Did Iranian Airbus Shootdown Foreshadow TWA 800?

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.

I believe that was revealed when the Navy owned up to the training exercise.

That was hardly a secret. The Navy had to issue the NOTAMS with the airspace restrictions ahead of time. The fact that some subs were transiting the area was most likely kept secret because the Navy doesn't like to advertise the locations of their subs and there was no part subs could possibly played in the incident anyway. Any other assets were hundreds of miles away. But you'll still look at all that and find a deep, dark conspiracy on the part of the Navy anyway.

I'd have to go back and read what was released about this night, but as I recall there were surface ships in the area as well. As for a deep dark secret, evidendly so, since the Navy lied about it after the weeks and possibly months later. I just don't remember the time frame precisely after all these years.

The Navy initially said they didn't have any vessels within something like 130 miles of TWA 800 that night. That's somewhat different than them having naval vessels within one mile of the TWA 800 flight path. And the fact that they had three to five vessels in the direct vicinity, means that the Navy was flat out lying for reasons unknown.

The closest surface ship was the Normandy, almost 200 miles away. The three subs that were in the general area are irrelevant since none of them had the capability of lauching a SAM anyway, either deliberately or by accident. And as I said above, the Navy doesn't like to advertise the location of their subs.

As I said before, I believe there were also surface ships on site. I may be wrong about that, but I do believe there were.

I have said that I rule nothing out. This is equated by you to be a very bad thing to say about the Navy, but the Navy lying isn't a problem for you at all. The Navy lying didn't make it look bad in your eyes. That speaks volumes to me.

Obviously you've never been in the military.

LMAO, So having been in the Military would have made it a-okay that the Navy lied.

The Navy may be innocent as it can be here, but I didn't force it to lie. It destroyed it's own credibility on this matter, and there's nothing you or I can do about that.

I doubt that in your eyes the military had much credibility to begin with.

I've been here close to ten years and I've supported the military consistantly for that length of time. We lost 260 some odd souls when TWA 800 went down, and I take the loss just as seriously as I take the need to be surportive of the military.

I'm sorry you don't.

Please do.

As I said before, I believe there were also surface ships on site. I may be wrong about that, but I do believe there were.

If you are right then surely you can identify the ships in question. And if you are wrong, what does that do to your conspiracy theory?

LMAO, So having been in the Military would have made it a-okay that the Navy lied.

The military denies things all the time in the interest of maintaining security. The fact that a P-3 was in the area or submarines were transiting had nothing to do with the TWA flight, so why publicize it? The Navy is particularly touchy about the locations of their submarines and will take steps to ensure that their whereabouts remain unknown. And yes, that would include issuing denials that they know to be false.

I've been here close to ten years and I've supported the military consistantly for that length of time. We lost 260 some odd souls when TWA 800 went down, and I take the loss just as seriously as I take the need to be surportive of the military.

And yet despite the lack of supporting evidence, you have no problems believing that the same military you claim to support is also capable of shooting down civilain airliners and then engaging in a massive coverup. With supporters like you they hardly need enemies.

I'd have to go back and read what was released about this night, but as I recall there were surface ships in the area as well. As for a deep dark secret, evidendly so, since the Navy lied about it after the weeks and possibly months later. I just don't remember the time frame precisely after all these years.

Please do.

No thanks.

As I said before, I believe there were also surface ships on site. I may be wrong about that, but I do believe there were.

If you are right then surely you can identify the ships in question. And if you are wrong, what does that do to your conspiracy theory?

I have not elicited a theory other than the fact that the Navy lied about it's presence in the area. Oh yes, well there is that! I have said that I will keep all options on the table until the downing of TWA 800 is given serious redress by the government. If you're too imature to control your bowels over that, too bad.

In a criminal court there is a concept known as 'clean hands'. If a party brings legal action against another, the case can be thrown out of court if it can be shown that the plaintif was involved in a criminal act associated with the case. When the Navy lied here, it destroyed it's credibility as it related to the matter.

LMAO, So having been in the Military would have made it a-okay that the Navy lied.

The military denies things all the time in the interest of maintaining security. The fact that a P-3 was in the area or submarines were transiting had nothing to do with the TWA flight, so why publicize it? The Navy is particularly touchy about the locations of their submarines and will take steps to ensure that their whereabouts remain unknown. And yes, that would include issuing denials that they know to be false.

Well I'd suspect even you might be able to understand that with a loss of approximately 260 lives this instance might be a little different than most others. As protective as the Navy is, submarine locations are revealed when they return to port, so it isn't like the Navy never reveals their location is it? As for what the actual disposition of assetts in the area were, we may never know. We've even seen some people express the belief that even under the circumstances that took place that night, it was okay for the Navy to lie.

