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Don Lemon Tonight

Iran Admits Shooting Down Ukrainian Airline by Mistake; Iran's Foreign Minister Blames U.S. Adventurism. Aired 11p-12a ET

Aired January 10, 2020 - 23:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is CNN breaking news.

DON LEMON, CNN HOST: This is CNN Tonight. I'm Don Lemon.

It is the top of the hour and we have huge breaking news for you tonight. We're just getting in a new information. Iran admitting that they shot down that Ukrainian plane and they did it unintentionally.

Here is what the general staff of Iran's armed forces says, that the plane was brought down due to human error. Due to human error.

Our correspondents in the region are gathering right now with the latest news on this big development and they will join us live in just a moment.

Again, Iran admitting that they shot down, unintentionally shot down that Ukrainian plane. We're going to get the latest for you in just moments so stand by for that.

Also, tonight, there's more news. President Trump's trouble with the truth. Americans may have a tough time believing anything he says about the conflict with Iran especially since his rationale for ordering the killing of Iran's top commander well, it keeps changing.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi preparing to send the articles of impeachment to the Senate next week, but are Senate Republicans preparing to launch a sham trial just to protect the president? It may all come down to a battle between Trump and the Constitution.

Days after that Ukrainian plane crashed after taking off Tehran's -- from Tehran's airport, what cause it to fall out of the sky? Well, again, we're getting new information that's coming in tonight saying that it was unintentionally shot out of the sky. We'll get more information on that as soon as we get it for you.

So, let's talk about the 2020 election as well. But first I want to get to the breaking news with CNN's military analyst Colonel Cedric Leighton. Colonel Cedric Leighton joins us now.

Colonel, thank you so much. I appreciate it. So, can you talk to us about this new information that we're getting U.S. intelligence among other countries believed that Iran shot down that Ukrainian airliner with two Russian-made surface-to-air missiles.

Iran says Ukrainian plane was brought down due to human error. But now they're saying that it was unintentional. What is going on here, what's your reaction?

CEDRIC LEIGHTON, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Well, Don, I think to add to what we're seeing here is that Iran has been basically forced to say what U.S. intelligence has been reporting to, you know, not only to the leadership but the leadership of our country has been talking about right, you know, during the last few days.

So, what it shows to me is that, you know, the Iranian system basically broke down. And they have no recourse but to admit they made a really bad mistake when they shot down this Ukrainian civilian airliner.

It really shows also the fact that their command and control of these systems is not as robust as it should have been during something like this, because it's very clear that, you know, when you have civilian air traffic, that missile battery operators need to understand what kind of air traffic they're going to be seeing before they're allowed to engage weapons and to fire those weapons. And that's clearly something that failed in this case.

LEMON: So, what do you think caused them to come to this determination? Because at first, they were denying it or at least trying to deny it. What do you think happened?

LEIGHTON: Well, I think that, you know, it's very interesting, the Iranian reaction to all of the things that have been going on has been very different from a lot of, you know, their historical patterns in a case like this, their pattern of usual denial.

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They at least started with that but something has changed in the way the Iranians are approaching these kinds of issues. And they seem to be more willing to admit when they're wrong, which is kind of interesting for someone like me who has been watching them for a few years, you know, for over 30 years, and looking at this saying, yes, this is a very different pattern of behavior.

And it seems that this may be a way for them to try to be more integrated with the rest of the world, at least when it comes to these kinds of issues. So, I don't want to make it seem as if there is a possible opening here without having further proof, but it is very notable that they are admitting that something went terribly wrong and that they were at fault.

It is a definite change in the way that they've approached these issues. There's a definite change in how they are, I think trying to really make amends for what has happened.

LEMON: So, where does -- what does this mean for the investigation? Where does it go next, Colonel? LEIGHTON: Well, I think it helps the investigation. Because now

instead of, you know, getting different stories from like we used to hear just a few hours ago from the head of Iranian Civil Aviation that, you know, clearly this was not a missile explosion, that missiles did not hit the aircraft.

But now we know that the head of Iranian Civil Aviation was in fact incorrect and that the real assessment is very much contingent on what they did and it basically coincides with the intelligence reports that we've heard discussed.

I think that the investigation has helped. I think that this may portend an era of greater cooperation between Iran and the rest of the world. Again, I don't want to read too much into it but it certainly seems like the Iranians are trying to be more open and they're trying to create some degree of an opening to the rest of the world. If they do that, that's certainly a change in direction from what we've seen in the past.

LEMON: In case you're just joining us, stand by, Colonel Cedric Leighton, If you're just joining us now, Iran is admitting that they shot down that Ukrainian plane unintentionally. It came just hours after that strike on U.S. bases in Iraq.

The general staff of Iran armed forces says that Ukrainian plane was brought down due to human error, Iran targeted the passenger plane unintentionally, according to Iran press TV reports.

Colonel Cedric Leighton who is CNN's military analyst is joining us on the phone. This information is just coming in, we're just getting it in, and as we get more, we'll bring it to you.

I want to continue on now with Colonel Leighton. Colonel, Iran had invited the NTSB to participate in the investigation. What does the U.S. do now?

