Wednesday, December 16, 2015

Is The Turkish Government Shifting Its Shooting Down Of A Russian Su-24 Blame To Its Air Force Chief?

A war plane crashes in flames in a mountainous area in northern Syria after it was shot down by Turkish fighter jets near the Turkish-Syrian border Nov. 24. (Photo: Reuters)

Sputnik: Passing the Buck: Turkish Government Shifts Su-24 Blame to Air Force Chief

Social media accounts operated by supporters of Turkey's ruling AKP party have begun to attack the head of Turkey's air force, the Turkish press has reported.

Accounts on Twitter belonging to supporters of Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan have turned their ire on the Commander General of Turkey's Air Force, Abidin Unal, blaming him for the shooting down of Russia's Su-24 bomber last month.

On November 24 Turkey's armed forces announced its fighter jets had shot down Russia's Su-24 bomber and claimed that the aircraft had violated Turkish airspace for 17 seconds, a claim disproved by Russia's air force.

WNU Editor: Knowing that this report was from Russian media made me treat it with a certain amount of scepticism, but there are now reports in Turkish media defending Turkey's Air Force Chief and shifting blame to the government .... Air Forces: We followed government orders in downing Russian jet (Today's Zaman). What's my take .... both countries will need to repair the damage that this has caused, and it looks like the Turkish government is looking for a "fall-guy" to pin the blame for this incident.

2 comments:

Rhaegar said...

A bit off topic, but finally a channel posted some footage from the arguing between Saakasvhili and Avakov: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seoenj5v00s Seems the government is having pretty bad problems with managing all their internal factions. Would be interesting to hear your thoughts about this.

1. Do you still thing that there may be protests this winter in Kiev?
2.Also do you think the ceasefire will still hold or are there a risk for the conflict reigniting on the long term?
3. Any news or reports on Right Sector or any other paramilitary groups lately? Since has the government finally got control over them or is the situation more unstable than it's visible in plain sight.
4. Will you make another analysis post about the Ukraine conflict and what you think will happen next?
5. And any news on the essay about Eastern and western relations?

Hope it's okay that I posted all this here, also if you see this post Jay, was there something I missed or you would like to add? Since you seem to have a good overview on this conflict

Unknown said...

Turkey might need a fall guy, but Turkey nor anyone else will be safe until Erdogan and his ilk are out of power.