Originally posted by Toad
I'll be very nice and explain your ignorance as gently as I can.
quote: Not about the US recon plane on a parallel course (this is a fact),
No, it's not a fact, it's fiction.
KAL 007 crossed the RC track but never paralleled it. No RC ever flew a track like KAL flew. Ever.
quote: KE007, still steered by its compass, crossed the track of an American RC-135 reconnaissance aircraft that was on its way home from its duty station, flying over international waters, two hundred miles east of the Kamchatka Peninsula. The RC-135, a modified Boeing 707, was crammed with electronic gear designed to monitor a Soviet ballistic -- missile test that had been scheduled for that same night but had subsequently been cancelled.
Although the RC-135 flight was unpublicized, it was not illegal or especially sinister: such flights were part of the "national technical means of verification" mentioned, though coyly not described, in the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty then in force between the superpowers.
The RC-135 completed its leisurely sentry run off the Kamchatka coast, well north of KE007's track, and was back on the ground on Shemya Island, one of the Aleutians, a full hour before the shootdown.
Verified by people I knew flying the RC-135S that night.
So, again, you have no clue.
Oh, my God ! The funky RC-135 WAS NOT PARALLEL TO KAL-007 ! My big mistake !
The funky RC-135 WAS ON AN ANGLE TO KAL-007 !
Toad, it's just that simple. Nice and tidy.
And timing is everything.
Initial spy phase : KAL-007 retransmit link to RC-135.
Second spy phase : the American spy satellite sucks up the KAL-007 triggered information leak from the Soviet radar activity. (Most likely without the direct retransmit from KAL-007).
And, in my books, the name of the satellite was 'MARISAT'.
Sincerely,
P.P.S. When I say 'It's a fact', I always mean that I am the witness. So, don't overfeed me with "the press".