Why would the Ukrainians need a high altitude air defence system so close to the front line given Rebels didn’t have any air capability at all? on the other hand rebels were shooting down jets with regular frequency.

Quite simply because they feared intervention from Russia, or maybe they just wanted to turn the political tide in their favour by shooting down an airliner. Until that point, the EU was hesitant with sanctions, so only the Ukrainian Nationalists stood to gain from the incident.

Meanwhile, ‘moderates’ in action:

Moderates LOL.

https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2015/10/syria-us-allys-razing-of-villages-amounts-to-war-crimes/

Syria: US ally’s razing of villages amounts to war crimes

A fact-finding mission to northern Syria has uncovered a wave of forced displacement and home demolitions amounting to war crimes carried out by the Autonomous Administration led by the Syrian Kurdish political party Partiya Yekîtiya Demokrat (PYD) controlling the area, said Amnesty International in a report published today. The Autonomous Administration is a key ally, on the ground, of the US-led coalition fighting against the armed group calling itself the Islamic State (IS) in Syria.

‘We had nowhere else to go’: Forced displacement and demolitions in northern Syria reveals evidence of alarming abuses, including eyewitness accounts and satellite images, detailing the deliberate displacement of thousands of civilians and the razing of entire villages in areas under the control of the Autonomous Administration, often in retaliation for residents’ perceived sympathies with, or ties to, members of IS or other armed groups.

http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2013/10/11/human-rights-watchsyrianrebelgroupsguiltyofwarcrimes.html

Human Rights Watch accuses Syria rebels of war crimes

Human Rights Watch said Friday that Syrian opposition fighters committed “war crimes” and “crimes against humanity” in an Aug. 4 assault, killing at least 190 civilians as the rebels began a large-scale offensive to take back government-controlled areas in Latakia province, where many members of President Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite sect live in rural villages.

So where’s the criminal investigation? Come on! When they thought Assad conducted a chemical attack, they were very quick to dial the Hague but these mass executions don’t seem to have raised an eyebrow because the perpetrators are facing in the right direction.

Almaz is saying what it believes to be the truth as it is based on the type of projectiles that are in the old warhead versus the newer one & the nature of the holes that the missile that shot down MH 17 made.

And they have conducted a full scale test, which the Dutch investigation didn’t. The test also showed that the missile was travelling in the opposite direction due to the distribution of shrapnel. The Dutch didn’t consider this evidence but if it becomes a criminal case, then there will be no ignoring it, unless it wants to be seen as a kangaroo court.

But then no previous shoot down of a passenger plane has ever become a criminal case. Ukrainian SA-5 04/10/2001 didn’t, USS Vincennes 03/07/1988 didn’t.

Funny that this article is rarely mentioned.

http://breakingdefense.com/2015/07/dunford-mulls-f-35b-ioc-decision-4-bs-take-out-9-attackers/

Dunford Mulls F-35B IOC Decision; 4 Bs Take Out 9 Attackers

Turkey overestimated itself. now there is no going back as Islamist will not leave it alone.
Russia hasn’t issued the warning yet.
http://diplomacy.bgnnews.com/china-joins-15-others-issuing-travel-warnings-for-turkey-after-ankara-bombing-haberi/10230

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/13/us-mideast-crisis-syria-turkey-idUSKCN0S71BF20151013

Turkey warns U.S., Russia against backing Kurdish militia in Syria

Turkey has warned the United States and Russia it will not tolerate Kurdish territorial gains by Kurdish militia close to its frontiers in north-western Syria, two senior officials said.

“This is clear cut for us and there is no joking about it,” one official said of the possibility of Syrian Kurdish militia crossing the Euphrates to extend control along Turkish borders from Iraq’s Kurdistan region towards the Mediterranean coast.

Turkey fears advances by Kurdish YPG militia, backed by its PYD political wing, on the Syrian side of its 900 km (560-mile) border will fuel separatist ambitions among Kurds in its own southeastern territories. But Washington has supported YPG fighters as an effective force in combating Islamic State.

“The PYD has been getting closer with both the United States and Russia of late. We view the PYD as a terrorist group and we want all countries to consider the consequences of their cooperation,” one of the Turkish officials said.

Turkey suspects Russia, which launched air strikes in Syria two weeks ago, has also been lending support to the YPG and PYD.

“With support from Russia, the PYD is trying to capture land between Jarablus and Azaz, going west of the Euphrates. We will never accept this,” the official said.

What? If they could already get their hands on it, then they wouldn’t have needed it to be given to them… free of charge. After this war ends, assuming it ever does, these decisions will come back to haunt people.

What’s the missile on the Hawks he mentions at 34:00?

Its not like they gave them an Sa-11 and hundreds of tanks and other armored vehicles or anything…

The SA-11 was Ukrainian. Russia doesn’t use that model anymore. So it could only have been taken from the Ukrainian regime (assuming it was the rebels), the regime which surprisingly quickly slotted into place immediately after the armed coup where shots were fired at protesters and police by armed elements from the protest.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-31359021

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26333525

From first link:

“I didn’t shoot to kill”
“I was shooting downwards at their feet,” says a man we will call Sergei, who tells me he took up position in the Kiev Conservatory, a music academy on the south-west corner of the square.

“Of course, I could have hit them in the arm or anywhere. But I didn’t shoot to kill.”

Sergei says he had been a regular protester on the Maidan for more than a month, and that his shots at police on the square and on the roof of an underground shopping mall, caused them to retreat.

There had been shooting two days earlier, on 18 February. The 19th, a Wednesday, had been quieter, but in the evening, Sergei says, he was put in contact with a man who offered him two guns: one a 12-gauge shotgun, the other a hunting rifle, a Saiga that fired high-velocity rounds.

He chose the latter, he says, and stashed it in the Post Office building, a few yards from the Conservatory. Both buildings were under the control of the protesters.

When the shooting started early on the morning of the 20th, Sergei says, he was escorted to the Conservatory, and spent some 20 minutes before 07:00 firing on police, alongside a second gunman.

His account is partially corroborated by other witnesses. That morning, Andriy Shevchenko, then an opposition MP and part of the Maidan movement, had received a phone call from the head of the riot police on the square.

“He calls me and says, ‘Andriy, somebody is shooting at my guys.’ And he said that the shooting was from the Conservatory.”

Shevchenko contacted the man in charge of security for the protesters, Andriy Parubiy, known as the Commandant of the Maidan.

“I sent a group of my best men to go through the entire Conservatory building and determine whether there were any firing positions,” Parubiy says.

So let’s see, protesters armed by an unknown entity, new government very quickly slots into place with immediate support from western countries, even prior to any election. You don’t need to be a genius to join those dots.

The US did supply terrorists in Syria with TOW missiles however, which hardly bodes well for buses, trains and taxiing planes in the future.