Originally Posted by dave_j

I think that you're in danger of seeing the event in isolation and blaming, as always, the man charged with actually doing the job. The real culprits, those who play politics, are never questioned, never put in this position. They simply give orders, they never get their clean hands dirty.
I suspect you'd agree that the 'button pusher' didn't wake up that morning with the idea of downing a civilian aircraft but found himself in a position where decisions needed to be made. Either through inadequate training, system failure, fright or simple human error, he made a decision that downed an aircraft.
It's not difficult to compare this action with the action the man on the Vincennes took and that comparison is one that bares closer examination. Each 'button pusher' was backed by a system that failed and the result and the reasoning behind the decision making that led to it are similar although the outcomes are proving to be wildly different. The US has never apologised for the Vincennes incident although you can argue their system failure was worse.
Yes, you can blame the man who pulls the trigger because that simplistically draws a line under the event, but the more difficult questions, those that could prevent future events such as these, are never asked because the answers highlight who's really responsible.

I buy a hammer, I buy a nail, I pick up the hammer, I pick up the nail, I swing the hammer, I close my eyes, I hit my thumb.
Which action led to my shouting 'Ow'?
None. There is a sequence of actions from the decision to purchase of the hammer and nail to the lack of expertise in knowing how to use it that could have prevented it. Simply choosing the last act is much too simplistic.

Originally Posted by BuckinghamshireBoy

From the LA Times article - link posted by Jsmth321 - https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-...792-story.html

Originally Posted by Jingsamichty

If you shoot a bear in the ass and it gets mad and bites a kid's head off, who is at fault - the bear or the guy that provoked it?

Originally Posted by Almost Canadian

Fair enough. It wasn't Trump though. And that was the point i was trying to make, without posting paragraphs and paragraphs about the chain of command or the inadequacies of the military's training in Iran.

Originally Posted by spouse of scouse

I think the causation chain is relevant. If Trump hadn't ordered the killing of Soleimani, that civilian aircraft wouldn't have been shot down by the IRGC.

Originally Posted by Boiler

I blame Soleimani's mother, if she had not given birth to him none of this would have happened.

Originally Posted by BuckinghamshireBoy

"As the Vincennes exchanged fire with Iranian speedboats last July 3, Iran Air Flight 655 appeared on the U.S. warship’s high-tech radar system. After the plane failed to respond to warnings on civilian and military channels, Rogers gave the order to fire."

Originally Posted by magnumpi

I’m sure we will all get this statement soon

We all need to have conversations about this incident and review all the facts, have deep discussions so we can all learn from this mistake.

one persons interpretation of a mistake can be interpreted differently by another

Originally Posted by Almost Canadian

That doesn't work, as Iran has stated it was an accident. Using your example, rather than the bear biting the kid's head off, a more accurate analogy would be to say that, after shooting the bear dead, the bear fell, dislodged a rock that came down a hill that hit a boulder that continued down the hill until it destroyed the bear's den, killing its offspring. The shooter started the chain of events but the deaths were not reasonably foreseeable. Trump did not take the civilian airliner to the "fight" with Iran.

Originally Posted by Jingsamichty

That's a fair enough analogy but it's also along the lines of the point I was trying to make. In this case though, the shooter lauded his decision to shoot the bear, despite knowing that people had advised that unpleasant consequences (e.g. your rock fall) were extremely likely.

But the salient question is: what was the real motivation for Trump to order the assassination of Soleimani at that particular point in time, compared to the 20 years he's been on the US radar as a troublemaker? I doubt very much that I am in a minority when I posit that the timing of this assassination and Trump's impeachment is not a coincidence - Trump is a master at deflection, diversion and water-muddying. You will, of course, note that he ensured that the press announcement included the words "on the direction of the President"...