The Board of Inquiry concluded that, even if the aircraft had been fitted with Explosion Suppressant Foam (ESF), it would not have prevented its loss. This is because ESF does not prevent leaks when the fuel tanks are punctured.
Not true - ESF does contain leaks to some extent. It causes them to become seeping leaks rather than running leaks. The ESF will expand somewhat to fill holes. Fuel will leak out through the foam, but not run out of a hole. Rather like putting a sponge over a hole; you cannot stop the leak with the sponge, but it will slow it considerably and any "burn back" will be unable to ignite vapours in the tank.
In this incident, it is highly likely that it would have contained the fire rather than explosively fuelled it.
A direct comparison can be made to the MC-130H that crashed on landing at Q-West two years ago last Jan & ended up impacting a construction crater. The #3 engine caught fire & burned through the wing. The fire was contained to just the inboard fuel tank, there was no explosion, and it was doused with a slack handful of fire bottles - no fire truck. There was fuel all over as well because the port wing snapped off on impact just outboard of the #2 engine.
The MC-130H that had to divert to Turkey during the opening night of Iraq experienced no significant fuel loss despite being riddled with holes from smarms/lt AAA throughout the wings.
I'm with airsound - this is propaganda.