--- title: MH17 Ukraine Crash: Trying to figure out who shot it down is daunting description: Both sides believe a missile downed the jet, but determining whose missile will be tougher canonical: https://time.com/3020427/mh17-ukrainian-crash-dusting-for-fingerprints/ author: Mark Thompson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-07-22T21:56:42.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:40:29.516Z article:section: Politics og:title: MH17 Ukraine Crash: Trying to figure out who shot it down is daunting og:description: Both sides believe a missile downed the jet, but determining whose missile will be tougher og:url: https://time.com/3020427/mh17-ukrainian-crash-dusting-for-fingerprints/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltec4db73e67a20361/69869cb13617606ec890d26d/screen-shot-2014-07-22-at-4-47-48-pm.png?branch=production&width=752&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 752 og:image:height: 423 og:image:alt: Screen Shot 2014-07-22 at 4.47.48 PM og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: MH17 Ukraine Crash: Trying to figure out who shot it down is daunting twitter:description: Both sides believe a missile downed the jet, but determining whose missile will be tougher twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltec4db73e67a20361/69869cb13617606ec890d26d/screen-shot-2014-07-22-at-4-47-48-pm.png?branch=production&width=752&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # MH17 Ukrainian Crash: Dusting for Fingerprints > Sponsored content. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. ## Video: Watch: TIME's Simon Shuster And Getty's Brendan Hoffman on The MH17 Aftermath [Watch (HLS stream): Watch: TIME's Simon Shuster And Getty's Brendan Hoffman on The MH17 Aftermath](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/TUxxp7Jz.m3u8) (5:27)  _Published 2014-07-24. The author of this week's TIME cover story and an acclaimed Getty photographer paint a rarely seen image – through words and photographs – of the aftermath of the Malaysia Airlines crash in Ukraine_ by [Mark Thompson](https://time.com/author/mark-thompson/) ## Mark Thompson Jul 22, 2014 9:56 PM UTC  The U.S. embassy in Ukraine posted this graphic Tuesday, suggesting how pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine downed Malaysia Airlines Flight 17. The U.S. embassy in Ukraine posted this graphic Tuesday, suggesting how pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine downed Malaysia Airlines Flight 17. U.S. government by [Mark Thompson](https://time.com/author/mark-thompson/) ## Mark Thompson Jul 22, 2014 9:56 PM UTC Missiles don’t shoot down airliners. People do. But determining whose finger pushed the button that sent a guided rocket into MH17 is a lot tougher than determining that it was a missile that brought the Boeing 777 down, killing all 298 aboard. While the smoke has cleared from the crash site of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, and its victims begun their long journey home, much smoke—and some mirrors—remain for those seeking to determine culpability. U.S. officials said Tuesday that their latest intelligence suggests that pro-Russian separatists acted alone, without Moscow’s help. But that’s a distinction without a difference. The Russian government has fanned and fueled pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine for months. There’s little chance the rebels would have been able to shoot down the jet—if indeed that is what happened—without Moscow’s support. Implicit in that latest assessment is Washington’s eagerness to avoid pushing Russian President Vladimir Putin into a corner. Washington is trying to entice him into abandoning his support for the separatists. Amid the ferocious propaganda battle, powered by dueling briefings and instant analysis on social media, it’s important to remember both sides have been caught fudging before. Moscow took nearly a week before finally acknowledging it shot down Korean Airlines Flight 007 in 1983, killing all 269 on board. The U.S. denied early Soviet reports that Moscow had shot down a U-2 spy plane in 1960—until it produced Francis Gary Powers a week after his plane was shot down (and the weapons of mass destruction used to justify the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq—weapons that remain MIA—are often cited when questioning the trustworthiness of U.S. intelligence claims). It has been nearly a week since the plane crashed. The pair of black boxes, at last in the hands of Malaysian authorities, are unlikely to offer many clues. The crew aboard the plane likely had no knowledge they were under attack, so there’s probably no conversation on the cockpit voice recorder detailing what happened. It’s also likely that the flight data recorder will show everything aboard the plane was normal—until it shut down as the plane disintegrated. There is growing [evidence](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/22/world/europe/jet-wreckage-bears-signs-of-impact-by-supersonic-missile-analysis-shows.html) that some kind of missile warhead [peppered](http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/2/1d6a9ac2-10e3-11e4-b116-00144feabdc0.html#axzz389hw0P5E) the plane with shrapnel. An anti-aircraft missile’s warhead generally shatters as it comes within 100 yards or so of its target, flinging