The to-do about Turkey shooting down the Russian jet continues. The US recently said that their data shows that the Turkish view of events is correct and that the Russian jet did indeed violate Turkish airspace.
However, a group of Belgian physicists recently calculated that there is no way that the Turkish account can be correct based on the laws of physics. In other words, the Turks are lying.
It is probable that the Russian jet never even went into Turkish airspace at allo. Further, it is also probable that no Russian jet has ever violated Turkish airspace. What probably happened on the occasions when Turkey was accusing the Russians of violating Turkish airspace was that the Russian jet flew within five miles of border. For years now, Turkey has said that its airspace begins five miles inside the Syrian border.
The navigator of the jet who was rescued insisted that the jet never violated Turkish airspace. He is probably telling the truth. The Russians have released radar maps proving their case. The Turks have also released maps supposedly proving their case.
There are problems with the Turks’ case.
First of all, it appears that there is no way that this downing could have taken place unless it was pre-planned. Indeed, the Turkish Vice President himself gave the order to take down the jet. There is no way that the VP could have been contacted in the supposed 17 seconds when the jet was over Turkish airspace in order to give the shootdown order. That’s just not possible. The only way that could have been true is if the Turks had plotted to down the jet as a pre-planned attack.
Indeed a former high ranking commander in the US Air Command stated that the only way that that attack could have happened at all was if it was pre-planned because he said 17 seconds was too little time to make a decision to down a jet. In other words, a top US NORAD official insists that the attack was pre-planned.
The US says that the Russian jet did indeed violate Turkish airspace based on US evidence (not presented). They also said that the jet was engaged over Turkish airspace. There is no way on Earth that that could be true. The jet was engaged instead 3-4 miles west of where it supposedly crossed the border, and when it was hit, it was 2.5 miles inside Syria.
There is no way that the missile could have been fired when the jet was over Turkey and ended up hitting the jet four miles away 2.5 miles inside Syria. The only conclusion based on where the plane was hit is that the Russian jet was simply shot down inside Syria – 2.5 miles inside Syria for that matter. Even if the Russian jet did violate Turkish airspace (probably not even true), it is never proper to fire on a jet that violated your airspace long after it left your airspace.
Considering the jet was downed 2.5 miles into Syria, the suggestion is that it never violated Turkish airspace in the first place and was simply shot down over Syria, and then a lie was invented that the jet had been over Turkey instead.
The Turks said that they gave many warnings to the Russian jet. However, even if the jet was only over Turkish airspace for 17 seconds, there is no way that the Turks could have given all of those warnings in only 17 seconds. It makes no sense. Anyway, the navigator said that they never received any warnings. He is probably telling the truth.
Even if the jet did violate Turkish airspace (probably not even true), the proper response is not to shoot it down. Planes violate other countries’ airspace all the time. For instance, Turkey violated Greek airspace 2,244 times last year. You need to decide if the plane’s intent is hostile or not. A jet momentarily going over the edge of your airspace for 17 seconds in what looks like an inadvertent move is never reasonable cause to shoot down a jet.
Even if the Turks did give warnings for five whole minutes (How could they give warnings for five minutes when the jet was only over Turkey for 17 seconds?), you are not supposed to shoot down a jet just because it is not picking up or heeding your warnings. In that cases, the Turkish jet could have paralleled the Russian jet. If the Russian jet was really over Turkey, the proper response would have been to escort the Russian jet out of the country, not to shoot it down.
Turkey would have done something so crazy and stupid unless they had the go-ahead from the US and NATO. The Arab press is now reporting that Obama gave the green light for Turkey to shoot down the Russian jet when he met with Erdogan in Turkey just recently. This story is probably correct.
The real reason that the jet was shot down is probably based on a number of factors.
First of all, for the past 3-4 days, Russian jets had been bombing a Turkmen jihadi group armed by both the CIA and Turkey that fights in this area which is the home to many Turkmen villages. Turkey regards the Syrian Turkmen as “Turks” as if they were citizens of Turkey itself. That Turkmen unit is armed and supplied by Erdogan, and Turkish officers and fighters are all mixed in with them.
In other words, that Turkmen jihadi group is Turkey’s baby. The Russians were bombing Turkmen who Turkey regards as fellow Turks and its de facto citizens, attacking the very force that Turkey has been raising by hand over time.
The Turks were growing increasingly furious over that few days of Russian attacks on the Turkmen jihadi group. The last warning the day before the jet shootdown had been ominous.
In addition, Russia had started bombing ISIS’s oil tanker trucks a few days before. Turkey profits greatly from the sale of ISIS oil. The ISIS-Turkey oil trade is run by none other than Erdogan’s brother himself. Support for ISIS is a family business in the Erdogan family, as Erdogan’s sister runs a hospital near the border that is dedicated to treating wounded ISIS fighters. The Russian bombing of ISIS’ oil business really hit the Turks where it counts.
The US probably had other reasons to encourage Turkey to shoot down the jet and start a rift between Turkey and Russia. There is a project to run Russian gas down through Turkey and the Black Sea to eastern Europe and then up to Austria. This project is called the South Stream, and the US has been anxiously trying to kill this project for some time now.
The US may also be trying one more time to deprive the Russians of the only warm water access for their Navy fleet as we did with the Crimea takeover by hostile Ukrainian Nazis determined to kick the Russians to of their Sevastopol seaport, their only warm water port. In order to salvage their desperately needed warm water port, Russia annexed Crimea, which had always been a part of Russia anyway. Annexing Crimea was an absolute necessity for the Russians.
Along the same lines, Turkey controls the vital Straits of Bosporus which is Russia’s only way to get out to the Mediterranean Sea. In fact, control over this strait is one of the main reasons why no one wants to make the Turks too mad. They could always close off that strait, and the world economy and especially the Russian economy would be harmed. Also Russia would lose access to its warm water port again because even if Russia retained the port at Crimea, it would do no good if Russian ships could not go through the Straits of Bosporus to get to the Mediterranean.
