Yves here. I have not followed the story of the Azerbaijan Airlines crash closely, precisely because the speculation was way ahead of information. Nevertheless, claims by Western officials that Russian air defense missiles brought down the jet are leading many to try to connect dots now.
What is missing here is the question of cui bono if this was deliberate….as some commentators are saying or at least insinuating.
By Andrew Korybko, a Moscow-based American political analyst who specializes in the global systemic transition to multipolarity in the New Cold War. He has a PhD from MGIMO, which is under the umbrella of the Russian Foreign Ministry. Originally published at his website
Pandora’s Box of speculation was already opened by the US and Ukraine so there’s no need for Russia to restrain itself from injecting its own speculation, albeit that which is much more reasonable, into the global discourse.
CNN cited an unnamed US official to report that the crash of Azerbaijan Airlines flight J2-8243 in Kazakhstan, which was traveling from Baku to Grozny before suddenly veering off course towards the Caspian Sea, might have been caused by Russian air defenses mistakenly firing on it. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov cautioned against indulging in speculation and to wait until the investigation is concluded, but his advice obviously went unheeded by the US, which has an interest in shaping the narrative.
In this case, it wants to absolve Ukraine of responsibility after it turned out that it had launched long-range drone strikes on Grozny around the time of the incident, which could have either led to Russian air defenses mistakenly firing on the plane or the shrapnel from a destroyed drone could have hit it instead. RT reported that the preliminary investigation hypothesized that a bird strike was to blame, but footage of the crashed plane appearing pockmarked prompted speculation that something else happened.
The viral spread of CNN’s report, which carries an air of authority for some since it cites an unnamed US official, necessitates that it be challenged despite Peskov cautioning against any speculation. The sequence of events that unfolded does indeed suggest that something happened in the air on the way to Grozny that resulted in the plane suddenly veering off course towards the Caspian, but the post-crash footage suggests that it might have been hit by drone debris instead of a direct air defense hit.
Regardless of whichever explanation one deems to be more credible, the point is that both were caused by Ukraine’s reckless drone attacks against Grozny, which is far away from the special operation zone. This week’s weren’t the first, and the reason why that city has been targeted likely has to do with Ukraine’s belief that these attacks can spark political unrest in that formerly separatist region, thus opening up a so-called “second front” for diverting Russia’s attention and forces from the primary one.
A supplementary objective can be intuited by what a top Ukrainian official told CNN in their report. Andrey Kovalenko, who’s the head of the “Center for Countering Disinformation” that’s part of the National Security and Defense Council, told them that “Russia should have closed the airspace over Grozny but failed to do so.” In other words, these drone attacks were deliberately meant to create an unsafe environment, which would either coerce Russia into closing its airspace or cause a tragedy.
Closing its entire southern airspace indefinitely as a precaution due to the long range of Ukrainian drones would have objectively been an overreaction with incalculable financial costs just like if the US would have done the same in response to mysterious drone sightings over the East Coast earlier this month. Nevertheless, precisely because Russia didn’t do so, Ukraine and its media allies will now predictably claim that this was irresponsible after what happened even though Kiev is to blame as explained.
What Russia needs to do as soon as possible is push back against this emerging information warfare narrative by maximally emphasizing how reckless it is for Ukraine to carry out drone attacks so far away from the special operation zone, let alone against civilian infrastructure like local airports. Pandora’s Box of speculation was already opened by the US and Ukraine so there’s no need for Russia to restrain itself from injecting its own speculation, albeit that which is much more reasonable, into the global discourse.
I see that people are quite slow to awaken to the implications of what happened the last few days.
It wasn’t just this accident but also the attack on and sinking of the Ursa Major, and the several strange accidents with Russian ships around the Kerch strait, which the Kremlin is keeping silent about in terms of foul play, but are a very strange coincidence nevertheless, happening right at this very moment.
The Ursa Major, however, they are openly calling a “terrorist act”, which still amounts to meekly accepting what happened rather than treating it as the casus belli that it should be. Because let’s face it — it happened in NATO controlled waters, and there is a strong suspicion it involved USVs controlled by NATO ISR. It clearly wasn’t a “terrorist act”, but an act of war.
