MH17 Crash Investigation Reaches Dead End

Might I suggest a MUCH better title ending in "... comes to the conclusion"? Come on, Ben.

That plane should NEVER have been flying in that area, and at the time, many operators had rerouted their flights to avoid much of Ukraine's airspace. What is unacceptable is that Russia and its proxies will have gotten away with murdering those on board the jet and what is worse, all over a dispute over a patch of land not worth fighting for. The Kremlin has always counted on the obscurity of the matter to wash its hands of it and once again, as it has for decades, inflicted misery, pain and suffering, something it knows how to to so well.

Lukas, well, maybe because there is NO conclusion yet.

True but my main reason for the change is because it includes the word 'dead' in the headline. I'm sure that can be changed to something more appropriate.

Many airlines also didn't reroute from flying in that area and were fine. It seems likely that it was a mistake, but an inexcusable mistake.

Hopefully someday this cold case will get resolved.

How many tens of millions of dollars were wasted coming to this conclusion?

Perhaps you're right. Think about all the money we waste investigating any crime . . . but especially war crimes and terrorism. Perhaps what was needed was an investigation like the Warren Commission that quickly came to the wrong conclusion about JFK's assassination. Congress was foolish to reopen the case in the 1970s and spend all that money to come to the correct conclusion.

Agreed. There will likely be a retired investigator or an amateur who keeps the case alive and finds *the* data point that precipitates the answer.

Chris - What’s your point? Don’t investigate and allow civil aviation to become target practice for terrorists? If I were a family member of one of the victims, I’d be outraged if the authorities just blew off an investigation to save money. It’s not concluded, it’s suspended for now and they did convict three in absentia. If those guys attempt to travel outside of Russia, they will get picked up.

Lukas is really trying to make trouble out of nothing. Let it go...

I have never thought it was anything but a mistake - they presumably thought they were shooting at a Ukrainian Air Force 'plane; indeed there might even have been an Ukrainian Air Force 'plane nearby.
Given that even the 2014 fighting was an undeclared invasion that was bad.
But the truly reprehensible behaviour on the part of the Russians was in denial, lying, trying to blame the Ukrainians, and trying to cover-up.

Not a reason to be shot out of the sky by a murderous regime that is Russia.

Maybe Putin's whole military operation was to kill the investigation.

People are missing what @Chris W is trying to point.

Yes there should be an investigation.
But the last 8 years is trying to convict Russia of ordering the hit.
Something we already assume within weeks of the crash (shoot down).

It's been dragging on for years because the 'why' is not what the investigators are looking for.
A simple mistaken identity without exact evidence is just not enough.
Concluding that it was mistaken identity is not acceptable, so they just close it.

Along those line, are wasted money trying to catch nothing except a witch.
They had Hanlon's razor from the start.

Some may have rerouted, but many did not. IIRC, there was a Singapore aircraft right behind MH17, and an Emirates one right in front. So it's not like whomever was firing in that area, didn't know it was a commercial lane....

Chris, wasted?? Sure you had no familiars, relatives or friends on that flight. Not one cent was "wasted" until now. It's called invested!
I'm astonished Ben didn't erase your comment.
Btw, as you talk about it in Dollars I guess you are American? Did you ever thought about how much million dollars trump has spend to try to become a second time president??? Just be human!

Bagoly, fighter jets in combat would never fly at that altitude.

It’s moments like these that make me want to clarify that there are several ”Lukas” on OMAAT 😉 I, for one, have no issue with the title 🙂

@Nelson
Trump? Don't just single out one guy.
Did you know how many billion dollars spent for any politician to be a President?

I am Malaysian and some people I know lost their family in both incidents. It's awful that no closure can be found because no one stepped up to accept responsibility. What a tragedy.

You can't be serious. You're really getting riled up over the widely common phrase, "dead end"? Trust me, nobody is getting their panties in a bunch over this expression... except you.

I think they thought it was a cargo plane. Apparently they shot one down a few days earlier.

"The big question" isn't really a question. It's pretty obvious it was a mix up - both because there's a lack of motive to target the aircraft, and based on intercepted communication of separatists following the shot-down.

Mistake or not (I don’t think the Russians intentionally shot down MH 17), the more important lesson is that there are genuinely bad state actors in the world. Russia under Putin is one of them and their supporters, yes China, I’m looking at you, are not states that will never act with any semblance of morality. They’re bad, horrible countries and need to be called out as such. There’s such a thing as right and wrong, as Ukraine has demonstrated.

@ Eskimo,
I know, it was just to give an example.

@Nelson

What altitude you think does fighter jets in combat flies?

You think Ukraine are capable of dropping precision bombs from 50,000 ft. like the NATO equipment.
Or they are thrill seekers and fly low enough to get shot by MANPADS.

I found incredible how fast ANY topic in the comments section become an american politics topic...

A day or two after the downing of MH17, Secretary of State John Kerry stated that US satellite recorded the event. This information was never publicly revealed, nor was submitted under seal to the Dutch investigation. The recordings from Kyiv ATC were supposedly erased or otherwise destroyed.

There is more to the murders of the MH17 passengers and crew than has been presented to the public.

@ Eskimo,
I think you misunderstood my reply. Fighter jets in combat usualy fly at lower altitude than comercial A/C's. That's what I meant. Yes they can fly higher but a combat is rarely at FL400 or higher, so yes I'm quite sure they were not trying to point any possible treatment.

I seem to remember in the immediate aftermath of the shoot down it being stated that the missile was meant for a Ukrainian IL76 which was in the area and the wrong aircraft was targeted. Interesting that the ATC tapes were not available.

@Nelson

I stand corrected. But also you missed my part that they wouldn't fly lower than commercial either.
The equipment that Ukraine have do operate at commercial airliner altitude to avoid MANPADS. With the exception of the SU-25, which is like Soviet's distant cousin of the A-10. Many SU-25 unfortunately were down by MANPADS.

However, the almighty NATO can and normally drop bombs from 50,000 ft. Many of their airframes are variant of commercial airliner, notably the 707.
So if NATO is operating, it's never safe from mistaken identity.

@ Phil,
Excuses were made to be used.