you couldn't make this stuff up!!
Senior Crab 1 : 'There's been another accident'
Senior Crab 2: 'Better blame the pilots then'
SC1: 'Errr... They're Yanks.'
SC2: 'Best nail the controller, then.'
SC1: 'They weren't under control, but we might be able to stretch credibility if we make RIS look like control, massage the known facts and ignore any other evidence which doesn't fit our case. Especially any civvy witnesses. What do they know anyway.'
Apologies if I sound flippant, I feel quite the reverse. As one of the (hopefully) thorns in the MOD's side over the Chinook crash, it appears to me that the above kind of scenario would appear to fit both mishaps.
I only found this thread last night, and have spent some hours going through every post.
I don't know you Spot, but as an ex dark blue, I fully appreciated that under RIS my life was in MY hands and the controller was there to help me achieve my task.
Your defence team is superb, and if I'm ever in the brown and smelly, I hope I can count on a bunch of friends such as yours. They do the service a darned sight more credit than those who have subjected you to this farce. On the evidence presented in the excellent daily summaries, I cannot see how ANY CM can find you guilty.
You will be aquitted. I will have a beer for you, and once again thank providence that I am no longer part of a service which can treat its loyal servants with such contempt.
To the families of the dead pilots I extend my deepest sympathies. Miltary low flying is an unforgiving, but intensely exacting environment. But the 'blame culture' of the RAF insults everyone's intelligence. Especially those loved ones who want the truth, not a convenient scape-goat.