Regardless, it is now open season on commercial shipping and on civilian aviation.
Where this is all headed towards is a physical blockade of Russia.
Numerous airlines have started canceling flights to Russia, even as far as Yekaterinburg, where nobody has seen any drones until now, because safety cannot be guaranteed.
And if Russian ships continue to go down in the open seas, then what happens?
Ships built for the calm waters of river traffic, then sent out into rough seas, are simply asking for trouble.
An average of two cargo vessels a week sink somewhere in the world, so it would be unwise to read too much into the Ursa Minor sinking, unless there is clear evidence pointing otherwise. The two tankers that went down were due to river based vessels hitting big swells for the first time. It was due to weather conditions and vessels taking unusual routes due to avoiding conflict areas.
1) What are the chance of FOUR Russian ships sinking within a week?
2) The Russian Ministry of Defense itself is claiming the Ursa Major was sunk by a “terrorist act”. The exact way it was done is to be established, but strong suspicion it was directly done by NATO.
It is the ones in the Kerch area that they are keeping silent about.
The shipping company stated that the crew observed three explosions, and at least one half a meter by half a meter hole below the waterline with plates twisted inwards.
They also say that the nearest ship, Norwegian Oslo Carrier 3, refused to help the Russian crew in lifeboats, so they had to wait for a Spanish vessel, Salvamar Drago, to arrive at the scene.
Well, I’m sure the shipping company carried out an exhaustive investigation and its statements have nothing whatever to do with future insurance/government compensation/liability claims.
I’d be interested to know how crewmembers of a sinking ship got a chance to closely investigate the hole water was pouring into, but whatever.
I’m no shipping expert, but I tend to watch What is going on with Shipping on YT for anything like this. His analysis makes sense to me, but of course at this stage it’s impossible to know until someone gets some divers down there. Even then, ship forensics is often even harder than for aviation crashes – Koreans still argue vigorously about the ROKS Cheonan, and there is a mountain of forensic evidence on that (just no definitive take). And as for HMS Hood….
Of course it’s impossible to rule out sabotage or attack in the circumstances. But sometimes the simplest explanation is best. Crappy old badly maintained cargo vessels go down all the time, they just rarely make the news.
Of course they did not, but their words are the only actual information provided so far. Naturally, everyone lies until proved innocent, so perhaps the right course of action is to assume they wanted the Russian officials to open a criminal investigation to cover their own negligence… because that would make so much more sense.
“…ship forensics is often even harder than for aviation crashes…”
Indeed, even after 109 years, they’re still arguing about whether or not the Lusitania was carrying weapons and ammo.
Indeed, remember the Maine…
What is going on with Shipping is great. The weather took out the tankers for sure. The ship in the Mediterranean was built in Germany in 2009 and had just completed coming from the Baltic all the way down through Gibraltar again according the WisgoWS, a great website. So the jury is still out on that ship. And Russian maintenance is not the greatest because it just is not but blowing a hole in a hull?? It was hard to believe Nordstream would get blown up and my first thought then was Russian maintenance….I am waiting for Seymour Hersh on the Ursa Major.
“It clearly wasn’t a “terrorist act”, but an act of war.”
Well, It clearly looks like a war in Ukraine and Russia calls it a “special military operation.”
Maybe throwing the “t” word around is trying fit with that concept?
I also better understand what winning and ending a war would look like more so than a “special military operation.” I don’t know how those are won.
Note that the Ursa Major went down right off Gibraltar. British naval base. If it turns out it was a British attack- or via a proxy- using naval drones- besides cowardly and utterly irresponsible, this is an act of war. Horrific.
Yes, the shennanigans in the Baltic are part of this also. Nordstream like activities in order to give cover to a de facto blockade of the Baltic for Russian ships. Of course if the situation turns hot the officer in St Petersberg with the land based Zircon batteries will decide who sails on the Baltic, but even when Ukraine is defeated they intend everything short of actual war to continue slowly ramping up. WW3 is inevitable and everyone is delaying as long as possible getting ready especially China.
Two things.
One – pilot to ground conversations. Several Russian-language sources – including those in Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, not just Russia – have published what is purported to be a partial transcript of these, and then we got additional information from officials in Kazakhstan.
