I remember the clamour that rightfully occurred when Korean 007 was shot down (he was not where he was supposed to be). Also, the Libyan aircraft the Israelies shot down, and the Iranian aircraft that that trigger-happy Naval ship shot up (and HE was on course, on a scheduled flight).
In all these cases, the military did not have the extreme circumstances to justify action that would now apply if an aircraft were not to respond to ATC & turn towards a major city or nuclear facility. Any Iraqi 727 even threatened is an abomination, unless he does something obviously threatening himself. The Iranian shootdown was particularly egregious, resulting in the loss of 2 planeloads of innocents (the Pan Am bombing was very likely the result). Forget good guys & bad guys...let's STOP shooting down, or even threatening same, no matter who. Iranian and Iraqi commercial cockpit crew are our professional brothers, regardless of politics.