Well, this is cosy Nigel, just thee and me it would seem! Such weighty moral issues, yet so little said by so few! So let's dot some i's and t's (well OK, cross them). Only mods can remove others' posts I believe, so how about spelling out the pros and cons, mods? Oh and can we take as read the whole Danny's train set spiel?
The only reason that occurs to me as to what might have motivated this is to prevent the rocking of the MOD boat. If the reward for non-rocking is that Jonathon Tapper's and Rick Cook's names might be cleared as against never, I would only comment that no spoon is long enough to sup with the MOD! Both the Nimrod and Hercules threads were instanced by brave NoK determined that no other families should go through such pain as they have had to endure following possibly avoidable accidents. They faced patronising and even hostile comments on this very forum, but were determined to discover what had happened and how best to avoid it in the future. In that regard they showed greater adherence to the tenets of Flight Safety than many of the professionals that post here. I realise that what they did not have to do was to clear the names of their loved ones, as with this tragedy. If the price of doing so is to prevent wrong doing from being exposed and thus being repeated again, is it not too high to pay? For that would be blackmail, an ugly word for an ugly deed. The greater good here surely would be to expose the way that airworthiness has been consistently compromised by the very authority charged with its enforcement, ie the MOD, as has been testified to in the Hercules and Nimrod threads. Appeasement never works. Censorship never works. The truth will out. Better if all here are at least agreed upon that.