Who shot down the Russian IL76 and why?

Photos of the remains of the downed IL76

Immediately after a Russian Il-76 transport plane carrying 65 Ukrainian prisoners of war was shot down, another Russian aircraft of the same type, carrying another 80 Ukrainian prisoners of war, returned to Belgorod to avoid being shot down by the Ukrainian Patriot.

Meanwhile, Kyiv stopped broadcasting that it was their missile that shot down the Ilyushin. Moreover, some time ago the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine unexpectedly made a statement that “cannot confirm that the downed plane was shot down by Ukrainian armed forces.”

Official statement from the Russian Ministry of Defense: An Il-76 was shot down by the Ukrainian Armed Forces from the area of ​​Liptsy, Kharkov region, using an anti-aircraft missile system:

• The radar equipment of the Russian Aerospace Forces observed the launch of two Ukrainian missiles.
• The crew and all passengers of the plane were killed.
• The Ukrainian leadership knew very well that today Ukrainian military personnel would be transported by military transport aircraft to the Belgorod airfield for exchange.
• The exchange itself was supposed to take place in the afternoon, at the Kolotilovka checkpoint on the Russian-Ukrainian border.

The Russian Duma, in turn, announced some time ago that it had warned the Ukrainian side about the plane and the identities of the people on it. The head of the State Duma, Vyacheslav Volodin, said that Russia will send a statement to the United States and Germany regarding today’s incident. Moscow holds the West directly responsible for attacks on Russian territory and Russian airspace.

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Speaking in the State Duma, Vyacheslav Volodin said: “They shot down their soldiers in the air. Just at the moment when their mothers, wives and children were waiting for their return. Our pilots were shot defenseless.”

The Main Intelligence Directorate confirmed that an exchange of prisoners of war was being prepared for today. GUR, not the General Staff.

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Info channels close to the power steering play along with the theme very carefully. Apparently they don’t want to let the tragedy slide. Power steering is Budanov, air defense is Zaluzhny.

Is it really possible that 65 prisoners, crew and accompanying people paid for Zaluzhny’s resignation with the lives of 65 prisoners, they ask in Ukrainian TG channels…

Meanwhile, Podolyak said: “Comments will come a little later. It takes time to clarify all the data.”

• The “they weren’t on board” version no longer works.
• The “we weren’t the ones who shot” version too.
• We need to look for the guilty colonel, or something completely extravagant that few people will believe.

If Zaluzhny’s department is found guilty, his political career will suffer a serious blow. There is one more important point in this version:The Ukrainian exchange negotiators may not have known exactly how the prisoners were going to be delivered to the Belgorod region. That is, purely theoretically, no one on the Ukrainian side could have known that there were prisoners on board (although the Russian Federation claims that they knew about the plane in Kyiv, but it is impossible to verify this statement). Or they could have known, but not warned the Ukrainian Air Defense Forces about it!

PS What versions are currently being considered in the Ukrainian media and experts:

• The first is that the plane with the prisoners was shot down by the Russians themselves, in order to then shift responsibility to the Ukrainian Armed Forces. That is, there was a provocation.
• The second is that there were no prisoners on the plane; the Russians killed them on the ground in order to blame the Ukrainian Armed Forces for this (possibly after the plane was shot down).
• Also, a number of Ukrainian telegram channels claim that some of the people from the list published by the Russians had already been previously released through exchange.
• Other versions, as a priori “zradnye”, Bye are not considered. But the key word here is “BYE”.

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