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Did Iranian Airbus Shootdown Foreshadow TWA 800?
Jack Cashill ^ | 11/14/07 | Jack Cashill

Posted on 11/16/2007 10:04:18 PM PST by Sioux-san

On the Sunday morning of July 3, 1988, at the tail end of the Iran-Iraq War, an Aegis cruiser, the USS Vincennes, fired two Standard Missiles at a commercial Iranian Airbus, IR655.

The first missile struck the tail and right wing and broke the aircraft in half. All 290 people aboard were killed. Misunderstanding America, the Iranians claimed that our Navy had intentionally destroyed the plane.

The Navy did no such thing.

(Excerpt) Read more at cashill.com ...


TOPICS: Editorial; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: cashill; flight800; iran; twa800; twaflight800
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To: Thermalseeker

“Mythbusters” recreated this incident exactly. In fact, they got a MORE powerful explosion using a wire spark and fuel tank vapors heated to the levels present in TWA 800.


41 posted on 11/17/2007 7:35:27 AM PST by LS (CNN is the Amtrak of News)
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To: NonValueAdded
Yes, the Vincinnes incident was debated hotly in Proceedings and the captain came under tremendous criticism.

The explanation of TWA 800's explosion has been validated by "Mythbusters," who are really good at recreating these things. In fact, they got a tremendous explosion that surprised even them.

People don't want to let this go because it happened on Clinton's watch, like the anti-FDR people still cling to the "FDR knew about Pearl Harbor" crap. Stuff happens sometimes. Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. The Japanese did achieve suprise on Dec. 7. Sacco and Vanzetti DID kill that guard. The Rosenbergs were guilty. Just because something fits, or doesn't fit, one's political desires doesn't make it less true.

42 posted on 11/17/2007 7:38:44 AM PST by LS (CNN is the Amtrak of News)
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To: PetroniusMaximus

I saw him say it ...also George Stepinclintoncrap
said it was a terrorist act just like TWA 800


43 posted on 11/17/2007 7:39:04 AM PST by advertising guy (If computer skills named us, I'd be back-space delete.)
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To: LS
“Mythbusters” recreated this incident exactly. In fact, they got a MORE powerful explosion using a wire spark and fuel tank vapors heated to the levels present in TWA 800.

At 17,000' pressure altitude? Got a link?

44 posted on 11/17/2007 7:47:05 AM PST by Thermalseeker (Thinking of voting Democrat? Wake up and smell the Socialism!)
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To: Thermalseeker

Nope. Watched the show. Yes, they recreated the same conditions. They always do.


45 posted on 11/17/2007 7:47:44 AM PST by LS (CNN is the Amtrak of News)
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To: LS

Mythbusters also “proved” that sugar in a cars gas wont hurt it. They “prove” a lot of things that are not true.


46 posted on 11/17/2007 7:51:48 AM PST by weezel
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To: LS
Yes, they recreated the same conditions. They always do.

Well, in order for them to create a pressure altitude of 17,000' for such a test, it would have to involve some sort of decompression chamber. They would also have to match the exact mixture of atmospheric gasses as are found at that altitude. These two things are crutial and ones that I doubt they employed due to the cost.

You can get kerosene to burn explosively at sea level if you heat it to the flash point and add a spark. A big kaboom will result. However, if you didn't see the pressure altitude or mixture conditions met, then they were comparing apples to oranges. I've camped at over 12,000' in the Rockies and a Bic lighter barely works. Forget building a campfire. The fuel tanks are vented to the outside ambient pressure. Otherwise, they would fail as you go up in altitude due to the pressure differential. There simply isn't enough O2 at the altitude TWA800 is supposed to have come apart to allow for explosive combustion of kerosene without it first being compressed to several atmospheres. That's what the jet engine does and why it works so well at altitude.

47 posted on 11/17/2007 8:06:12 AM PST by Thermalseeker (Thinking of voting Democrat? Wake up and smell the Socialism!)
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To: BIGLOOK; bobby.223

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1927080/posts?page=2#2


48 posted on 11/17/2007 8:07:33 AM PST by Calpernia (Hunters Rangers - Raising the Bar of Integrity http://www.barofintegrity.us)
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To: PetroniusMaximus

I remember that.


49 posted on 11/17/2007 8:11:07 AM PST by Calpernia (Hunters Rangers - Raising the Bar of Integrity http://www.barofintegrity.us)
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To: DoughtyOne

There were weapon caches reported buried in the beach too. The confiscated weapons were in the ATF vault. That vault was in the basement of the World Trade Center.


50 posted on 11/17/2007 8:12:59 AM PST by Calpernia (Hunters Rangers - Raising the Bar of Integrity http://www.barofintegrity.us)
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To: neodad
The "bluebirds" are on the rails when you go in and out of port and to conduct training but cannot launch.

