MH17 facts give way to Putin lie

Part of the Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 at the crash site in the village of Hrabove some 80km east of Donetsk.

Investigators have finally confirmed that a Russian missile was used to shoot down MH17 on July 17 2014. This however was obvious right at the start of the investigation when I challenged, in the Daily Telegraph, the lie by President Putin that a Ukrainian Su25 ground attack fighter bomber had fired the missile that brought down the huge B777 and murdered 298 people on board.

Several facts gave immediate lie to Putin’s assertion.

Su25 fighter bombers carry for defence two Vympel heat-seeking missiles with a tiny 7kg warhead. These would home on the heat source of the B777 engines and would be unlikely to bring down the huge aircraft which could continue on one engine. They would be fired from the rear hemisphere in a targeted attack, yet MH17 was tracking east, which was the direction from which the missile with a very large fragmentation warhead — in a front quarter attack — came from. Also the Ukrainian Su25’s had not been modified to carry these short range air-to-air Vympel missiles unlike the Russian Su25’s. Also what is essentially a low level battlefield close support aircraft with a top speed of around M. 77 would probably have difficulty achieving a firing solution on a target travelling at M. 84 at 33,000 feet.

The Russians would hardly have let untrained ratbag separatists access to their sophisticated BUK missile systems, which would be capable of identifying the radar signature as a B777.

That the Russians deliberately did this is a worrying sign for NATO as it shows the aggressive and reckless mentality behind the senior officer corps.

Foreign Minister Julie Bishop rightfully is determined to identify and pursue the culprits behind the mass murder of 38 Australians when MH17 was shot down over eastern Ukraine. It is a shame that she has not shown the same enthusiasm to address, as believed by professionals in the aviation industry, the murder of 238 persons on board MH370.

* Byron Bailey is a former military pilot and Emirates captain