31 Years Ago the USA Shot Down an Iranian Airbus - Wild Crime Left Unpunished

On July 3, 1988, the American missile cruiser Vincennes destroyed the Iranian A300 with 290 passengers and crew members on board. The commander and chief missile cruiser received awards.

Explaining the phenomenon of why Americans are not so loved in the world is much simpler than it might seem at first glance. Because they behave ugly. The tragedy with the Iranian Airbus A300, deliberately destroyed by the US Navy exactly 31 years ago in the sky over the Persian Gulf, is one example. On July 3, 1988, Americans deliberately cut off the lives of 290 people from six countries, including 65 children. And only because Washington was afraid that Iran began to take over Iraq in the war prepared by the United States, and Tehran needed to be warned urgently.

At the time of the missile launch, the US Navy cruiser Vincennes was in Iranian territorial waters. The victim was a civilian airliner A300B2-203 of Iran Air Airlines, flight IR655, en route Tehran - Bandar Abbas - Dubai. The flight took place within the international air corridor, in a straight line, at an approved altitude.

Washington stated that the huge airliner was mistakenly identified by the stressed American sailors as ... the F-14 fighter of the Iranian Air Force (for hypocrisy, the world also cannot tolerate Americans). In Tehran, there was no doubt that Vincennes specifically attacked a civilian aircraft, the airborne defendant of which was turned on and functioned properly before the airliner broke into at least two parts after an American missile hit it. Confusing the A300 with the F-14 was impossible.

Americans can't apologize

President Ronald Reagan called the actions of the Vincennes crew a justified defense, stressing that the United States does not consider itself guilty of what happened. Moreover, he even partially blamed the tragedy on ... the Iranian government.

In 1989, Iran filed a lawsuit against the United States with the International Court of Justice requesting compensation for damage and finding the United States guilty of violating international air transport conventions. The settlement agreement between the US and Iran on this score was signed only in 1996, after which the case was dismissed. The USA had to pay compensation of about $ 132 million for its attack.

Iran's Revenge

Naturally, Iran has not come to terms with this outrage and humiliation.

The then Minister of the Interior, Ali Akbar Mokhtasi, vowed to avenge the dead. Iran’s ambassador to the UN, Jaafar Mahallati, promised to punish the Americans for terrorism. A few months after that, Pan American's Boeing 747-121, which was flying PA103 on the route Frankfurt am Main - London - New York - Detroit, exploded in the months after that.

An explosion occurred in its cargo compartment, after which the wreckage of a collapsed airliner crashed into the town of Lockerbie. killing 259 aboard and eleven others on the ground. And although ultimately this attack, as was later established, resulting from the internal conflict, the CIA and the US military intelligence "hanged" on Libya, which was completely not involved in this, there are serious suspicions that the Iranians were also connected with the case .

This can happen again

Alas, the new threat of another war in the Persian Gulf zone and the last US provocations with attacks on tankers attributed to the Iranians, as well as sending spyware drones into the airspace of the Islamic Republic create a favorable environment for the tragedy with the Iranian Airbus to repeat at any moment. Under current conditions, this can cause not only a painful Iranian response, but also lead to a full-scale war, in which the matter will not be limited to a few hundred corpses.