Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 crashed in Ukraine after being hit by a missile. It’s not the first civilian flight to have been shot down in error though. Here are four other times mistakes have been made in the past 60 years, and the Spectator’s responses to them:
On 3 July 1988, as the Iran-Iraq war was drawing to a close, a US military ship, the USS Vincennes, mistook Iran Air Flight 655 for a fighter jet and launched a missile at the plane. 290 people were killed:
Iran Air Flight 655 (1988)
On 3 July 1988, as the Iran-Iraq war was drawing to a close, a US military ship, the USS Vincennes, mistook Iran Air Flight 655 for a fighter jet and launched a missile at the plane. 290 people were killed:
It is ironic that the nation which has done most in the world to further the idea of inalienable human rights should have destroyed 290 innocent lives by shooting down a civilian aircraft on the very eve of the anniversary of its foundation. There were extenuating circumstances: a warship in a zone of conflict is not a propitious environment for calm ethical debate. The killing was a mistake and not one made callously.
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