Grin, I used to be involved in building/testing/deploying the "blue birds" or GMTRs... They could fly, briefly... :-) That is, on the original (4?) Aegis ships with the MK-26 trainable launchers. They could "dud jettison" a round - including our GMTRs... Of course, that was just enough to clear the rail... Thanks for bringing back some memories.

51 posted on 11/17/2007 8:33:20 AM PST by CodeMasterPhilzar
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To: CodeMasterPhilzar

Yeah. The Block I Aegis had the Mk. 26 launchers. Looked cool coming in and out of port. It was Yorktown, Vincennes, Valley Forge, and Ticonderoga. I’m partial to the MK 26 over the VLS.


52 posted on 11/17/2007 9:08:20 AM PST by neodad (USS Vincennes (CG-49) Freedom's Fortress)
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To: neodad
The Navy did not shoot down TWA 800. Go blame someone else.

I never said they did. But they certainly did shoot down IR655, deliberately, by mistake, and tried to finesse their responsibility for having done so.

53 posted on 11/17/2007 9:30:17 AM PST by Grut
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To: DoughtyOne
Think about who was president. Bubba Klinton would throw the Navy to the wolves and like it. He'd publicize everything, smear the entire Navy, fire and court martial everybody he could while giving the press unprecedented access, and whip up the biggest anti-military frenzy possible.

I was in the Navy from 1988-1994. Trust me, Klinton screwed the Navy six ways from Sunday. He and his baboon wife have always shown utter contempt for the military. Why would he lie and cover up something that would make them look like total garbage? The risk of getting caught is too high for him personally, and it's more in his nature to "prove" that the military is run by a bunch of nutcases who need their wings clipped big-time.

I'm betting it was a shoulder-fired missile that some islamokazi was packing.

54 posted on 11/17/2007 1:05:39 PM PST by Excuse_My_Bellicosity (Oh, the huge manatee!!!)
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To: rbg81

I’m not immune to that arguement.


55 posted on 11/17/2007 1:32:43 PM PST by DoughtyOne (California, where the death penalty is reserved for wholesome values. SB 777)
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To: Thermalseeker

What I found amusing was that they tried to play up the heat that day and that the plane had to stand still with it’s air conditioning unit on, as if the heat buildup were somethng significant. These aircraft fly in and out of the Middle-East constantly with no problem at all.

Then there’s the wiring issue, that to this day still hasn’t cost another aircraft it’s existance ten years farther along in the life cycle.

Some folks claim that there have been other fuel tank problems, but they are very very far and few between and I’m not sold on their actual cause of loss either.


56 posted on 11/17/2007 1:38:11 PM PST by DoughtyOne (California, where the death penalty is reserved for wholesome values. SB 777)
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To: Thermalseeker

I should have addressed your comments. Sorry about that. I believe your reasoning is quite solid on those points.


57 posted on 11/17/2007 1:39:14 PM PST by DoughtyOne (California, where the death penalty is reserved for wholesome values. SB 777)
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To: Non-Sequitur

I’m afraid I’m not as confident of that as you are. About six days prior to the TWA 800 incident there were reports of missile(s) sighted in the area. I honestly don’t know what was going on in the area, but I have an open mind when it comes to life fire testing.


58 posted on 11/17/2007 1:44:30 PM PST by DoughtyOne (California, where the death penalty is reserved for wholesome values. SB 777)
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To: ryan71

Ryan, my objective isn’t to place blame on anyone. If (and I say this objectively) the Navy did make a mistake, I would grumble and forget about it. There were reports of people seeing some type of missile in the area about six days prior to TWA 800. I’m not trying to give anyone a hard time here, other than to say that I do not believe the government line on this accident in the slightest.

Was it the Navy? Some have come to it’s defense and I can understand why. I believe you folks do so with more information than I, and the honest belief that it just couldn’t have been involved. I don’t fault you for that. I only consider it because something caused it and there aren’t too many entities out there that could have been responsible for this.

If it was a terrorist act, I would have expected the government to be honest about it. The only reason for a coverup in my estimation, would be a cause that the government just couldn’t own up to. Terrorism, a government mistake, I don’t honestly know. Too many eye witnesses saw the deed. Evidently some electronic evidence of this popped up later also.

Thanks for the response. I appreciate your thoughts on it and I’m not here to belittle your opinion.


59 posted on 11/17/2007 1:51:27 PM PST by DoughtyOne (California, where the death penalty is reserved for wholesome values. SB 777)
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To: Thermalseeker

Thanks for those comments. There were informative.


60 posted on 11/17/2007 2:02:09 PM PST by DoughtyOne (California, where the death penalty is reserved for wholesome values. SB 777)
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