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The distance travelled over Turkish airspace, shown here: https://twitter.com/CNNTURK_ENG/status/669098577524822016/ph...

was less than 3km. At Mach 1, that takes less than 9 seconds. It appears to have flown over twice.

The pilots ejected, but were shot dead by Turkmen fighters while they parachuted down: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-middle-east-34908469

What's the incentive to do this? Isn't it enough to shoot the plane down? Why kill the pilots?

Wouldn't you at least want to interview or ask questions if you just shot them down?

They're different people. The Turkish air force shot down the plane, but it crashed in Syrian territory and the pilots were allegedly killed by ethnic Turkmen in Syria, who are not under the control of the Turkish government.

Though it's officially not the same, it's practically indistinguishable, because of the feeling of national identity and common purpose.

It's like if you really REALLY wanted to kill someone whom your neighbour also hates, and he bought a gun and just peacefully placed it on a table in front of you without saying a word.

They also hit one of the rescue helicopters with a missile. Shooting down the plane, killing of the pilots in the air (by Turkish assets), ambush of rescue party. This looks like a planed provocation to me. http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/11/24/us-mideast-syria-c...

>(by Turkish Assets)

Source? Everything I've read says the Syrian Turkmen are certainly allies of Turkey, but not assets.

"..Turkish camps in Syria which the Turkmens are being trained, stating that it still takes place unofficially and in a secret way.[6][7] He added that Turkish Forces are training the Syrian Turks to protect their settlements and to join the fight with Syrian Turkmen Brigades in those secretly located camps. Nuceyfi also gave more information saying that Turkish officials have told that military supplies and weapons will be sent to Turkmens in Iraq and Syria in the near future but he isn't acquainted about the exact amount and date.

Later that day, Turkish 'officials' in Ankara, confirmed the statements of Esil Nuceyfi about the before and the positively promising future of the training of Turkmens both in Iraq and Syria" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syrian_Turkmen_Brigades#Brigad... http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/turkey/1201...

Yes, it's readily acknowledged that Turkish special forces have trained the Turkmen. But that is not the same as the Turkmen fighters being "Turkish Assets", which suggests command over their actions.

It's a very weird stance. So if a country officially trains forces (wouldn't say soldiers) in another country, it isn't like it influences and directs them just a little bit?

I see it like directly comparable to what the US did in most of the significant conflicts ever since the ww2. It didn't say what Osama bin Laden should do (back when he was a "good guy"), but it did give him intel support, training and guns, which is almost the same.

Not saying that the US is unique in this, it's just the most prolific and egregious by far. Turky is just learning from the best.

As the article mentions, the Turkmen are people in northern Syria, not Turkey, and have apparently had their villages bombed by the Russian military recently. A pretty strong incentive, I'd say.

I've heard enough stories of Russian planes violating other countries' airspace and not responding to warnings, that I immediately assumed a fairly deep incursion and Russia being clearly at fault, but crossing that tiny sliver of Turkish territory? Technically it's still a violation of airspace, but shooting it down is exceedingly harsh. The only possible conclusion is that Turkey was eager to shoot down a Russian plane.

Not shooting down a plane doesn't have to mean you tolerate airspace violations. You can still complain and stress that this is not okay without shooting anything.

> Not shooting down a plane doesn't have to mean you tolerate airspace violations. You can still complain and stress that this is not okay without shooting anything.

Turkey's been complaining and stressing that this is not okay -- and even threatening that if it didn't stop, they would start shooting down the intruding planes -- for months; the intrusions started at the very beginning of the campaign Russia started in September.

At some point, you have to either impose the consequences you've threatened or reveal yourself to be unwilling to do so, making all your complaining and stressing empty rhetoric.

Mind you, since 2012 Turkey consider their airspace anything 5km south of their border with Syria, thus why they keep complaining of Russia invading their Airspace (even when Russia is fighting rebels inside Syria, they are inside Turkish airspace by Turkey definition).

I think the way to think of it is as a violation of airspace in the context of being belligerents by proxy.

For various reasons (confessional and otherwise)Turkey has been firmly and outspokenly anti-Assad since the early demonstrations and since they evolved into civil war.

Russia has intervened effectively on behalf of the Assad regime. Since the Assad's failure today would almost certainly result in a jihadist Syria, this is not looking so terrible to the rest of Turkey's NATO allies, like France. Turkey is by some (fairly loose) definition engaged in proxy war with Russia.

At the same time Lebanese, Iraqi & Syrian airspaces to their south and east are free-for-alls with 8 national forces bombing as they see fit in Syria. This is probably making Turkey paranoid about their own air space.

I suspect they see/saw this as Russia testing their resolve to defend their border. There have been previous violations and stern warning had been made. There's also the possibility that this is a bad decision made by field officers in the short decision window they had.

^On larger conflicts, I think it's a real danger.

France is hysterical right now, and I imagine they are considering an "all arms" invasion with Russia at their side. There is growing international support for Kurdish independence. Even Assad might agree to it. This is a Turkish red line. Turkey is still keen to oust Assad. The longer IS & other jihadis can demonstrate unprecedented achievements like capturing and holding territory, the more the danger grow in other ME countries. Russia has lost a civilian airliner to IS & a military jet to Turkey in a few weeks. The combination of successful IS terrorism, daily reports of raids on Jihadi safe houses, and massive refugee migration has made Syria the number 1 political issue everywhere in Europe.

It's all a tinderbox and Turkey just shot down a Russian jet.

And it occurred to me that Russia might have "accidentally" intruded into Turkey's airspace to provoke a reaction to give Russia a pretext to take stronger action in Syria.

I don't know if that even makes sense, but Russia is in the driver's seat. The U.S. is taking a nap.