hundreds of high-velocity shards of shrapnel into it. They cripple the plane’s flaps and engines, severe fuel lines and can lead to its near-instantaneous destruction. The shrapnel plays into both competing narratives. The Russians have suggested, without offering proof, that a Ukrainian Su-25 may have fired the missile that brought the plane down. The U.S., showing how much remains unknown, didn’t dismiss the Russian claim. “I haven’t seen any information that indicates a Ukrainian jet,” State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said Tuesday. “We’re still looking into it, obviously. The president of Ukraine has said there was not, but again, we like to independently verify things.” Russian officials also indicated that their own intelligence shows that Ukrainian missile systems were in the area and could have downed MH17\. Moscow has argued that photographs of purported Russian missile systems inside Ukraine, and taped phone calls implicating Ukrainian rebels and their Russian allies in the shootdown, have been doctored, or are from different times and different places than the shootdown and its aftermath July 17. The rest of the world—the U.S., Europe and Ukraine—believes that an SA-11 surface-to-air missile—fired either by pro-Russian separatists or Russian troops themselves, from rebel-held territory in eastern Ukraine—is responsible. Chemical testing of any explosive residue left on the remnants of the plane—or the missile—might pinpoint the kind of missile involved. Smarting under increasing global pressure, Russian generals went on the offensive at a briefing Monday where they claimed a Ukrainian fighter jet flew within two miles of MH17 despite Kiev’s contention that no other aircraft were close by. And if an SA-11 Buk missile downed the jet, Lieutenant-General Andrei Kartopolov said, it didn’t come from Russia. Moscow hasn’t given pro-Russian Ukrainian separatists missiles, he added, “or any other kinds of weapons or military hardware” (that claim set off howls of laughter from inside U.S. intelligence and military circles). “According to the U.S. declarations, they have satellite images that confirm the missile was launched by the rebels. But nobody has seen these images,” Kartopolov said. “If the American side has pictures from this satellite, then they should show the international community.” If Monday’s Russian briefing—complete with radar images flashing across giant screens—was state of the art, Tuesday’s U.S. posting of a [graphic](https://time.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/screen-shot-2014-07-22-at-5-41-59-pm.png) designed to show how the shootdown happened was crude. The American embassy in Ukraine posted the sketch, which quickly turned up on cable television. But it listed no sources for what it supposedly showed, and was widely ridiculed online for its lack of provenance and authority. “It’s commercial imagery that’s available commercially,” the State Department’s Harf said Tuesday. “Flight paths are obviously publicly available information.” But it’s the alleged trajectory of the missile that’s key. Who added that? “I don’t think anyone here did,” Harf said. “I think this is just something we’ve been using internally inside the broader USG \[U.S. government\] who’s been talking about this.” Ukraine and Russia were involved in a similar case more than a decade ago. In 2001, Kiev belatedly acknowledged that its military mistakenly shot down a Siberia Airlines plane over the Black Sea, killing all 78 aboard. Coming less than a month after the 9/11 attacks, Russians initially suspected Chechen rebels for the shootdown. Back when Moscow and Kiev had warmer relations, the Russians declared that U.S. intelligence suggesting a wayward Ukrainian missile was to blame was “unworthy of attention.” Putin, no less, denied that the plane could have been downed by a Ukrainian missile. “The weapons used in those exercises had such characteristics that make it impossible for them to reach the air corridor through which the plane was moving,” he said shortly after the shootdown, while in his first of three terms as Russian president. So were terrorists responsible? “The final judgment of that and the cause of the tragedy,” he said, “can only be made by the experts after very careful study.” Ultimately, such study concluded that a Russian-built Ukrainian S-200 flew past its target drone after a second missile destroyed it. But instead of self-destructing, the S-200 locked on to the civilian airliner 150 miles away and blew it out of the sky. ### Scenes from the crash site of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17  A woman cries during a religious service held by villagers in memory of the victims at the crash site of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, near the village of Hrabove, eastern Ukraine, July 22, 2014. Vadim Ghirda—AP   Members of a Dutch forensics team prepare to inspect rail cars where the bodies of the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 crash victims were being held in Torez, Ukraine, July 21, 2014. Mauricio Lima—The New York Times/Redux  The bodies of victims of the crash of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 arrive at the Torez train station in the back of a truck to be loaded into a refrigerated train car on July 21, 2014 in Torez, Ukraine. Brendan