MH17 crash: Dutch experts say numerous objects hit plane

[reorg]

86. David Lindorff points out the editorializing by the NYT

He doesn't add any interpretations, he just shows that the NYT makes claims that are not in the report.

The report describes some of the damage you can see on photos, and at the same time points out that they still need to collect and analyze the evidence on the ground. It doesn't even mention SAMs or missiles anywhere, that's not editorializing, it's a fact. They describe the cause of the damage as "high-energy objects" which could be consistent with a lot of things, but the investigating experts don't mention them. The exact wording in the report:

"The pattern of damage observed in the forward fuselage and cockpit section of the aircraft was consistent with the damage that would be expected from a large number of high-energy objects that penetrated the aircraft from outside."

The NYT, without mentioning which other experts they may have consulted, turn this into "consistent with an attack by a surface-to-air missile". Then they add their interpretation "indirect support to assertions by the United States and Ukraine that pro-Russia rebels shot down the aircraft with an SA-11, or Buk, surface-to-air missile."

If the report lends "indirect support" to this very specific claim, then how about the report's "indirect support" for other claims, indicating Ukrainian culpability? Why were airliners allowed to fly over a region where military planes had already been shot down, several times, in the days prior to the accident? The report confirms that 4 airliners were cruising above the war zone at the same time, so that not every plane could fly as high as they would have wanted in order to avoid risk.

Ukrainian military planes were allegedly flying in the shadow of airliners, using them as human shields. After the incident, the Ukrainians claimed they had known that the self-defense forces had acquired a Buk missile launcher, they even presented intercepted phone calls as proof. The Ukrainians had Buk missile launchers in the region themselves, to defend against possible (and allegedly already happening) air attacks from Russia. The report doesn't mention any of this, naturally. So, by providing "indirect support" to the claim that the plane was shot down by a missile, does this mean it also provides "indirect support" to the allegation of Ukrainian culpability or even provoking the incident?

Another bummer in the NYT report is this, I think David Lindorff didn't mention it:

"Its findings also debunked several theories circulated by Russian media and on the Internet, including reports that moments before the disaster the pilots of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 reported to air traffic controllers that they were being tailed by a Ukrainian military jet."

I never heard about these theories, what I read was that the Russians have radar data showing that MH17 was being tailed. That was not debunked by the Dutch investigation, it wasn't mentioned.

There were some reports (originating with Interfax, I believe) claiming that the air traffic audio and transcripts had been confiscated by the Ukrainian intelligence service. That may or may not be true, fact is these transcripts and audio recordings were never published. (Even now, the report only cites the final communications with "Dnipropetrovs'k CTA 4", UTC 13.07 - 13.20 hrs.) What these recordings and transcripts might contain was therefore subject to speculation and questions. Again, the NYT editorializes when they are saying that the report "debunks several theories". All it does is showing that the pilots didn't mention "that they were being tailed". Some people may have assumed that they did, I don't know, but in no way does this "debunk" that military planes have been close to the airliner, which is the actual claim by the Russians, confirmed by their radar recordings. I guess we could even state that the report "indirectly confirms" the Russian claims, since the don't actually "debunk" them.