Iran Blames Plane Crash on U.S.
TEHRAN, Iran — An Iranian passenger plane carrying 168 people crashed a quarter-hour after takeoff Wednesday, smashing into a field northwest of the capital and shattering to pieces. State television said all on board were killed.
Caspian Airlines is a Russian-Iranian joint venture founded in 1993. Iran has frequent plane crashes often because of bad maintenance of its aging aircraft. Tehran blames the problem in part on U.S. sanctions that prevent Iran from getting spare parts for some planes. Caspian Airlines, however, uses Russian-made Tupolevs whose maintenance would be less impaired by American sanctions.
First of all, let me say that yes, of course this is a tragedy and I mourn for the families. Now, to focus on the government of Iran—please stop blaming every damn thing that goes wrong in your country on the United States. First it was the mosque bomb (which really wasn’t first at all), then it was the post-election riots, and now this. Not only is it getting old, but a majority of the time, the claims are utterly factless.
This particurlar allegation, that the U.S. is responsible due to sanctions, is mostly if not completely irrelevant. While it may be true that they cannot receive spare parts for their aircraft, the plane that crashed was a jet from the Russian-Iranian joint venture. Shouldn’t they be receiving their parts from Russia—if not manufacturing the parts themselves? “Down with the U.S., because we can’t solve our own problems and are losing control of our educated and resourceful citizens who yearn for the freedoms of said country!”
