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What happened to MH17?
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Ukraine used fighter planes to shoot down MH17

The theory that Ukraine shot down MH17 using Su-25 fighter planes emerged after multiple witnesses stated seeing multiple Ukrainian planes in the air with the MH17 passenger plane that day.

The Argument

A freelance journalist from Berlin interviewed over 100 people in the region surrounding the crash site, multiple citizens said that they had seen a fighter jet near MH17 before it crashed, and one said that he saw a missile coming from a plane[1]. Russian air force chief Lt. General Igor Makushev stated in a press conference that russian radar spotted another aircraft with MH17 that day, and suggested that it was probably a Ukranian fighter jet[2]. To corroborate this, Yana Erlashova, a russian reporter for the network Russia Today, along with the help of the Russian air force, was able to prove that the Ukrainian Su-25 fighter jet could reach the 33,000 ft. altitude needed that MH17 was at in order to shoot it down. Beyond this, Russian news networks released satellite photos of a Ukrainian Su-25 fighter jet firing a missile at the MH17 plane[3].

Counter arguments

Many people point out large contradictions in this theory. The main contradiction being that the alleged satellite photos of the Ukrainian fighter jet firing a missile at MH17 was proven to be a fake photo. Also, Yana Erlashova's experiment only allowed the Su-25's to reach that altitude if they dropped all of their weaponry, which would make it impossible for them to have shot down MH17. The reason that the general may have claimed that there was a second aircraft visible on their radar may have been because oftentimes, when an airplane breaks apart, it can be registered on radar as two aircrafts

Proponents

Premises

Rejecting the premises

References

  1. https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-35706048
  2. https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2014/07/russia-mh17-downed-by-ukrainian-jet-missile.html
  3. https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-35706048
This page was last edited on Monday, 2 Nov 2020 at 07:16 UTC

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