"I will question why 14 good men died in an incident caused by some type of failure."
Unfortunately that is aviation. Any analysis on why planes crash always provides a string of unconnected decisions that converge into an incident. There are no "accidents".
Well short of quoting Homer J Simpson's "Yeah? Well, what can you do?", that seems to write off Flight Safety with one proverbial shrug of the shoulders! I would suggest that Civil Aviation has changed itself over the decades from one of the most dangerous to one of the safest forms of transport by taking a totally contrary point of view. That is that every accident has a primary cause, with many contributory ones no doubt, that can all be attended to with (a)technical, (b)training and (c)procedural changes. That used to be the system used in the RAF in my time, but seems to be less so now as a, b, and c cost money, though d, the continued predictable and inevitable repeat accidents caused by not applying a, b and c costs much more financially, operationally and worst of all needlessly costs lives.
As long as incompetent officials, military and political can hide behind the archaic Official Secrets Act there will never be accountability for stupid, fraudulent and senseless decisions. The UK military have been brainwashed to believe the media are their enemies, as shown by the rhetoric against the BBC. The media are the only defence against the legions of faceless bureaucrats who have absolutely no regard for their "Subjects" life or safety.
Speaking as one who frequently indulges in "rhetoric" aimed at the BBC all I can say is that if they are the only defence that the armed forces have against the MOD's apparatchiks then they are indeed doomed. This government has an attitude about the Armed Forces, its political party shares that attitude, as does the BBC, as do great swathes of the population, witness only just over 1000 signatures in support of the RBL's Military Covenant protest petition. None of that makes it acceptable for the MOD to equip the RAF with unairworthy aircraft. That is the nub of this thread, that is the thrust of TD's search, and the proof will be found in the very same paper audit trail that tuc commends to us.