Hoffman—Getty Images  Local residents gather to watch as the bodies of victims of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 are removed from the scene of the crash on July 21, 2014 in Grabovo, Ukraine. Brendan Hoffman—Getty Images  Personnel from the Ukrainian Emergencies Ministry load the bodies of victims of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 into a truck at the crash site on July 21, 2014 in Grabovo, Ukraine. Brendan Hoffman—Getty Images  An armed pro-Russian separatists gestures as he blocks the way to the crash site of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17, near the village of Grabove, in the region of Donetsk on July 20, 2014. Bulent Kilic—AFP/Getty Images  People search a wheat field for remains in the area of the crash site of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 near the village of Hrabove, July 20, 2014. Vadim Ghirda—AP  Emergency workers carry a body at the crash site of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17, near the settlement of Grabovo in the Donetsk region, July 19, 2014. Maxim Zmeyev—Reuters  A rose lies on a plastic sheet covering a victim of a Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 plane which was downed on Thursday near the village of Rozsypne, in the Donetsk region July 18, 2014. Maxim Zmeyev—Reuters  Miners inspect a piece of debris found in a field from the Malaysia Airlines plane on July 18, 2014 in Grabovka, Ukraine. Brendan —Getty Images  A group of miners prepare to search a field for debris and human remains from the Malaysia Airlines plane on July 18, 2014 in Grabovka, Ukraine. Brendan Hoffman—Getty Images  A man looks at debris from the Malaysia Airlines plane crash on July 18, 2014 in Grabovka, Ukraine. Brendan Hoffman—Getty Images  Self-proclaimed Prime Minister of the pro-Russian separatist "Donetsk People's Republic" Alexander Borodai stands as he arrives on the site of the crash of a malaysian airliner carrying 298 people from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, near the town of Shaktarsk, in rebel-held east Ukraine, on July 17, 2014. Dominique Faget—AFP/Getty Images  People walk amongst the debris at the crash site of a passenger plane near the village of Grabovo, Ukraine, July 17, 2014. Dmitry Lovetsky—AP  People walk amongst the debris at the crash site of a passenger plane near the village of Grabovo, Ukraine, July 17, 2014. Dmitry Lovetsky—AP  The site of a Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 plane crash is seen near the settlement of Grabovo in the Donetsk region, July 17, 2014. Maxim Zmeyev—Reuters  An Emergencies Ministry member works at putting out a fire at the site of a Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 plane crash in the settlement of Grabovo in the Donetsk region, July 17, 2014. Maxim Zmeyev—Reuters  Smoke rises from where a Malaysia Airlines commercial plane crashed in eastern Ukraine on July 17, 2014. Andrei Kashtanov—AP  The wreckage of the Malaysian airliner carrying 295 people from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur after it crashed on July 17, 2014 near the town of Shaktarsk, in rebel-held east Ukraine. Zuran Dzhavakhadze—AFP/Getty Images  Luggage seen at the crash site the Malaysian airliner carrying 298 people from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, near the town of Shaktarsk, in rebel-held east Ukraine, July 17, 2014 Dominique Faget—Getty Images  A woman and child walk past the crash site of a passenger plane near the village of Grabovo, Ukraine, July 17, 2014. Dmitry Lovetsky—AP  The wreckage of the Malaysian airliner carrying 295 people from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur after it crashed, near the town of Shaktarsk, in rebel-held east Ukraine, July 17, 2014. Dominique Faget—AFP/Getty Images ## Transcript [ MUSIC ] There weren't a lot of people there. There weren't very many people around. There were some journalists who were filming. In the field we could see sticks with white scraps of cloth tied onto them. There were some local coal miners who have been sent over by their bosses to help with the clean up effort. It just spread randomly around everywhere as far as you could see. There were these sticks with the ribbons on them. And there were just a few of the rebel fighters, just one of them guarding the road leading up to it. So it, it felt quite deserted. Right next to the road was a big black smudge where a section of the plane had landed. Everything was charred, and we could see twisted chunks of metal, we. We could see luggage strewn all over the place. And mixed in with all of that we could see the bodies of the victims. In the first day or two after the crash happened, the, the separatists in, in the region didn't play much of a role at all. In fact, I only saw maybe a handful of them the entire first day, that Friday the day after. The plane crash happened. There was no one who had, stopped, access to the site. We were able to roam freely through, the fields where the wreckage and everything, it was open. There was no one, there was no one to stop us. The rebels themselves are a mixed bunch. A lot of them are local guys, many who were unemployed when the conflict broke out. Some of them petty criminals, some of them just regular citizens, regular men who took up arms under the impression that