KAL007 Coldwar Mystery

Fred J. McCall wrote:

The airliner was a SCHEDULED FLIGHT IN AN
IDENTIFIED COMMERCIAL AIR CORRIDOR WITH TRANSPONDER SENDING COMMERCIAL
CODES 3 AND C.

This is exactly on target ahem. All the arguments using the terms
"combat zone," "war zone," "shooting gallery," etc., invoking
international law and principles of war, are begging the question.
Their authors seem to *assume* the Gulf must have been designated as
such. It wasn't -- not by us, and (w/r/t commercial aviation) not by
the Iranians or Iraqis. They seem to *assume* IA 655 was anomalous. It
wasn't.

Air India, British Air, and other third parties had done sporadic,
temporary re-routing during the war. But by and large (and
specifically in the summer of 1988) all of them were using normal
corridors throughout the region. Iraq's and Iran's national carriers,
although obviously not overflying the other's airspace as they had
before 1980, were using normal corridors over the Persian Gulf.

My father was an AA executive, then an editor for aviation and travel
trade publications. One of his friends was a BA exec, a vocal admirer
of Thatcher and Reagan, and in general of the US, who said: "Eight
years of war, a million dead, gas, missiles, many gross military
blunders on both sides -- but Iraq didn't shoot down any Iranian
airliners, Iran didn't shoot down any Iraqi airliners, and neither
shot down anyone else's airliner. That distinction is yours alone."

(Also FWIW, my father, mother and brother had all been US Marines and
sailed with the Navy. We were aware that **** inevitably happens in
and around combat. But they -- and civilian I -- all saw the
destruction of IA 655 as a shameful screw-up, not an occasion for
blaming the victims.)