In the transcript itself, a) at 08:16 the pilot tells ground control “bird strike on the cabin” and that they are experiencing a loss of control over the aircraft; and b) at 08:22 the pilot reports “loss of hydraulics”. [https://ulysmedia.kz/news/43676-obnarodovany-peregovory-pogibshikh-pilotov-samoleta-pered-tragediei-v-aktau/] But then, the aircraft crosses the Caspian Sea and starts circling around Aktau for over two hours, so the loss of control could not have been that critical.
And then the Minister of Transport for Kazakhstan comes out and states at a press conference that at 10:53 the pilot reported “an explosion of an oxygen tank” and “several passengers knocked out”, and requested ambulances. At this point the response teams at the Aktau airport mobilized, but the aircraft went down before it could reach the runway (with landing gears out, mind you, so they were trying). [https://life.ru/p/1715529]
So the first question to answer is – why would the pilot allegedly report a bird strike on the cabin if the aircraft’s tail (!!) were hit by drone debris or a missile. I mean, it is possible that the pilot was mistaken, or that the transcript is fake, but somewhere Mr. Occam is making meaningful noises. The second question is – clearly the aircraft was still serviceable for two and a half hours after the first incident, and then we have a second incident in mid-air which, one assumes, is why the aircraft did not quite reach the runway in its landing attempt. Obviously there were no Ukrainian drones or Russian missiles over Kazakhstan, and it is too early in the morning for me to speculate as to why an oxygen tank would just suddenly blow in mid-flight more than two hours after the initial “hit”, so we shall see what the investigation says.
Two – originally all Russian official sources plainly stated that the flight was diverted from Grozny because of foggy conditions. This goes all the way up to the Vesti nightly news broadcast. Today we get some headlines stating that the air space was closed due to both fog and an “air defense condition”, which makes little sense, because if you have the latter in place it supersedes any sort of weather event. So we shall see if the official story changes, but there is just enough uncertainty now for the conspiracy-minded among us to speculate in an unbridled fashion.
My thesis is the pilot flew around the “pattern” to reduce weight/fuel load, lightening the aircraft and eliminating combustibles in case of landing outside controlled flight.
I viewed two or three alleged vids of the landing the aircraft came in steep, starboard wing rolled low to level. Degraded hydraulics to controls can be suggested.
Also worth of notice is that there were 5 other airfields closer to Grozny than Aktau 450 km away! On the other hand, the head of Russian Federal Air Transport Agency says that the whole area was cleared of air traffic due to the drone attack on Grozny airfield (which is a civilian only airport).
Which would, of course, explain why the flight diverted so far – to clear the area and wait out the attack.
I think it would be extremely difficult for a drone to attack or hit a plane, although possible if the drone was hovering at a specific altitude on a descent path on final approach of a runway. But “bird strike on the cabin” means feathers and a dead bird somewhere in the cabin.
If there was loss of pressure (bird strike in the cabin would do it) then the oxygen masks would have deployed, and if there was fire or even sparks somewhere near oxygen, that could lead to something dramatic. Heck, someone could have lit a cigarette.
So yeah, I’m inclined to side with Mr. Occam here. Eventually the flight recorder will come out.
It was also amazing how quickly attempts were made to link this to the downing of the Malaysian MH17 flight and that Russia is guilty of both. Despite the Dutch show trial, any objective viewing of the evidence points the finger at Ukraine, but western propaganda never lets inconvenient facts get in the way of the Russia bad narrative.
Thank you, Yves and John A.
I’m glad that Yves has published this post and John has added.
Yesterday evening, I chuckled when I heard the BBC say Reuters reported “US officials familiar with the matter, but not authorised to speak”. These weasel words,eh?!
Reuters is power and spook adjacent, to use the modern expression. Boris Johnson in his inimitable way blurted out the truth about Nazanin Radcliffe. Three friends, two of whom were colleagues, worked there and noted how as the absentee majority owners, the Thomson family in Canada, neglected the firm, journalists began to cosy up to the powers that be.
The fact that RU did not shoot down MH17 is by now even official jurisdiction by the highest Western court.
“ROBERT PARRY: Vindicated on MH-17 Reporting”
https://consortiumnews.com/2024/02/07/robert-parry-vindicated-on-mh-17-reporting/
Ignoring their OWN court decisions has however become normalcy among our media, government, academic “elites”.
