No doubt you recall the mystery that began when Malaysian flight MH370 vanished into thin air en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8, 2014. It had 239 people on board.
Truth be told, I felt certain international search teams would find it. The technology that enabled deep-sea explorers to find the wreck of the Titanic informed my certainty.
Yet I could not resist positing that its passengers might either meet the real fate of Amelia Earhart, or play out the TV fate of the characters on the popular series, Lost.
Nobody knows what became of it. …
My own scenario follows the takeoff for the TV series Lost. All things considered, those on board should be so lucky.
(“Malaysian Airlines MH370 … ‘Lost,’” The iPINIONS Journal, March 14, 2014)
This is why I am as dumbfounded as I am resigned that, despite four years of the most exhaustive, technically advanced search in the history of mankind, it has come to this:
A privately funded underwater search for the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 has ended in failure. …
The decision to engage Ocean Infinity came after Australia, China and Malaysia ended a fruitless A$200-million ($159 million) search across a 120,000 square-kilometre (46,332 square mile) expanse of the Indian Ocean last year.
(The Telegraph, May 29, 2018)
In a word: lost.
Still, the Malaysian government is offering grieving families hope against hope. Only this explains Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamed marking the end of this second search with this Delphic statement:
We have come to a stage where we cannot keep searching for something we cannot find. … If we find any new information, we may resume the search.
(Xinhua, May 30, 2018)
That said, I hasten to clarify that the fateful mystery of MH370 has nothing to do with the shameful tragedy of MH17.
Here in part is the informed speculation I offered about the latter in “MH17: Another Malaysian Flight Falls from the Sky,” July 18, 2014.
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Despite his denials, Russian President Vladimir Putin has clearly been inciting and supporting (pro-Russian) Ukrainian separatists pursuant to his agenda to reclaim Russia’s ‘sphere of influence.’
I asserted from the outset that his strategy is fraught with geopolitical peril. Nothing demonstrates this quite like yesterday’s breaking news implicating those separatists in the downing of Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17, killing nearly 300 innocent men, women, and children. Not to mention that Ukrainian separatists using Russian missiles to down this airplane (even if from mistaken identity – as seems to have been the case) must now be seen as a foreshadowing of countries like Iran and Cuba using even deadlier Russian weapons to cause far greater damage … and casualties.
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This is why I felt more vindicated than surprised last week when investigators published evidence that explained this tragedy.
The announcement by international investigators that they have uncovered evidence of Kremlin culpability in the shooting down of flight MH17 is a development of significance, and comes at a time when relations between Russia and the West are in one of the worst states since the days of the Cold War. …
Not only had the BUK missile system come from across the Russian border, they say, but it has been narrowed down to the 53rd anti-aircraft brigade based in Kursk.
(The Independent, May 24, 2018)
Case closed.
Of course, congressional Republicans will impeach Trump before any international tribunal prosecutes Putin.
Therefore, I fear the loved ones of those who perished in the tragedy of MH17 will have no greater “closure” than the loved ones of those who vanished in the mystery of MH370.