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> the USS Vincennes incident took place Summary for those who like me didn't know about the incident. Our guy shot down a passenger flight, murdering 290 human

> the USS Vincennes incident took place Summary for those who like me didn't know about the incident. Our guy shot down a passenger flight, murdering 290 human beings, we gave him a medal but we then paid USD$213,000 in blood money per passenger to Iran without ever admitting fault. " Iran Air Flight 655 was an Iran Air passenger flight from Tehran to Dubai. On 3 July 1988, the aircraft operating on this route was shot down by the United States Navy guided missile cruiser USS Vincennes under the command of William C. Rogers III. The incident took place in Iranian airspace, over Iran's territorial waters in the Persian Gulf, and on the flight's usual flight path. The aircraft, an Airbus A300 B2-203, was destroyed by SM-2MR surface-to-air missiles fired from Vincennes. All 290 people on board died ... As part of the settlement, the United States did not admit legal liability or formally apologize to Iran but agreed to pay on an ex gratia basis US$61.8 million, amounting to $213,103.45 per passenger, in compensation to the families of the Iranian victims. ... Commander David Carlson, commanding officer of USS Sides, the warship stationed nearest to Vincennes at the time of the incident, is reported to have said that the destruction of the aircraft "marked the horrifying climax to Captain Rogers's aggressiveness, first seen four weeks ago". ... In 1990, Rogers was awarded the Legion of Merit "for exceptionally meritorious conduct in the performance of outstanding service as commanding officer ... from April 1987 to May 1989. " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655

jacobush 10y ago
Makes the downing of that Malaysian aircraft over Ukraine with a Russian surface to air missile seem almost normal? A medal to mr Rogers even...
yread 10y ago
Compare it to KAL 007 5 years prior. Wiki has the front pages of News Week "Murder in the skies" vs "Why it happened". Would be interesting to see what to Soviet newspapers were writing - Soviets didn't acknowledge they shot down the plane until 5 days later! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_Air_Lines_Flight_007#Initial_Soviet_denial https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_Air_Lines_Flight_007#In... In conclusion when an imperialistic superpower makes a mistake don't expect apologies.
Trundle 10y ago
Didn't know they gave that guy a medal. That's straight up sadistic.
- enkid 10y ago
  He got a medal for completing his tour. He didn't get a medal for shooting down the plane. It's normal to get a medal whenever you move in the military. Not saying he deserved one, but the military wasn't going out if it's way to reward the shoot down if a civilian airliner.
  - shawabawa3 10y ago
    The military also didn't go out of its way to punish recklessly shooting down a civilian aircraft. The guy should have been court martialed, but at the very least not given a medal
    - wtbob 10y ago
      > The military also didn't go out of its way to punish recklessly shooting down a civilian aircraft. It wasn't reckless: it was the right call based on the data Vincennes had, which showed that an Iranian fighter was able to kill it.
      - kwhitefoot 10y ago
        Only because no one went out with binoculars to take a look.
        wtbob 10y ago
        The aircraft was 11 nautical miles away, which is over the horizon.
        Someone 10y ago
        It's only over the horizon if the plane was flying below 200m or so (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horizon#Distance_to_the_horizon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horizon#Distance_to_the_horizo...) I can't find conclusive evidence, but I think that's unlikely, given that the planned cruising height was 4300m (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655#Shootdown_of_Flight_655 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655#Shootdown_...), and it was shot down about halfway through its flight. I'm not sure whether using binoculars at 20km distance makes sense, though. There's quite a size difference, but even if it would be easy to spot the difference from that far away having half a minute or so to find the plane using your binoculars would be challenging (it's about a minute of flight for a passenger plane, but if it were military, you would want to hit it before it had a chance to fire a missile, and according to Wikipedia, the Maverick that they feared an Iranian F14 might carry has a range of over 12 nautical miles)
wtbob 10y ago
> Our guy shot down a passenger flight, murdering 290 human beings, we gave him a medal but we then paid USD$213,000 in blood money per passenger to Iran without ever admitting fault. Vincennes believed it was shooting down an attacking Iranian fighter, not a passenger jet. It wasn't murder; it was an accident (due to faulty electronic data). We didn't give the skipper a medal for shooting down the plane; we gave him an end-of-tour award. And I don't know what the big deal with paying weregild is: that's what you do. Has Russia paid anything to the families of the Malaysian airliner shoot-down?
- coldcode 10y ago
  No, but horrible things down by other people doesn't really have anything to do with stuff we do. We can't control other countries (well without forcing things) but we can and should control what we do.
- mikeash 10y ago
  Your comment would be far stronger without that Russia bit at the end. You raise excellent points, but the descent into whataboutism overshadows them.
- Mikeb85 10y ago
  > Has Russia paid anything to the families of the Malaysian airliner shoot-down? If you want to compare situations, the Malaysian airliner flew over an active warzone, along the same path as Ukrainian military planes that were targeting the rebels. Surely you can see the situations aren't quite the same.
- dhimes 10y ago
  You are correct on Vincennes. And it was reported. It was talked about. We (Americans) were horrified and apologetic- and angry with our military (at least on the college campus).
- kwhitefoot 10y ago
  The aircraft was surely within visual range. If someone had gone out to look with a telescope perhaps the disaster could have been avoided.