4 years ago I might have said that the RUs calling off their US Ambassador is a bit paranoid.
I have learned my lesson since. They will do anything to provoke. Kill, murder, terrorize.
Interesting: Martyanov in his first video on this plane crash was surprisingly cautious considering the smearing that already started the moment the plane had crashed.
On this note here a translation of today’s BERLINER ZEITUNG piece, a general assessment on RU and the war of the more friendly kind (!!!). Of course full of garbage. The hyperlink to CSIS leads nowhere sadly. I would have liked to check those fraudulent footnotes.
Putin will not be impressed by Friedrich Merz’s ultimatums
Russia is producing weapons at record speed and on an immense scale. The civilian economy is merging more and more with the military. Where is this leading?
https://archive.is/JrhNi
The text is fraught with the usual half-truths, lies and malign twists which I am not sure will get across in the translation.
Recently I decided not to post a translation when I discovered that an important paragraph was not in indirect speech in the translated version and thus the statement came across as a statement by the author himself. A huge difference there.
I would like to challenge the claim that ‘The fact that Russia did not shoot down MH17 is by now even official jurisdiction by the highest Western court.’ Based on the text of the press release of the judgment, this claim does not hold true. The English version of the press release of the judgment simply states:
‘Finds that the Russian Federation, by failing to take measures to investigate facts contained in information received from Ukraine regarding persons who have allegedly committed an offence set forth in Article 2 of the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism, has violated its obligation under Article 9, paragraph 1, of the said Convention;’ and later:
‘Rejects all other submissions made by Ukraine with respect to the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism.’
While I am not an expert in law, it seems that the case was structured in a way that led to this particular finding, rather than making any definitive claim about Russia’s involvement in shooting down MH17. If such a claim could be proven, it should have been included in the judgment. I trust that the judges have the necessary expertise to address this matter appropriately. Of course, all the points mentioned in the consortiumnews link still hold, and the non-release of data, which is good enough to make claims publicly, but not good enough to be released publicly, is a non-starter for any resonable person.
In my opinion, a more accurate statement would be: ‘The fact that Russia shot down MH17 is not part of the official jurisdiction of the highest Western court.’
PS. Of course, I did not have the time to go into the summary, because it was 40 pages, and I do not have adequate training to parse quickly, the information.
Meanwhile as we see this MH17 rerun, tens of thousands of North Korean troops have died trying to save Russia from defeat in Kurzy!
Show me proof of ONE North Korean soldier killed in Kursk.
You sound like Jake Sullivan or any other spox for the State Department/DOD.
No proof, all conjecture.
Go away troll
timbers is a regular so your tone is out of line. He didn’t add a /sarc tag because he assumed it was obvious.
timbers is okay. Just look at the end of the phrase, it’s an exclamation mark and Kurzy instead of Kursk. Add to that the term “MH17 rerun” and the exaggeration (“tens of thousands”).
Unless you yourself were counter-spoofing us! 😉
Biting commentary requires no sarcasm tag. C’mon, get with the game.
Would you believe that according to the South Koreans, the Ukrainians managed to finally get one North Korean as prisoner yesterday, but alas, he died of his “worsening wounds” today. So we still have to just take them by their word.
I’m waiting for the day they live-stream audio video of a “North Korean soldier” in custody speaking Korean to a bona fide Korean translator. I’m not holding my breath either.
Actually these are the better links on MH17:
ICJ Rules Against Ukraine on Terrorism, MH17
2024
https://consortiumnews.com/2024/02/01/icj-rules-against-ukraine-v-russia-on-terrorism-mh17/
Meet the British intelligence-linked firm that warped MH17 news coverage
2023
https://thegrayzone.com/2023/03/05/british-intelligence-firm-mh17-news/
some background by Helmer
2021
https://johnhelmer.org/the-devil-in-the-mh17-details-how-ken-stolworthy-deceived-the-dutch-how-the-dutch-agreed-to-be-deceived/
Yes, I immediately thought of MH17, but from the (exhaustively documented) John Helmer, as opposed to mainstream, perspective, so glad to see I am not alone.
