Who would have thought that President Donald Trump had such great skills as an actor?
Trump appeared Thursday at a news briefing in Washington to allow journalists to practically drag the knowledge out of him that Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 was shot down on Wednesday in Tehran by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Aerospace Division, and then said perhaps Iran made a “mistake.”
WATCH: Trump Says Iran Could Have Shot Down Ukraine Intl Flight 752 ‘By Mistake’
“Well, I have my suspicions,” he said. “I don’t want to say that . . . because other people have those suspicions also. It’s a tragic thing when I see that. It’s a tragic thing. But somebody could have made a mistake on the other side. Could have made a mistake. Not our system. It had nothing to do with us. It was flying in a pretty rough neighborhood and somebody could have made a mistake,” he said. “Some people say it was mechanical. I personally don’t think that’s even a question. We’ll see what happens. I don’t know. I really don’t know….I have a feeling . . . something very terrible happened. Very devastating,” he said.
It was an act well played. By then, US intelligence had clearly established the fact that two SA-15 surface-to-air Tor M-1 missiles were launched by the IRGC via Iran’s aerial defense system, and had taken down the passenger plane a few seconds later.
Trump giving the Iranians cover for the fact they had taken down a civilian aircraft. But perhaps it was for another “mistake” as well — one that would have had even graver consequences.
If so, what could that mistake have been?
Middle East defense analyst Babak Taghvaee, who is also an investigative journalist, contends that Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps launched that Tor M-1 surface-to-air missile (SA-15 anti-aircraft air defense system interceptor) at the Ukrainian passenger aircraft after mistaking it for an enemy aircraft — specifically, after mistaking it for a US Air Force fighter jet.
: Eyewitness reports & wreckage of 9M331 missile found near 's crash site prove that the Boeing 737-8KV of Airlines is shot-down by Tor-M1 SAM of |ASF located in a ballistic missile research facility of ! They mistook it with a airplane! https://t.co/4zu7TGEe3x pic.twitter.com/wlNyORe1Ip
— Babak Taghvaee (@BabakTaghvaee)
Taking a shot at an American fighter jet, and missing the mark would have been stupid. But taking a shot at an American fighter jet and actually hitting one would produce an entire universe filled with catastrophe, and an introduction to World War III. President Trump knew that, and also knew the massive reaction that would have been generated by a “near-miss.”
But to make a “mistake” and accidentally fire a missile at a civilian passenger plane? That’s an Iranian miscalculation that has kept the planet alive for another day and can be finessed, although it has cost nearly 200 families their loved ones, and has damaged and changed their lives forever.
President Trump, on the other hand, has once again had to play the ‘dumb bunny’ with lawmakers who despise him and journalists who don’t respect him.
A day later, he faced a room full of those journalists while holding close the knowledge that yes indeed, Iran had every intention of attacking American forces wherever they could find them, whether by land or in the air, and had to weed out which information to allow out, and which information could not be said, even though he is known worldwide as an uncontrolled motormouth.
And though he is once again being vilified by Congress, it is also 100 percent true that were it not for Trump immediately sending a full contingent of Marines when he did, the now-deceased Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani would certainly have succeeded in “blowing up” the US Embassy in Baghdad last month, and made history by creating a second Benghazi inferno, this time in Iraq.
This guy still donates his salary to charity every quarter . . .