From: rlawler@dfw.net (Rick Lawler)
Subject: SNET: TWA Kinetic Missile
To: snetnews@world.std.com
Date sent: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 00:21:56 -0500 (CDT)

http://www.parismatch.com/actualite/twasuite/indexang.html

TWA 800: our complete coverage

Following, the last revelations from Pierre Salinger's investigation team

Investigation Reveals US Navy Kinetic Energy Missile Responsible for Shooting Down TWA Flight 800

Two years ago the US Navy was describing its new missile on the Internet

A super-secret U.S. Navy missile, the SM-2 (IV/IVA), a kinetic energy "kill" missile was responsible for shooting down TWA Flight 800 on the night of July 17, 1996, a 10-person investigation team headed by Pierre Salinger and Mike Sommer has disclosed. "Unless public opinion forces it, the US Government will never reveal the truth about TWA Flight 800".They add also: "If the US Government says we are wrong, all it has to do is contradict the following, and we challenge it to do so":

1-Start a completely separate investigation of TWA Flight 800 than that conducted by the FBI and NSTB(National Transportation Safety Board). This one should be conduct by Secretary of Defense William Cohen and the Department of Defense.

2-Allow French investigating authorities - in view of the fact that 70 French citizens were killed aboard TWA Flight 800 - Who have been excluded by the FBI and the US authorities to the TWA Flight 800 investigation, to fully participate. To accomplish this would take one telephone call from President Clinton to French President Chirac.

In the case of TWA Flight 800, contrary to frequent Pentagon and FBI statements that no Navy missile was launched near the area where the flight crashed, our investigation reveals that many missiles were in fact test-fired over the area during the last two years. The US Navy, in particular, has tested out the brutal and outlawed kinetic energy KKV kill missile near civilian areas on several occasions.

One of the nation's leading aviation and missile technology magazines, "Aviation Week and Space Technology, reported in its February 24, 1997 edition that the US Navy is "fielding a modified version of the Standard Missile so that Aegis ships can protect ports, coastal airfields and landing areas". The magazine states that the Navy will start "fielding" these Aegis missiles - which incidentally are of the same type and using the same type of ship which were located under TWA Flight 800 on the night of its shootdown - starting in the year 2002. But the Salinger-Sommer team has discovered that the Navy has already launched testing "full speed ahead". Aviation Week reported that "the success of a prototype Standard Missile 2 Block 4A in destroying a Lance missile target at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico on January, 1997 was so great that the Defense Acquisition Board will review the missile this month. The board will then take a decision on whether to begin the missile's further engineering and manufacturing".

Critically, the closure speed of the US Navy kill missile's test at White Sands showed that the Block 4A missile has speeds in excess of mach 8, or eight times the speed of sound. Such speeds made it easily possible for any number of US Navy Aegis missile ships which were participating in a super-secret US Navy exercise under TWA Flight 800 on the night of the July 17, 1996 disaster to have shot at and exploded the Boeing 747 aircraft.

The Kinetic Kill Vehicle (KKV), known as a Lightweight Exo-Atmospheric Projectile (LEAP), was being integrated into the Standard Missile as early as 1992, despite Pentagon statements and protestations that the KKV was never tested in War Zones near the TWA disaster.

According to a statement of the Ballistic Missile Defense organization (BMDO) in that year, 1992, "the BMDO-Navy-LEAP Technology Demonstration Program, which began in 1992, completed the necessary missile systems engineering to integrate the LEAP project into the Navy's STANDARD Missile and a BMDO-developed Advanced Solid Axial Stage (ASAS) third stage motor.

The investigation has uncovered that the KKV missile was tested in 1995, and that flight tests were performed in March, 1995 from the Navy's guided missile cruiser USS Richmond K. Turner.

Phillips laboratory's Advanced Solid Axial Stage (ASAS) team, consisting of personnel from the Lab's Propulsion Directorate, and contractors from SPARTA and Thiokol Corporation - Elkton Division, successfully developed, tested, and delivered ASAS stages for use in the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization (BMDO) and Navy Terrier Lightweight Exo-atmospheric Projectile (LEA) flight demonstration test series. The ASAS went through a series of qualification and safety tests to demonstrate propulsion system performance, reliability, and safety characteristics. Two flight stages were delivered for incorporation into Flight Test Vehicles 3 and 4. Both flight tests were then performed by the USS Richmond K. Turner. In both tests, the ASAS performed "as expected", providing what were called "optimal" performance from the thrust vector control and attitude control systems. ASAS was then baselined for follow-on demonstrations from the BMDO and Navy Aegis-LEAP flight test demonstrations.

The SM-2 (IVA) was test fired in the Atlantic in early 1995, contrarily to what the Navy and Pentagon continually states, that it has only been test-fired this year.

Furthermore, documentation proves not only the SM-2 (IV) is a test missile, but that KKV kill vehicle is fully integrated into the SM-2 (IV). The IV missile is, in fact, the IVA missile. These missiles have been continually used by the US Navy for at least two years, in direct contradiction to statements by the Pentagon and US Navy.

In its own admission, the US Navy, in a document, admits to be the "exclusive agent" for KKV kill missile!

During its eight-month investigation of the TWA Flight 800 disaster, the investigation team was in frequent contact with the previous and founding director of the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization, Brig. Gen. Burton K. Partin, who agreed with the team's analysis and conclusion that a US Navy missile had shot down TWA Flight 800. General Partin differed with the team in only one minor respect: he thinks the KKV missile had approached the TWA Flight 800 from the front to down it, not from the right side as the team had concluded. General Partin is widely respected in military circles as the man who built the Ballistic Missile Defense organization and designed many of its missiles. He stands as one of America's outstanding missile authorities.

The investigative team procured a US Navy "Memorandum for Correspondents", dated from February 8, 1995, that has been purged from many, but not all, military web pages. It invites the media to a test of the very missile that the US Navy says was not tested:

February 8, 1995

Memorandum for Correspondents

"On February 10, 1995, the Navy will test the integration of modified Standard Missile (SM-2 Block IV) and the Lightweight Exoatmospheric Projectile (LEAP) kinetic-kill (KKV) in a ship-launched intercept of a mock Tactical Ballistic Missile.

Stationed off the coast of North Carolina, the navy cruiser USS Richmond K. Turner (CG 20) will fire the Standard Missile at a Scud-like target launched from NASA's Wallops Island Flight Facility in Virginia. The KKV is designed to track, manoeuvre, lock-on and guide itself to impact the target. Live video from the launch site and from the missile/KKV will be downlinked to the Pentagon Auditorium, Room 5A1070.

Rear admiral Rodney Rempt, Director of the Navy's Theater Air Defense Division, will be on hand to discuss specific aspects of the test and answer questions. The launch is scheduled for 6:04 a.m., EST. The Pentagon Auditorium, Room 5A1070, will be open for correspondents beginning at 5:30 a.m., and those interested in attending should be seated by 5/45 a.m. We realize this is early but we will have coffee available.

Hughes Corporation is providing a LEAP hotline to update the status of the launch every hour until the missile launch, XXXXXXXXXX, phone number deleted. The navy is the executive agent for the LEAP KKV program, which is funded through the Ballistic Missile Defense organization (BMDO).

Correspondants having additional questions on the launch should contact Lieutenant David Albritton at the Navy News Desk, XXXXXXXXXXX, phone number deleted."

This statement is now highly embarrassing for the US Navy which has yet answer nothing to explain it.

By Pierre Salinger, Mike Sommer, and Ian Goddard