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1. THE DOWNING OF FLIGHT PS752 1.1 Military Tensions before January 8, 2020 Since the 1979 revolution, the Islamic Republic of Iran and the United States have been in a wavering conflict. These tensions have fluctuated but the animosity has remained constant over the past 43 years. 2019 marked a turning point of heightened tensions between the two countries. On June 20, 2019, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) air defence unit shot down an American military drone over the Strait of Hormuz, resulting in escalation of tensions between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran, and especially the IRGC which was designated a foreign terrorist organization by the US government two months earlier [1-3]. The United States refrained from retaliation at that time, but the war of words dragged on to the end of 2019, when a mob of IRGC-backed militia attacked the American embassy in Baghdad and set parts of it ablaze. This attack was in retaliation for the killing of 25 IRGC-supported militia in Western Iraq in a US. air strike which in turn had been in retaliation for the earlier killing of an American contractor in Iraq by militia indirect rocket fire [4]. Three days later, the United States military launched a drone attack on a convoy that was carrying Qassem Soleimani, the head of IRGC’s Quds Force, away from the Baghdad airport. Soleimani, a senior Iraqi militia commander and other IRGC officers were killed in this strike [5]. Cries of a “hard revenge” reverberated among the rank and file of the Islamic hardliners in Iran [6]. The IRGC orchestrated a series of lengthy and dramatic funeral ceremonies for their senior commander, which itself led to the death of at least 56 civilians resulting from several stampedes [7]. The Islamic Republic of Iran’s parliament rapidly ratified a motion to provide 200 million Euros to the Quds Force for taking a “hard revenge” for the killing of their elite commander [8]. The world was bracing for an outbreak of war in the Middle East [9].
1.2 The Morning of January 8, 2020 A few days before the downing of the Ukrainian airliner Flight PS752, the director of the airport, Ali Rostami was removed from his position and was replaced by a former commander of the IRGC, Mohammad Mehdi Karbalaie [10]. On the early morning of the downing of Flight PS752, and while its passengers were getting ready to check in to their flight, a group of IRGC members and clergy had organized a protest rally in the airport terminal [11]. Through inflammatory chants and slogans, they were calling for hard revenge. A Reuters’ report confirms that nearly six hours before the IRGC ballistic missile attack on the US military bases near Baghdad, the American officials were informed of this operation through the Danish Embassy that had received the information from the Iranian government [12]. As a result, the American military had partially evacuated those bases; fifty aircraft and one thousand soldiers were removed from the bases [13]. Such a mobilization surely required time and logistical resources while the passengers of Flight PS752 were not warned, oblivious to these activities. In contrast, the Americans were aware of what was about to happen and the IRGC had informed them of their plans [14]. Later in a television interview, the IRGC air force commander acknowledged the forewarning of Americans and added that he was unaware which government branch among the foreign