I've been here close to ten years and I've supported the military consistantly for that length of time. We lost 260 some odd souls when TWA 800 went down, and I take the loss just as seriously as I take the need to be surportive of the military.

And yet despite the lack of supporting evidence, you have no problems believing that the same military you claim to support is also capable of shooting down civilain airliners and then engaging in a massive coverup. With supporters like you they hardly need enemies.

I have said that I am keeping all options on the table. That is judgement neutral in case you don't have the faculties to determine it on your own.

The Navy is a rather large entity. Most folks would be capable of understanding that someone could hold off judgement on a certain incident and still be supportive of the service over all. I am supportive of police services over all, but when one of those services goes postal, I look at the situation openly and urge condemnation or exhoneration depending on the facts that surface.

What could be more destructive to any wholesome organization than to have people who were willing support it no matter what some of its members did? I will continue to keep all options on the table.

If your idea of support for the Navy means that it can never do wrong, then you and I have a different perception of what healthy support for an organization actually is.

No thanks.

Couldn't find any, huh? Well there's a simple reason for that. There weren't any.

Well I'd suspect even you might be able to understand that with a loss of approximately 260 lives this instance might be a little different than most others. As protective as the Navy is, submarine locations are revealed when they return to port, so it isn't like the Navy never reveals their location is it?

It'd be kind of hard to hide a submarine tied up to a pier. But before reaching port, the Navy would have every possible reason for wanting to hide the whereabouts of their submarines or what areas they're transiting in. And that would well include P-3 exercises that involve them. And since neither submarines nor P-3s could shoot down an airliner why should the Navy publicize their activities?

The Navy is a rather large entity. Most folks would be capable of understanding that someone could hold off judgement on a certain incident and still be supportive of the service over all.

I don't see how. You would have us believe that you support our military while at the same time believing they're capable of shooting down a civilian airliner and engaging in a massive coverup to deny responsibility. I don't see that as supportive, expecially since there is no evidence to support it.

No thanks.

Couldn't find any, huh? Well there's a simple reason for that. There weren't any.

No, that would mean that I didn't look for any. Let me know if you need more help comprehending forum responses.

Well I'd suspect even you might be able to understand that with a loss of approximately 260 lives this instance might be a little different than most others. As protective as the Navy is, submarine locations are revealed when they return to port, so it isn't like the Navy never reveals their location is it?

It'd be kind of hard to hide a submarine tied up to a pier. But before reaching port, the Navy would have every possible reason for wanting to hide the whereabouts of their submarines or what areas they're transiting in. And that would well include P-3 exercises that involve them. And since neither submarines nor P-3s could shoot down an airliner why should the Navy publicize their activities?

Are you going on record stating that a shoulder fired SAM couldn't be fired from a surfaced submarine?

The Navy is a rather large entity. Most folks would be capable of understanding that someone could hold off judgement on a certain incident and still be supportive of the service over all.

I don't see how.

Now there's startling news.

You would have us believe that you support our military while at the same time believing they're capable of shooting down a civilian airliner and engaging in a massive coverup to deny responsibility.

I believe that there are a very limited number of players that could have fired a SAM capable of taking down TWA 800. Our military would obvsiously be one of them. Once again, I am keeping ALL options on the table regardless of the odds against one of those options is 'THE' option. The possibility still exists. Until the cause is revealed, we just don't know for certain.

I don't see that as supportive, expecially since there is no evidence to support it.

Were you on one of the vessels in question that night?
Do you know what the operation was?
Do you know what every person was doing at the moment TWA 800 was taken down?

My perception is no, no, no.

No, that would mean that I didn't look for any. Let me know if you need more help comprehending forum responses.

No, I just assumed that you were serious when you admitted that you'd have to actually look for some evidence to support your claims. In retrospect the fact that you didn't isn't surprising at all.

Are you going on record stating that a shoulder fired SAM couldn't be fired from a surfaced submarine?

My, you are getting wilder and wilder with your theories, aren't you. Very well, I won't go on record stating a shoulder fired SAM couldn't be fired from a surfaced sub, but I will go on record stating that shoulder fires SAMs are not carried on U.S. submarines, for obvious reasons.

I believe that there are a very limited number of players that could have fired a SAM capable of taking down TWA 800. Our military would obvsiously be one of them. Once again, I am keeping ALL options on the table regardless of the odds against one of those options is 'THE' option. The possibility still exists. Until the cause is revealed, we just don't know for certain.

Oh you can stick your 'keeping ALL options open' where the sun don't shine. What you are saying, and please be man enough to admit it, is that you think it's possible, even probable, that the U.S. Navy shot down TWA 800 and then engaged in a massive coverup. Like I said, with supporters like you the Navy hardly needs enemies.

