainian warlord Igor Kolomoisky, who owns Kiev airport) or its military high command to the investigation team.  Mysteriously this refusal has been accepted by the investigators. […]


And speaking of Kolomoisky, there’s this curious video of him commenting on the downing of MH17:

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Categories: conflict zones, latest, mh17