F-16 Crash Follow-Up, Pt. II: DNA Testing??

So, I've got a bug up my butt about this F-16 crash in the Anbar province for a few reasons. First, my gut says it's a tipping point in the Iraq war, second, I've been expecting late-model shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles (SAMs) or mobile truck-mounted weapons to show up C.O.D. Iran for about two years now, and third, I had NOT been expecting them to show up in the Anbar province (because Shia Iran would never give or sell advanced weapons to Sunnis). I believe the US will soon withdraw from the Anbar Province, and that this downed F-16, along with the 3 helicopters downed in the same area on the same day, are the straws which broke the back of occupying the Sunni heartland. Sunnis armed with effective SAMs would be a very, very expensive proposition.

Here's where it gets strange. The Air Force is performing DNA tests on the ejection seat from the F-16CG as part of a crash investigation. Umm... the pilot looked pretty dead on the video taken by an Iraqi journalist at the crash site. Next, other aircraft were said to be circling the site before the crash occurred, reportedly spotting "insurgents" (or civilians) at the scene. So how could they not notice people carrying off a body or a wounded pilot from the middle of a large, open, uninhabited field? This doesn't even start to add up.

The Air Force should not need to get blood and tissue samples from wreckage to confirm who was jocking their F-16. That's pure, triple-distilled BS. Normally they would know it off the top of their head, and if not, they would just look at their duty roster. If someone's mascot ate the duty roster or erased it, then the plane was still under observation in real time from other assets at altitudes above it, and the pilot would've been using his call sign and communicating with his combat air command during close support of ground troops, very tightly controlled to make sure he didn't accidentally waste his own people. Bottom line, I can imagine no plausible reason the Air Force would need a DNA test to figure out who their pilot was. Nor that they would ever admit to one if there actually were a reason. What the hell is going on here?

This happened at the exact same time when neo-cons (will no one rid us of these craptards?) are pushing for a re-Baathification of Iraq, which would mean going around to all the Arabs in the region to support their brother Sunnis and prop them up against the Shiites. Oddly, Cheney and Bush were in Jordan and Saudi Arabia, meeting with two kings, both named Abdullah while denying they're going to negotiate with anyone. Neocons are longing for the days when the US had a puppet dictator in Iran, and trying to line countries up to isolate Iran.

Now, I don't want to think some rogue pilot was set up to get shot down to support a pull-out of Anbar and a re-arming of the Sunnis, but at least I can dream it up as a reason, and the neocons do reside in Dreamland. Or maybe the pilot was taken prisoner and the DNA is a cover story, which...makes no sense. And before anyone trots out the incompetence/fubar angle, no, the Air Force has kept scrupulously accurate records for the past 50 years which pilots are up in the air when flying around in combat zones with nasty ordnance, and hundreds of people at the base and on the op should've known the pilot's identity. Seems like there's a big rotten fish lying here, and if anyone can tell me why the Air Force claims to be doing a DNA test to confirm who was flying their downed fighter, please de-lurk and comment, because I'm all ears.

Downed F-16 Follow-Up

Circumstantial evidence of the presence of sophisticated anti-aircraft missiles in Iraq has mounted to the "very high" level:

Three US Helicopters Crash in Iraq
27 November 2006 | 21:55 | FOCUS News Agency
Baghdad. Three helicopters of the US Air Force crashed in Iraq on Monday, RIA Novosti reports.
According to the information the aircrafts crashed in the same region where an F-16 fighter jet crashed earlier. No further information has been announced so far.

The odds of four aircraft crashing in the same area on the same day, unless from enemy fire, are very low. And about that F-16CG...the Air Force spokesperson at the F-16's base says all its pilots are "safe and accounted for." Obvious question: then who belongs to the dead body in the anti-gravity suit strapped into the ejection seat? The plane was assigned to the 524th Fighter Squadron based at Cannon Air Force Base in New Mexico.

One additional area for speculation is that Iran is testing out new weapons systems which they recently bought from Russia, like the truck-mounted Tor M1 system. One thing's for sure: the US won't be staying in Iraq for long if they lose a heli or a fighter jet every day.

F-16 Downed By Missile

It slices, it dices. It's the Iraq-o-matic. Military sources refused to divulge the cause of the crash, but witnesses say a missile hit and disabled an F-16CG yesterday, and that the pilot managed to eject after flying losing control of his aircraft, but died. The plane was said to have been flying low, and if it was hit by a SAM, this was a long-feared event which will send shock waves through the close-knit Air Force and change the rules of engagement. In all probability it indicates the presence of the most modern Russian-designed SA-16 missiles, which have the fast enough arming and reaction times to down a low-flying jet. If these missiles appear in any number in Iraq, flying low on combat support missions will pretty much be a thing of the past, especially for helicopters. I have long been wondering when Iran would start sending more in.

The decision to get into Iraq was like watching a blustering, belligerent know-it-all put his hand down a garbage disposal, and hearing him say, "See I'm gonna free up that ham bone trapped down there, and then it'll run like a top. Huh? Is the power off? Well duh, dipshit, of course the power's off, I'm an expert on garbage disposal repair, the power is off if I say it's off, and if you open your mouth on me again I'll kick yer ass."

The power wasn't off. It's still not off. Please, somebody, anybody, for the love of God hit the switch. Ali over at Gorilla's Guides posted this.