Kill everyone is certainly not the only option nor
the most likely reason for scrambling. Any commander
will value eyes on the ground as high quality intelligence,
and in this situation a calm professional pilot obsrving
the cockpit will be useful, even if the airforce
don't have gizmos for listening in, videoing etc
so, no, reaching for a gun might mean you just want to look down the sight to see more.
>He fired a pair of R-60 missiles, one of which caused heavy damage to part of the left wing of the Boeing 707 and punctured the fuselage, causing rapid decompression, and killing two of the 97 passengers. After being hit, the airliner descended into cloud and was lost by the Su-15s. At 23:05, 40 minutes after the missile strike, it was finally forced to land by another Su-15TM on the frozen Korpijärvi Lake
>Now, there is only one thing that the F-16s could have done in this situation. Either they do nothing, or they shoot down the plane.
Utter BS. Before it comes to killing, the escort fighters usually show to the plane being escorted where to go. They do it using radio, visually (pilot's hands, overall fighter maneuvering and rolling), and if it comes to it - using tracer rounds. After the escorted plane refuse to follow the commands ... and continue flying toward DC ... in the post 9/11 world the kill would seem like a publicly acceptable outcome.
to drive technological progress? After all, the exponential development of brain and technology was triggered by the ape discovering the tactical advantages of stick and stone in fight/hunt.
I figured it was a scare tactic. "See those jets outside the window? Yea you're in that much trouble". Kind of like when you're picking on someone and their big bother shows up.
When information channels are so weak, it's imperative to get into the best decisionmaking vantage point available.