No, that would mean that I didn't look for any. Let me know if you need more help comprehending forum responses.

No, I just assumed that you were serious when you admitted that you'd have to actually look for some evidence to support your claims. In retrospect the fact that you didn't isn't surprising at all.

I agree. It isn't surprising at all because I havn't proposed a theory other than that all options remain on the table. Why would I be looking for proof of something I haven't included in a specific theory.

Are you going on record stating that a shoulder fired SAM couldn't be fired from a surfaced submarine?

My, you are getting wilder and wilder with your theories, aren't you.

Wilder?

Very well, I won't go on record stating a shoulder fired SAM couldn't be fired from a surfaced sub,...

Okay, so much for the "wilder and wilder" theory.

but I will go on record stating that shoulder fires SAMs are not carried on U.S. submarines, for obvious reasons.

Unless unbeknownst to you a special ops training exercise was under way.

I believe that there are a very limited number of players that could have fired a SAM capable of taking down TWA 800. Our military would obvsiously be one of them. Once again, I am keeping ALL options on the table regardless of the odds against one of those options is 'THE' option. The possibility still exists. Until the cause is revealed, we just don't know for certain.

Oh you can stick your 'keeping ALL options open' where the sun don't shine.

No problem, I haven't exactly been respectful in my responses, so that's fair.

What you are saying, and please be man enough to admit it, is that you think it's possible, even probable, that the U.S. Navy shot down TWA 800 and then engaged in a massive coverup. Like I said, with supporters like you the Navy hardly needs enemies.

Once again:

I believe that there are a very limited number of players that could have fired a SAM capable of taking down TWA 800. Our military would obvsiously be one of them. Once again, I am keeping ALL options on the table regardless of the odds against one of those options is 'THE' option. The possibility still exists. Until the cause is revealed, we just don't know for certain.

Well you've said a lot of things. Unfortunately none of them have addressed what actually did take down TWA 800.

If you would like to address that, be my guest.

Let me ask you a question. Do you think the actions of the FBI were problematic at Waco?

Unless unbeknownst to you a special ops training exercise was under way.

Your imagination is running away with you.

Look, believe what you want. Don't let the fact that there is zero evidence to support your wild-ass conspiracy theories get in your way. Go ahead and make up special ops training exercises or super secret weapons systems or rogue Navy ships that go off and shoot down airliners. Whatever makes you happy. But if you also insist that after all of that you still support and respect the U.S. Navy and the other armed forces, well then speaking as a Naval officer I don't want your respect because I doubt its sincerity and I can live without the support of people like you who think that the armed service that I spent almost my entire adult life in could engage in mass-murder and coverups.

Unless unbeknownst to you a special ops training exercise was under way.

Your imagination is running away with you.

Is it my imagination that the Navy lied about whether thay had assets in the water under TWA 800 that night?

Look, believe what you want.

I will. And right now I believe the true reason for the downing of TWA 800 hasn't been provided. That means that we don't know what took it down.

Don't let the fact that there is zero evidence to support your wild-ass conspiracy theories get in your way.

There is but one wild-ass conspiracy theory between you and I, and it is the conspiracy theory that I am here to take down the Navy. You have called me a conspiracy theorist a number of times on this thread, but I haven't proposed one single substantive act on behalf of the Navy as the cause of TWA 800 going down. Point to one place where I have.

Right now, link me to the place where I said, "The Navy...", and you fill in the blank with whatever action I specifically stated the Navy took. Link us to it. Now.

Go ahead and make up special ops training exercises or super secret weapons systems or rogue Navy ships that go off and shoot down airliners.

I have been quite clear that I do not know what took place that took down TWA 800. I have left all options open. You are the one who blew that out to mean that I was specifically stating the Navy took down TWA 800. Yet you call me the conspiratorialist.

Whatever makes you happy.

You think it makes me happy to wonder what took down TWA 800? You think it makes me happy to have all options on the table? Whew!

But if you also insist that after all of that you still support and respect the U.S. Navy and the other armed forces,...

There's no 'if' option here bud. I do. I will tell you that I am sorry to see your judgement on display like this though. I happen to appreciate your service and accept this is not an example of the judgement you used in service to our nation. I support just about everything the military asks for, and there are times when I want more for it than it does asks for.

well then speaking as a Naval officer I don't want your respect because

Thankfully my support isn't dependent on your desires...

I doubt its sincerity

It's a free country...

and I can live without the support of people like you

Perhaps you can and perhaps you can't. I suspect there are quite a few of us out here, who have open minds and a healthy skepticism when things are not on the up and up. And I would be quite surprised if there weren't many of them serving in the armed forces.

who think that the armed service that I spent almost my entire adult life in could engage in mass-murder and coverups.

This comment pretty much reveals the gap between what I have been saying and what you have been comprehending.