I would like to challenge the claim that ‘The fact that Russia did not shoot down MH17 is by now even official jurisdiction by the highest Western court.’ Based on the text of the press release of the judgment, this claim does not hold true. The English version of the press release of the judgment simply states:
‘Finds that the Russian Federation, by failing to take measures to investigate facts contained in information received from Ukraine regarding persons who have allegedly committed an offence set forth in Article 2 of the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism, has violated its obligation under Article 9, paragraph 1, of the said Convention;’ and later:
‘Rejects all other submissions made by Ukraine with respect to the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism.’
While I am not an expert in law, it seems that the case was structured in a way that led to this particular finding, rather than making any definitive claim about Russia’s involvement in shooting down MH17. If such a claim could be proven, it should have been included in the judgment. I trust that the judges have the necessary expertise to address this matter appropriately. Of course, all the points mentioned in the consortiumnews and Helmer links still hold, and the non-release of data, which is good enough to make claims publicly, but not good enough to be released publicly, is a non-starter for any resonable person.
In my opinion, a more accurate statement would be: ‘The fact that Russia shot down MH17 is not part of the official jurisdiction of the highest Western court.’
PS. Of course, I did not have the time to go into the summary, because it was 40 pages, and I do not have adequate training to parse quickly, the information.
Also, as another example of the polluted information landscape:
Wikipedia still says that Russia was responsible and, another “disinformation combating website” that I found in a quick search, tries its best to make the point Russia was definitely responsible. It even goes to the extent of linking the website from the Dutch legal system, while only mentioning BBC and CNN instead of linking the press release of the international court.
This is very much a fog of war situation with lots of explanations being offered (bad visibility at Grozny airport, a drone strike, friendly fire from Russian AA, an oxygen tank exploding, a bird strike, etc.), so we will have to wait for the investigators to do their jobs. Interesting that it’s a Brazilian jet operated by Azerbaijan that crashed in K-stan, so both Russia and the collective West will have limited ability to influence the investigation.
No question that UKR drones were targeting the area. It should be straightforward for the investigators to ascertain what caused the apparent shrapnel damage. The usually reliable Stephen Bryen thinks it was a MANPAD:
https://asiatimes.com/2024/12/what-happened-to-embraer-flight-j2-8243/
One of the survivors (a Russian woman interviewed in a hospital) said there was a loud THUNK noise shortly before the crash landing in K-stan, so perhaps a last-minute bird strike was in fact the coup de grace that caused the unfortunate pilots to lose control of the aircraft.
UKR has been targeting Chechnya a lot recently, which seems to me like a desperate attempt to provoke some kind of reaction (given that Chechnya is a long long way from UKR). At the very least, UKR’s goal might be to scare away foreign airlines from flying into Russian airspace:
https://www.ft.com/content/c6b98c15-9c91-4f74-a494-ffea4f3fdab4
A Manpad makes sense if it caused an engine to disintegrate, producing all that debris – Strelas use just around 1.5kg warheads, so I doubt it would have enough frag material to do that type of damage directly. The aircraft would have to have been flying quite low to be in range (i.e. on a landing approach) Some sources are saying it was a Pansir, but it doesn’t use a frag warhead. The Buk does have a frag warhead with quite a distinct damage pattern. It should be pretty easy to work out if those punctures were caused by frag or aircraft debris or something else. What is pretty clear is that there was an explosive detonation of some sort near the aircraft, as there are both entry and exit holes visible in the fuselage.
I think the reports of various thuds and impacts would be consistent with a damaged engine blowing out and causing a cascading series of failures. It would be very easy for inexperienced crew to confuse one of those incidents with a bird strike, simply because ‘bird strike’ is the first thing any commercial pilot thinks when there is a very heavy external ‘thud’ sound heard at low altitude.
The Aviationist states that there are something like 33 historic cases of accidentally shooting down of civilian aircraft, and that’s not including ‘possible’ ones like Aer Lingus Flight 712. In theory, transponders should make such an accident very rare, but we know that poorly trained military operators have made errors like this in the past (as with the Ukrainian airliner shot down by Iran) and others. To add a complication its not been unknown for militaries to attach civilian transponders to armed aircraft – Iraq did this with some success in the first Iran-Iraq war. And then you have the added problem of combat aircraft using civilian aircraft as protection, as allegedly Israel has been doing for years over Lebanon and Syria.