the revolution that brought a new government to power in Ukraine in February was a fascist revolution, and they needed to defend their home [ FOREIGN ] By the second day, on Saturday, there were separatists who were in control of the site. They were just as shocked as anybody, and couldn't believe what had happened, didn't have any clue who might be responsible, certainly didn't feel like it had anything to do with them. And were just as devastated as any and, as anyone else would be by the scene [ MUSIC ] The most elite and well trained well armed, gunmen among the rebels are Russian, they've come over for the most part as volunteers paramilitary fighters, they see this as a conflict of civilizations, as Russia's opportunity to ,. Regain control of land in Eastern Ukraine that they think historically, culturally, by right, belongs to Russia. I think what's interesting about the, the separatists that are operating in the eastern part of the Ukraine right now, is their command structure, it's still very, very. Loose, and authority is only fleeting and ephemeral. There is no one in charge except for the person who's at that spot at that time. They wear mis- matching camouflage uniforms, they're usually armed with Kalashnikov assault rifles. They have grenades usually in their pockets. A lot of the fighters that I've met seem to get quite a kick out of the impunity that they enjoy in Eastern Ukraine, they are in full control of these cities. There were times when the separatists did prevent us from doing the reporting that we wanted to do, we wanted to access the site. And at one point, the man who was the, the leader at that time, at that spot, he raised up his gun and, and I don't speak very much Russian but I understood enough of what he said to get the point. Which was if you don't speak Russian, then maybe you'll understand [ INAUDIBLE ] is was clear we couldn't, we couldn't stay around and photograph anymore. [ MUSIC ] The smell is probably the most. Disturbing, and, and the part that's hardest to remember. Crash scene it's self was exceptionally gruesome, there were a lot of things that I saw at that scene that I wished I had never had laid my eyes on. The, the most difficult part of being at the crash site. Was seeing the piles of personal belongings. There was children's pink suitcases. I saw a diary, I saw this one itinerary printed out for a family vacation to an Island I think in Indonesia, plans for an elephant ride, notes in the margin about how fun it's going to be. And that really brought home how these lives have been completely, senselessly interrupted by a conflict that I think a lot of them probably either have never heard of or knew very little about. There are plenty of things that I did photograph that I would never in a million years, publish, just because I felt like it needed to be photographed for historical purposes but not necessarily to appear in tomorrow's newspaper. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3020427/mh17-ukrainian-crash-dusting-for-fingerprints/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3020427/mh17-ukrainian-crash-dusting-for-fingerprints/"},"headline":"MH17 Ukrainian Crash: Dusting for Fingerprints","datePublished":"2014-07-22T21:56:42.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T07:40:29.516Z","description":"Both sides believe a missile downed the jet, but determining whose missile will be tougher","url":"https://time.com/3020427/mh17-ukrainian-crash-dusting-for-fingerprints/","keywords":["Terrorism","Ukraine","russia","Malaysia","#MH17"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltec4db73e67a20361/69869cb13617606ec890d26d/screen-shot-2014-07-22-at-4-47-48-pm.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Mark Thompson","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/mark-thompson/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltec4db73e67a20361/69869cb13617606ec890d26d/screen-shot-2014-07-22-at-4-47-48-pm.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Screen Shot 2014-07-22 at 4.47.48 PM","caption":"The U.S. embassy in Ukraine posted this graphic Tuesday, suggesting how pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine downed Malaysia Airlines Flight 17.","creditText":"U.S. government","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/terrorism/","name":"Terrorism"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3020427/mh17-ukrainian-crash-dusting-for-fingerprints/","name":"MH17 Ukrainian Crash: Dusting for Fingerprints"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Watch: TIME's Simon Shuster And Getty's Brendan Hoffman on The MH17 Aftermath","description":"The author of this week's TIME cover story and an acclaimed Getty photographer paint a rarely seen image – through words and photographs – of the aftermath of the Malaysia Airlines crash in Ukraine","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/TUxxp7Jz/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2014-07-24T02:21:56.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/TUxxp7Jz.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/3020427/mh17-ukrainian-crash-dusting-for-fingerprints/","duration":"PT5M27S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/3020427/mh17-ukrainian-crash-dusting-for-fingerprints/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```