It is enlightening and sometimes even amusing to see how the treatment of the shooting down of civilian planes is politicized, and how in this area, as in so many others, the media propagandize in the service of the government’s agenda and party line. On the humorous side, consider the following New York Times editorial statements: On the Soviet shooting down of Korean Airlines flt.007 on August 31, 1983: “There is no conceivable excuse for any nation shooting down a harmless airliner.” This is “cold blooded mass murder,” and the editors ask “whether the Kremlin accepts its responsibility for a minimally decent international order” (ed., “Murder in the Air,” Sept. 2, 1983). On the Israeli shooting down of Libyan civilian airliner in February 1973: “No useful purpose is served by an acrimonious debate over the assignment of blame for the downing of a Libyan airliner on the Sinai peninsula last week” (ed., “After Sinai,” March 1, 1973). On the shooting down of Iranian Airbus 655 by the USS Vincennes in the Persian Gulf in July 1988, the New York Times editors found that in this case, “while horrifying, it was nonetheless an accident. On present evidence [i.e., on the claims in the immediate official account], it’s hard to see what the navy could have done to avoid it” (ed., “In Captain Rogers Shoes,” NYT, July 5, 1988).   more »