At no place in this thread or anywhere else have I stated that the Navy intentionally shot down TWA 800 or engaged in mass-murder. While I do keep an open mind to the ultimate fate of TWA 800, I have never considered this an option and I have never stated that I did.

Hi LS. If you’d rather I not communicate with you on this, that’s fine. I wanted to ask some questions.

1. If the FBI, CIA explanation was correct, could you please tell us why there haven’t been any other instances of mid-tank failure?

2. If 250 witness accounts don’t mean anything to you, how many wintesses would there have to be before you would accept that their observations were acceptable?

3. Did mythbusters put the fuel tank in an artificial environment so that it matched the environment TWA 800’s tank would have been in at 17,000 feet?

1) It doesn't matter if something happens only once. Doesn't mean it didn't happen (parting of the Red Sea). But it didn't happen only once. The test has been recreated, meaning that the EVENT happened once, but potential other events were averted. For example, a ship the size of the Titanic only sank one time from iceberg collision . . . because they changed the shipping rountes right after that so that it wouldn't happen again. Likewise, there was only ONE catastrophic failure of the hydraulic system of a DC-10 that caused the horrible Chicago crash 20 years ago, because they fixed it.

2) I don't care how many "eyewitnesses" you have. It's irrelevant if they mis-saw something. Eyewitness testimony, as any attorney or cop will tell you, is notoriously unreliable. I'm satisfied with FBI interviews of these people that showed that, in fact, most did not "see" what the reports claimed they saw.

3) Yes.

4) But all this continues to get away from the REAL evidence: there was no missile that could have done this capable of being fired by anyone other than the U.S. Navy in a DELIBERATE attack. This cannot "happen" accidentally. If you work with the military, you know how incredibly detailed "live fire" operations are; how ESPECIALLY in zones where civilians might be nearby, tremendous precautions are taken. No one has explained how a "Standard" (the ONLY missile that could have done this) was "accidentally" fired. (Doesn't happen). If it did, THOUSANDS of sailors, radar guys, air guys etc. would have been in on it, and you never would have kept a lid on that. Simply impossible. And "Standards" are not just fired off except in highly controlled tests (too expensive), so for a test you would have a drone (oops! No radar signature of a drone hovering around the area for a half hour!), and no way a "Standard" would jump from a drone to a real plane. Finally, you have aborts on these tests.

So ruling out foreigners (couldn't, didn't, had no weapon support capable of doing that); ruling out accidental; all you then are left with is a deliberate launch. Silly.

Now, use Occam's Razor. When you eliminate the alternatives, an exploding tank is all that fits the evidence, regardless of what people think they "saw." Again, note in Dallas hundreds of people "saw" shooters on the "grassy knoll," but no sound evidence of a shot exists; no other bullets were ever found; no forencis evidence of people standing or shooting from the front; etc.

Thanks for your response. If we’re going to go by Occams Razor the simplest answer is the one that we should follow. The simplest answer is that hundreds of aircraft flying out of Middle-Eastern ports of call in the midst of summer, didn’t develop what an aircraft traveling out of New York did one summer evening. If the parts were faulty, the parts would have been faulty in other aircraft as well. And they weren’t.

The center fuel tank may have blown, but it didn’t blow by natural causes.

Six hundred people in an arc of about 240 degrees saw something fly up in the air to reach the aircraft. Their observations of the location of the specific item they saw, makes it clear they each saw the same thing from different perspectives. And over 600 people seeing this, it defies Occam’s Razor to ignore what so many people saw. The simple answer is, they saw a missile. No convoluted twists of logic and warps of reality are going to change that.

All things considered, the simplest explanation is that these people saw a missile leave the surface of the ocean and hit TWA 800. That’s the end of discussion.

If you folks want to play flights of fantasy, be my guest.

Well, you keep dodging the real questions:

1) there were NO ---get it? ZERO---bomb fragments or explosive residue of ANY kind found.

2) the so -called "red residue" was NOT---repeat, NOT---explosive residue. It was only (possibly) evidence of a rocket motor's exhaust. But no rocket parts were ever recovered, and other things could have caused that residue.

3) We have no missile parts, no evidence of explosives, and . . . no missile capable of hitting that plane except one fired by AMERICANS. We have complete denial by the Navy that any vessel capable of firing such a missile was in the area, not to mention the fact that you have not had ONE SINGLE STATEMENT by any sailor or officer that in any way implicates the Navy. That is truly damning for the conspiracy theorists, because NO ORGANIZATION is 100% leak-free . . . unless it didn't happen.

Now, come on. You have to quit ducking real evidence in favor of "logic" and eyewitnesses. If there's one thing we learn from nighttime TV, it is that in crimes, the forensics don't lie.

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