Some years ago, I suggested that the system may have regarded the team on board as an obstacle to the peace process - on the grounds that they were planning to hit the IRA hard and not seeing the need to compromise with terrorism - and so, however unpalatable, the possibility of the crash having been set up required consideration.
None of you on this thread supported that view and indeed some tried to downplay the importance of the team.
Recently, talking to the BBC during the Queen's visit to Ireland, Bertie Ahern enthusiastically mentioned that the one big problem for the Republicans to accept the peace process was the RUC - he said that it had had to have been opened up (restructured/culture change/root and branch sort of scale). This would not have been possible had those on board ZD576 that day remained in their positions.