John Chuckman

EXPANSION OF COMMENTS POSTED TO AN ARTICLE IN CBC NEWS

 

“Iran says some arrests made for downing of Ukrainian plane, but gives no details”

 

A comment below speaks of a “mistake” (in quotes to express doubt or contempt for Iran’s explanation) and of our never being able to learn what happened.

That is simply incorrect.

It already is known, and in some detail. It involved a communication-connection error with an officer in charge of a missile battery some distance from others.

Of course, everyone was under great pressure from constant American threats, and there were reports of American cruise missiles being launched.

Given the height and speed of the airliner at the moment, its radar signature on the remote unit’s radar, not at all the latest technology, resembled that of a cruise missile.

The reports had to be treated seriously, and split-second decisions had to be made.

After all, the United States had just used missiles to kill 35 people, including Iran’s General Soleimani, in Iraq in the previous few weeks.

Ultimately, only one person is responsible for all of it. His name is Donald Trump, and he busies himself with threats and violent acts against a nation which has attacked no one in its modern history and is known by all experts to have followed scrupulously its nuclear treaty obligations, the treaty Trump just suddenly one day decided to rip-up.

But our politicians never address the matter fairly or accurately. They are all under Washington’s thumb and shill for Trump, some even asking for further hostile measures against Iran.

It is a shameful situation for Canada to be in.

What kind of a country do you want for your children?

Ethics matter, or why does anyone bother go to church or synagogue to pray and read scripture?

And the rule of law matters. In these matters, Trump has been in complete contempt of the rule of law.

Trump is given a free hand by our politicians to commit murder in public. And to make vicious threats, day after day. Please remember that in ordinary civil society, uttering serious threats can put you into prison.

If Trump’s vicious activities don’t cause our government to speak up, what would?

Certainly not the bloody terrors of Saudi Arabia, courtesy of Trump’s good pal, the Crown Prince. Our government says nothing about his murder, executions and bombing of civilians. Nothing.

We have constructed a society with all kinds of barriers against ethics, and we have learned nothing from the bloody horrors of the past.

All the hypocrisy towards Iran, charging it with crimes it has not committed, makes our ethics and respect for rule of law devoid of meaning.

_______________________

“Iran says some arrests made for downing of Ukrainian plane”

There really is only one arrest that should be made.

Complete responsibility for this mistake made under the threats and pressures of war, as well as for related violent events, is Donald Trump’s alone.

It is of course a sign of Canada’s now close-to complete subservience to Trump’s White House that this indisputable truth is not heard.

Harry Truman famously said, “The buck stops here,” a reference to the expression, “passing the buck”, but that sense of responsibility is totally ignored by Trump. Instead, a steady line of new lies and tales are spun daily to justify what cannot be justified.

And our guys just go along.

_______________________

Response to a comment about there being no justice after Iran’s downing of an airliner:

Please.

Where was the justice when the United States shot down Iran Air Flight 655, killing 290 Iranians above the Strait of Hormuz, Iran’s own territorial waters, in 1988?

The captain of the American warship that downed that airliner was even awarded a medal.

Or where was the justice when Israel sent 114 people aboard an airliner – Libyan Arab Airlines Flight 114 – to their deaths in 1973 over the Sinai?

A known, clearly marked airliner, trying to return to Cairo, was downed by two Israeli fighters. There were no repercussions at all for Israel.

John Chuckman

COMMENT ON IRAN’S ADMISSION THAT IT ACCIDENTALLY DESTROYED A UKRAINIAN AIRLINER

 

Iran has apologized for its terrible error, and it did so promptly. And in judging, everyone should keep in mind the terrifying pressure Iran has been put under by the United States (see footnote).

Has America apologized for any of the pain and death and destruction it has inflicted on the Middle East in recent years?

America’s Neocon Wars in the Middle East (2003 – present) have killed something like two million people, destroyed many treasured historic and religious sites, reduced millions to primitive living conditions (eg, to this day, much of Iraq’s electricity, deliberately destroyed by America in its 2003 invasion, still has not been restored), and created so many desperate refugees that Europe’s stability was threatened.

Going back before the Neocon Wars, we have the Iraq-Iran War (1980-88), an extremely bloody war facilitated by the United States to hurt Iran’s revolutionary government of 1979. In that war, America shot down an Iranian civilian airliner (Iran Air Flight 655), killing 290 people.

A United States warship, the USS Vincennes, was in Iranian waters of the Strait of Hormuz and fired missiles at the plane, claiming to mistake the airliner, flying a well-established route, for a hostile plane.

The Captain of the American warship was later actually awarded a medal, the Legion of Merit.

The United States absolutely refused to apologize or pay damages for its obvious destruction of a civilian airliner.

It wasn’t until the late 1990s, as the result of a lawsuit, that the United States properly acknowledged what it had done and paid damages to survivors.

 

WHAT IRAN FACED AT THE TIME OF ITS MISTAKEN DOWNING OF AN AIRLINER – INDEED WHAT IT FACES STILL

 

Iran has been under constant threat by the Trump White House, and for no good reason since Iran has started no wars in its modern history and is recognized as complying with its treaty obligations.

Trump started by suddenly ripping-up a valid international nuclear agreement, one which had been scrupulously kept for four years. He followed that by imposing war-like sanctions which seriously hurt millions of ordinary people. Iranian assets abroad have been seized, and every effort has been made to disrupt Iran’s economy.

Trump sent fleets of warships and nuclear-capable bombers to intimidate the country. He made many public threats, including the barbaric threat to destroy Iran’s national heritage sites. Trump even once bellowed he would “obliterate” Iran’s eighty million people.

Just before the airliner’s destruction, Trump had committed a set of murders in neighboring Iraq, including the murder of an Iranian national hero, General Qasem Soleimani. Iran had been put on the highest war alert.