Smolensk Crash ATC transcripts

The big picture is coming into focus, but very slowly.

The tragic crash last January at Smolensk that killed Polish President Lech Kaczynski and 95 others on their way to a memorial service for the Katyn dead has been a matter of great confusion. Was it purely weather related? Pilot error? Air Traffic Control error? Some matter of political intervention on the part of either the Poles or the Russians?

It hasn't been the clearest of investigations, either.

The Russians took complete charge of the investigation and recovery, and spent most of their effort on not letting out exactly what happened. That didn't go over well at all in Poland...

So they released transcripts of the black box recordings. (As far as this author knows, however, the actual recordings remain in Russian custody. They certainly held them back for a long time.)

Now, the BBC reports that Russia has released transcripts of the ATC traffic... and that still doesn't really settle things:

Russia released the transcripts after Poland complained they had not been included in Moscow's official report into the crash on its territory.

Questions remain about communications with the doomed plane.

That would be because the transcripts seem almost nonsensical.

In their conversation in Russian, detailed in the transcript released by Russia along with its final report on 12 January, the Polish pilot appears not to take in what the Russian ATC officer is saying.

"...fog, visibility 400m," says the Russian.

"Understood," the pilot replies. "What are the weather conditions?"

The ATC officer spells out the visibility in English, then gives temperature and pressure readings, adding, at 1024: "There are no conditions for taking you."

"Thank you," the pilot replies, "but if possible we will try to approach, but if the weather is bad we will circle around."

The last message from the Polish plane, at 1040 as it tries to come in to land, is that it has switched its lights on.

It strikes tree-tops just before 1041, crashing about five seconds later.

The Russian ATC transcripts show controllers swearing obscenities in between desperate attempts to contact the pilot.

If what the transcripts say is what actually transpired... swearing obscenities is an entirely reasonable response.

This simply isn't going to be resolved until a full investigation by a third-party with access to original recordings happens.

Russia should invite one.

Russia Wargames Polish Aggression?

This would be one for the "You're joking, right?" Department, except for the fact that at least two reports have it that Belarus-Russian exercises called Operation West were based on Poland as the aggressor, Belarus the victim of an "ethnic" uprising, and various means including nuclear missile strikes being required to win, as defined by the exercise set.

This wasn't just a paper exercise, either, apparently:

The manoeuvres are thought to have been held in September and involved about 13,000 Russian and Belarusian troops.

If reports are right, the Polish government is steaming about this, and given how faithful an ally the rest of NATO is looking to be right now, having Russia practicing storming Polish beaches has got to be almost maddening.

One question, though: The best open source on matters like this, Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, has *nothing* on this as of right now... the link is included to allow a look there later to see if anything breaks.

***

A rather lengthy piece on the importance of Belarus to Eastern European security, its history, and the odd with-them-against-them alliance they have with Russia was posted last year, here at CompHyp.

The logical reaction to being abandoned

Who? NATO, in particular the Eastern European members.

Abandoned? Yeah. Sold out by the Yanks.

The reaction? NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen has called for a new strategic partnership with Russia.

In his first major foreign policy address as Nato chief, Mr Rasmussen called for a "joint review" with Moscow of global security challenges.

Mr Rasmussen was speaking in Brussels after the US announced it was shelving plans for controversial missile defence bases in Poland and the Czech Republic.

Actions have consequences. Sadly, none of those consequences are likely going to fall upon the perpetrators of this situation any time soon. Former President (American) J. Carter, for example, nearly made it out of his four year term before one of his administration's acts of poltroonery came back and bit them.

But the people of Eastern Europe have to deal with this as of today, if they can.

It sure must be fun to be Vladimir Putin right now.

Damn it.

One good... two bad...

The current American administration certainly has a demonstrated willingness to take action... generally the concern voiced by observers regards the thought involved prior to said actions...

Here are three reports: one good; two astoundingly ill considered

A (rare) direct action Special Operations mission scored a major kill, doing in Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, who was (among other villainy) an operative in the 1998 Kenya and Tanzania Embassy Bombings. Good riddance.

This is a case of Presidents getting the credit when people actually doing their jobs do it right. Fair enough; the chief executive has to take the blame when things go sideways in public, after all. So good job for approving Operation Celestial Balance (this raid) and BZ to the operators who got it done.

But...

The apparently intentional contempt for established alliances held by the Obama administration has been obvious for months now, and Asian alliances have gotten a particularly short shrift. So much so that advice given here (to the previous government, however) was to plan for the day when the Americans would lack the will and means to effectively contribute to the defense of Japan. Well, the day the U.S. leaves Japan to its own defense grows closer. This was actually floated by the Yanks back in April, but it hit the open source media this week designed to tie in with the change in government to the DPJ majority.

And...

It seems that no decade is complete without a Western sell-out of Eastern Europe's liberty or security. This time, it is the abandonment of any meaningful antimissile defenses based in the region and the obvious corollary of conceding regional dominance to Russian desires. The antimissile system was not about Russia, of course. It was intended to thwart Iranian aspirations of having a nuclear missile threat to Europe. However, the timing of the agreement (during the Russo-Georgian crisis last year) *and* the associated guarantees of an American presence providing improved air defenses (which could be reasonably considered a trump card over Russian intentions) both cast the U.S. as making a commitment to the Eastern European NATO members. But this commitment is neither desired nor fulfilled by the current regime in the 'States. What makes this bone-deep foolish is that it looks like *nothing* was gained in a realpolitik sense from Russia.

Oh, bother.

NATO MAP for Ukraine -- two views

The recent NATO conference in Tallinn, Estonia, has yielded mixed messages on the future membership of Ukraine.

There are statements the Ukraine will become a member.

There were no indications that the meeting would speed Kyiv's membership bid.

The deep divisions between the France-Germany-Spain-Italy camp (no MAP) and the U.S.-Eastern Allies (Ukraine in NATO is a fundamental issue) are still there, and getting noisier.

Russia watches, and likely smiles a little.

Arrrrgh.

I am at a loss for a polite way to comment on *this*, Monsieur Président de la République française.

Hopefully something more meaningful will happen on the 10th at the EU Foreign Ministers meeting.

A faint hope, I well know.

Russia postures as Allies hope for continued missile defense.

The brave efforts by Poland, the Czech Republic, and (by alliance) the Baltic republics of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia to support the Atlantic Alliance in providing a Missile Defense system to Europe may be in doubt, but Poland for one expects the incoming administration of B. Obama (U.S.A.) to continue with the project.

The Russians seem unwilling to read a map well enough to see what approaches said Missile Defense would and would not provide coverage of, and are threatening all sorts of nonsense, and to electronically interfere with the system.

Let us not overlook the facts that Russian occupation of Kaliningrad (Koenigsberg) and the still legally undefined Estonian-Russian border are the major open territorial issues in Northern Europe. In the aftermath of the Russian Invasion of Georgia, these matters have undergone "paradigm change" in the thinking of all parties at risk.

To the governments of the NATO Alliance: These are not matters to be trivially negotiated away.