Don’t know if that Iranian AA crew was poorly trained or just trigger happy, but according to the Iranian reports it was an IRGC unit that was deployed without communicating with (or knowledge by) Iranian Air-Defense Forces and thus it was not networked with any command and control system operational at the time.
As a remedy there’s now a high ranking IRGC liaison officer in the Iranian ADF headquarters.
Kiev/US deep strikes on Russia are not military/strategic anymore than Hitler’s V-1. They are terror tactics aimed at the civilian population!
Kiev/US is late stage demise similar to Hitler in autumn 1944.
Last gasp is too kill civilians!
Kiev cannot ties it combat boots w/o US.
I can see your logic. But if it’s correct, then far from being reckless it was effective. And makes your article read with a tinge bitterness. Sad
So you are on the side of killing civilians way outside the conflict zone, as in no way, no how will this tragedy change the outcome of the war in Ukraine, just for the jollies of trying to pin one on Russia? This on your part is not just “sad” but depraved.
Bomber Harris comes to mind. By 1945 heavy bombers became punishers.
Had Germany won Harris would have been prosecuted.
Curtis Lemay even said as much himself as the bombing campaign against Japan was happening in 1945.
Also, the entirety of the Korean war was mostly about using air power to level NK
then far from being reckless it was effective.
Right up there with genociding gaza for the beachfront property and gas fields…
actually not effective at all.. Chechens are an important part of Russian Federal army and played a key role in the liberation of Mariupol and other shorter actions. They also took over after Wagner in Artiomovsk/Bakhmut.
This American/British drones strikes on Grozny make Kadyrov troops and Chechens very angry against Banderists.
Then nor Azeris nor Kazakhs are happy with this.
The comm’ op telling Russia did it can work only on part of Euro-American public, not on Russia public.
Bemusing that El-Al suspended flights to Moscow.
I recall IDF hiding behind the radar signature of an unarmed Russian IL-20 in Syrian airspace as it came in to land and caused its destruction by a Syrian SA-200 missile in Sept 2018
Given the Crocus attack, given the Mariupol theatre attack, given the burning of the Trade Union Building in Odessa, given the assasination of Darya Dugina, we can say this is established form for the Ukrainians and this form should be an important consideration. I’d add Nordstream but I’m convinced that was the Americans, not Ukrainians.
However, if any kind of missile or missile debris had hit the plane it would have crashed closer to Grozny. Also, pilots reporting a “bird strike in the cabin” means feathers and a bird in the cabin. That it flew to Aktu suggests things were calm enough in the cabin that they didn’t feel a need for immediate emergency landing, which suggests to me that the engines weren’t out, nor was it gliding on no engines.
what in the heck is the joke russian propagandist Andrew Korybko doing on this site?
The fact is that the US is largest state sponsor of terrorism in the world. The US, as a matter of policy, uses proxies in any number of countries: Ukraine, Israel, Syria, e.g. While the particpants are all willing actors on behalf of the US, the media detaches US responsibility . Terrorism ( an act of violence in order to achieve a political objectives) may or may not be an effective tactic. When will Ukranian (or Israeli) terrorism stop? When the US quits funding the proxies. Russia has to address: When will terrorism against Russia by the US cease and how would that occur? Russia, most likely, will come to the conclusion, that it won’t stop until policy makers in the US are completely defeated (the Ukranians today, someone else later). The implications are, short of a direct nuclear war between Russia and the US, both countries are invoilved in a ‘long war’. Russia’s strategy seems to be to address the alternative, instead of accepting a direct confrontation, it accepts a strategy of attrition, which means it will accept the ‘blows’ of acts of terrorism and ‘move on. Note: Even if Ukraine’as army was defeated outright an an unconditional surrender effected, Russia would probably still suffer acts of terrorism. The outcome of a war of attrition depends on the resolve and resources of the participants. It does not necessarily run on the ‘clock’. The key question that the US has to address is whether it will achieve whatever foreign policy goals are sought, before it goes bankrupt (as Musk and Ramaswamy seem to suggest is a near term outcome).