- Note - There is also the possibiilty Iraqi resistance
fighters have received newer, better, longer-range missiles that can defeat
the normal countermeasures US-UK aircraft use. -ed
-
-
- New questions emerged today over whether the downed RAF
Hercules was shot down or destroyed by an on-board explosion.
-
- Military experts believe the plane should not have been
flying low enough for a low-technology terrorist missile to have reached
it and some have suggested a bomb may have been planted on the
flight.
-
- Another possibility is that some volatile equipment on
the plane exploded halfway through its flight from Baghdad to the US
airbase
at Balad.
-
- The "effective range" of shoulder-launched
surface-to-air missiles is between 5,000 and 10,000 feet, although it is
possible that a freak missile could get higher, said an RAF source.
-
- The flight, which some sources say was at least 15,000
feet up when it exploded, came down 20 miles from Baghdad airport.
-
- Any normal transport flight would be flying at a height
of at least 20,000 feet, probably higher, by the time it reached this point
in its journey, precisely because of the risk of missile attack.
-
- The few civilian flights from Baghdad climb sharply
immediately
above the airport for exactly the same reason.
-
- There were also questions about the reason for the
flight,
with the number of people on board and the timing of the mission both being
viewed as suspicious by military analysts.
-
- RAF sources have also questioned the description of the
flight by the chief of the air staff, Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup,
as "routine".
-
- "He is not lying - an operational flight is a term
that can cover a number of possibilities - but if it was shot down, as
is being claimed, it would need to have been flying far lower than you
would expect for a straightforward transport flight," said one RAF
source.
-
- "It would have needed to have a good reason for
being at that level.
-
- "The other suspicious thing to me is the timing
of the flight. If it was truly routine, it would probably not have been
flown at dusk on election day, the most dangerous time you can possibly
think of."
-
- The fact that the downed Hercules worked for 47 Squadron,
closely associated with special forces, has led to suspicions that it was
either on, or returning from, some sort of mission connected with the
elections,
such as surveillance or communications interception.
-
- "Nine crew is an awful lot, even for a special
forces
Herc," said the RAF source. "There are many possible explanations
but one is that they had some special equipment on board."
-
- There are also some questions about the quality of the
downed aircraft's "defensive aids systems" equipment designed
to repel missile and other attacks.
-
- It is not known whether the plane was an old version
of the Hercules or a newer one which is known to have had difficulties
with its infrared defensive mechanisms.
-
- The questions arose as terrorists tried to turn the
downing
of an RAF Hercules into a propaganda coup.
-
- Arabic television channel Al-Jazeera is repeatedly
showing
footage supplied to it by one rebel faction claiming to show the moment
the plane was shot down with the loss of 10 British lives.
-
- The video shows a button being pressed before cutting
to a shot of a missile streaking into the sky.
-
- The footage does not show the plane in flight or the
moment of impact but instead moves onto a shot of a huge fireball.
-
- The next images are of extensive wreckage apparently
belonging to a Hercules plane.
-
- The MoD has declined to comment on the film but military
experts have dismissed the tape, handed to Al-Jazeera by the 1920
Revolution
Brigades, as largely faked. While the wreckage does appear to be from a
Hercules, the footage of it is shot in daylight, though the attack happened
at dusk.
-
- There is also doubt over the images of an explosion.
The plane came down in a flat marshy area without the palm trees which
appear in the foreground of the fireball.
-
- Andrew Brookes, of the International Institute for
Strategic
Studies, said: "I think it is a genuine Hercules crash, with the other
bits superimposed on it. It is possible some one has decided to cash in
and produce a video."
-
- Tim Ripley, defence analyst at the Centre of Defence
and International Security Studies, added: "The rebels have not shot
down any big planes before, so it's not as if they'd be recycling old
footage
of wreckage. But the first bit looks of a more propaganda
nature."
-
- Sir Jock said the C-130 Hercules had been transporting
nine RAF personnel and one soldier on a "routine operational
flight"
when it crashed on Sunday afternoon.
-
- It is understood at least one person on board was a
member
of the SAS.
-
- He said: "I am aware that there is a great deal
of speculation about what caused that crash, not least because of the
video,
purporting to be of a missile shooting down an aircraft.
-
- "We have to find out the facts but this is going
to take some time."
-
- http://www.thisislondon.co.uk
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