jacobush 10y ago

Makes the downing of that Malaysian aircraft over Ukraine with a Russian surface to air missile seem almost normal? A medal to mr Rogers even...

yread 10y ago

Compare it to KAL 007 5 years prior. Wiki has the front pages of News Week "Murder in the skies" vs "Why it happened". Would be interesting to see what to Soviet newspapers were writing - Soviets didn't acknowledge they shot down the plane until 5 days later! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_Air_Lines_Flight_007#Initial_Soviet_denial https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_Air_Lines_Flight_007#In... In conclusion when an imperialistic superpower makes a mistake don't expect apologies.

Trundle 10y ago

Didn't know they gave that guy a medal. That's straight up sadistic.

enkid 10y ago
He got a medal for completing his tour. He didn't get a medal for shooting down the plane. It's normal to get a medal whenever you move in the military. Not saying he deserved one, but the military wasn't going out if it's way to reward the shoot down if a civilian airliner.
- shawabawa3 10y ago
  The military also didn't go out of its way to punish recklessly shooting down a civilian aircraft. The guy should have been court martialed, but at the very least not given a medal
  - wtbob 10y ago
    > The military also didn't go out of its way to punish recklessly shooting down a civilian aircraft. It wasn't reckless: it was the right call based on the data Vincennes had, which showed that an Iranian fighter was able to kill it.
    - kwhitefoot 10y ago
      Only because no one went out with binoculars to take a look.
      - wtbob 10y ago
        The aircraft was 11 nautical miles away, which is over the horizon.
        Someone 10y ago
        It's only over the horizon if the plane was flying below 200m or so (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horizon#Distance_to_the_horizon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horizon#Distance_to_the_horizo...) I can't find conclusive evidence, but I think that's unlikely, given that the planned cruising height was 4300m (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655#Shootdown_of_Flight_655 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655#Shootdown_...), and it was shot down about halfway through its flight. I'm not sure whether using binoculars at 20km distance makes sense, though. There's quite a size difference, but even if it would be easy to spot the difference from that far away having half a minute or so to find the plane using your binoculars would be challenging (it's about a minute of flight for a passenger plane, but if it were military, you would want to hit it before it had a chance to fire a missile, and according to Wikipedia, the Maverick that they feared an Iranian F14 might carry has a range of over 12 nautical miles)

wtbob 10y ago

> Our guy shot down a passenger flight, murdering 290 human beings, we gave him a medal but we then paid USD$213,000 in blood money per passenger to Iran without ever admitting fault. Vincennes believed it was shooting down an attacking Iranian fighter, not a passenger jet. It wasn't murder; it was an accident (due to faulty electronic data). We didn't give the skipper a medal for shooting down the plane; we gave him an end-of-tour award. And I don't know what the big deal with paying weregild is: that's what you do. Has Russia paid anything to the families of the Malaysian airliner shoot-down?

coldcode 10y ago
No, but horrible things down by other people doesn't really have anything to do with stuff we do. We can't control other countries (well without forcing things) but we can and should control what we do.
mikeash 10y ago
Your comment would be far stronger without that Russia bit at the end. You raise excellent points, but the descent into whataboutism overshadows them.
Mikeb85 10y ago
> Has Russia paid anything to the families of the Malaysian airliner shoot-down? If you want to compare situations, the Malaysian airliner flew over an active warzone, along the same path as Ukrainian military planes that were targeting the rebels. Surely you can see the situations aren't quite the same.
dhimes 10y ago
You are correct on Vincennes. And it was reported. It was talked about. We (Americans) were horrified and apologetic- and angry with our military (at least on the college campus).
kwhitefoot 10y ago
The aircraft was surely within visual range. If someone had gone out to look with a telescope perhaps the disaster could have been avoided.