For 9 seconds.

I don't see how they could have been warning him for 10 minutes if he was over their airspace for nine seconds.

Well they probably were warning him before he hit Turkish airspace

>There's also the possibility that this is a bad decision made by field officers in the short decision window they had.

That's an excellent point, and one I think is often missed. These are decisions made by commanders in the field in a short amount of time, with limited information. They have many concerns, worries, and instructions to comply with. What if it was misidentified as a Russian plane? What if they did nothing, and the plane dropped bombs on a Turkish village? There's lots of potential outcomes, limited information, and consequences and repercussions far beyond the event itself. And it's a mistake to think national leaders are involved directly in this process.

To give my personal views for a moment here, this is why it's so important they recognize, that whenever force is involved, regardless of intent, aim, or goal, it's messy, and things like this will occur, without fail. There will be accidents, without fail.

I think this is a fairly known scenarios, that strategists and leaders taught well in advance with all possible and military personnel are trained on. I also read in an article that the order to shot it down came from the turkish president.

> I also read in an article that the order to shot it down came from the turkish president.

Can you link to that article?

I can't remember which source it was was I read different articles from FB trending news, I tried to find it but couldn't, later I'll have another go.

> almost certainly result in a jihadist Syria

What does that even mean?

> I agree with some of the other comments, it's far too early, and even alarmist, to assume that much worse will come up this. A larger conflict is in no one's interests and is in no one's intent.

Putin is not known for his soft heart and willingness to let bygones be bygones.

While I wouldn't characterize him as having a "soft heart" either, I never got the impression that he's so simplistic as to want to retaliate in any situation. The Russians are not stupid.

I don't think for a moment that any side didn't envision this as a possibility. When you're flying sorties, there's going to be accidents. With this many borders involved and a NATO power next door, the risk only became larger. While it's serious, it's not like Russia didn't know these risks beforehand. They saw this possibility before they got involved. Doesn't mean they won't be happy about it, but I guarantee a Turkish response was at least thought about.

> While I wouldn't characterize him as having a "soft heart" either, I never got the impression that he's so simplistic as to want to retaliate in any situation.

Of course not, that's why the Russians initially tried to deescalate by publicly attributing the downing to Syrian rebels, not Turkey; however, now that Turkey has made that impossible (for which, given the recent series of Russian intrusions since the campaign in Syria began, they had pretty strong domestic reasons), the Russian leadership's room to deescalate while maintain an image (particularly a domestic image) of strength is narrowed.

What are the russians going to do? Start a nuclear war over some ego smear? They could have not done that. It's been an issue for months. Unless there will actually be a major conflict now, I think it's the best thing that could have happened. The russians are now in a corner - whatever they do short of going WWII Japan will be a loosing move.

Maybe, but if he retaliates against Turkey NATO get dragged into it because of existing treaties. While Putin may not be the most forgiving of people I don't think he's going to trigger World War III over a single jet getting shot down over someone else's airspace.

Second that motion. The main deal here, is violation of air space, because Turkey is a moderate (by and large, which is debatable) Islamic Muslim state and provocation in the area has RUN terse for decades because of the pro-Russian+Syrian agenda/backing. I don't blame either part, considering how tense Russia is with the Muslim world in the first place - with exception noting Iran, which is Persian (like the emo kid in the class). Just look north to Chechnya and you can easily link/stroke in bits of issue across the region by the suppression and integration attempts with Russian people in that area alone. Regardless, a blip and nobody died. Russia just lost a 500 million dollar investment. Should end fairly quickly.

Putin isn't soft, but he also isn't a fool. He's managed to actually conquer and hold territory (Crimea and East Ukraine) in the post-Cold War world through a mixture of rhetoric, propaganda, and timing. Not only that, but he did so while managing a corrupt Russian oligarchy and increasingly unhappy Russian people in the post-Communist era.

Putin is a brilliant tactician. That is why he is in the position he is in. He isn't going to retaliate against NATO for a downed jet, but I am also going to wager that at the end of all the reporting and global discussion about this incident, he will come out looking stronger. That's the kind of leader he is, hate him or love him.

> A larger conflict is in no one's interests and is in no one's intent.

It never is for most people, for 99.99% of people anywhere, and every war ever fought, was not because most people wanted to. Its always an elite, minority of people which decide they can and do want to send others to war.

Such people are Erdogan, Putin and Obama.

Strangely enough, when I made that comment, Erdogan, Putin and Obama were the people I was referring to.

I don't think for a moment anyone's itching for a war.

I get your sentiment, but I think the hyperbole undervalues that often wars are popular. Sometimes widely popular. The US's entrance into WWII, the US War for Independence. The US Civil War. These are a handful of cases, but they each had far far higher support than .01% approval.

Currently roughly 75% of Americans support our war against ISIS.

That's not really true. A full-scale war is necessarily conducted by both the state and the nation. Even autocrats need the blessing of the general population to successfully prosecute such a war, otherwise he runs the risk of the people rebelling and shutting down vital infrastructure just when they need it most. You can't have your army in two places at once, quelling the populace and fighting the enemy. Full-scale war intensely taxes everyone's resources. Also soldiers won't fight with the zeal they need to be effective against soldiers defending their homeland unless they really believe in what they're doing.

Hence the general move before and after the two world wars towards more limited war. With a limited war, you have to rely on professional, volunteer soldiers to conduct operations. Many nations conscript, but largely to keep readiness up. It's difficult to conduct the sorts of operations you see in the small-scale military operations of today with a conscript army. These are people with jobs and lives, they just won't be able to give their all.

Big wars only happen after long-term feedback loops of media coverage rousing national anger against other nations make it politically feasible to actually declare war. These wars truly are everybody's affair.