LEIGHTON: Well, this is a good opening, also, Don, for the U.S., because what the U.S. I think can do, you know, if this type of cooperation continues, is they can bring a lot more to the accident investigation than would otherwise be the case.

They can, you know, take a look at what the Iranians have gathered from the crash site. Hopefully the Iranians will change their other policies when it comes to these kinds of things. And, you know, allow access to the actual wreckage.

There's no reason now for them to hide what happened, you know, for them to hide forensic evidence, for example. I think that's going to be critically important.

So, the NTSB, Boeing, should be prepared to go in with as many resources as they possibly can go in and help not only Iran but the rest of the world community find out what actually happened in this case. That I think is going to be critical.

It's also something that's very important for the families of the people who were killed in this tragic accident. I think it's very important for them to know what happened, as horrible a mistake as this was, it is very important I think for them to also find out what went wrong, how it went wrong, and you know, in essence assess culpability where it's due.

LEMON: Ukrainian officials were holding off any judgment here and trying to be impartial about it because they wanted to make sure that the investigation was handled properly. But with this admission, this certainly makes a determination a whole lot easier now that Iran is admitting it, they know what happened, now there's not much to get to the bottom of it, now they just want to know how it happened exact, right?

LEIGHTON: That is right. Absolutely, Don. And what this also points to is the fact that the investigation can now focus on what happened within Iran's military. So, there's obviously the forensic evidence that they can gather from the crash site and that, you know, will be in that hangar that's near Tehran's airport.

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But what's also important is, you know, for the Iranians, this is actually not just something that affects the Iranian military but all civil aviation throughout the Middle East.

It is very -- going to be very important to find out how and why the Iranians behaved the way they did in the second and minutes leading up to the shootout. This is something that should never have happened.

But the fact that it did happen and now the fact, the new fact that Iran has admitted that they shot this plane down, that becomes very important. And it can also eventually lead to improved command and control procedures that will increase the safety for civil aviation in the region, and that's also a critical thing and will help assure the safety of thousands of passengers, you know, for the foreseeable future if they do the right thing.

LEMON: One hundred seventy-six lives lost in this unintentional act here, Iran admitting that they shot down this plane.

I'm going to keep Colonel Cedric Leighton. We're going to take a quick break and we're going to gather our reporters and our experts and we'll continue on with our breaking news right after this.

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LEMON: So, we're now. Here is our breaking news on CNN. Iran admitting that they shot down that Ukrainian plane, shot it down unintentionally, obviously, blaming human error.

I want to go now to CNN's Frederik Pleitgen. Frederik joins us now from Tehran. Frederik, give us the latest from Iran about Iran admitting that they shot down --

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes.

LEMON: -- this Ukrainian plane. Airliner.

PLEITGEN: Hi there, Don. Yes, you're absolutely right. The Iranians just put out a statement saying that admit, that they have shot down this plane.

We just got a statement from the Iranian general staff that I want to paraphrase it for you because I just heard about it myself. They're essentially saying that because of the tensions obviously, because they had just conducted that missile strike against those U.S. assets or those bases housing U.S. troops in Iraq, therefore they say they were in a state of heightened alert.

They say their military systems, their air defense systems were in a very sensitive state, that they had put those on high alert. They say that their radars which they had, had detected some movement in the air which they thought might be a threat.

And then -- and then the key part comes in, they say that this aircraft that took off, the Ukrainian airlines flight was misidentified because it took off from the airport, and then they say made a turn towards a Revolutionary Guard base which they say is a highly sensitive area.

And so, therefore, because of the state of heightened alert, because their air defense system was then also placed in a very sensitive setting, one that makes it go off obviously a lot quicker than it usually does, they say that then human error led to the plane being shot down.

The general staff of the military also says that they're going to determine who the culprits were, obviously who was responsible for that error and then place them in front of a military court.

Again, the statement coming just now. We know obviously that the plane was shot down. The Iranians for now had been saying that they denied that a missile could have shot it down. But that was the investigative committee of the Iranian Civil Aviation Organization.

And this time it is actually, Don, the Iranian military itself coming out and saying yes, they were the ones that shot this plane down, they say it was human error, they say it was because of those heightened tensions between the U.S. and Iran after the Iranians targeted those bases with the U.S. troops on it.

And they're obviously saying they're going to launch an investigation of their own as to how this could happen, who was behind it. And finally, Don, I'm just paraphrasing the statement because I just read it myself, they are saying that they are going to put in place measures to ensure that something like this does not ever happen again.

So, it does seem as though there is a full admission after last night, of course we know that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo came out and said that the U.S. officially now does believe that it's likely that the plane was shot down by a surface to air missiles, that after the Canadians said exactly the same thing.

So now the Iranians themselves also coming out and admitting that they did indeed, by accident, they say, shoot down this plane, Don.

LEMON: Yes. Other countries are saying the same thing but the Canadians, obviously there were many Canadians on board that plane, they were saying that.

Stand by, Frederik. I just want to read something and I'm going to get back to you. This is the Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has tweeted this saying, "A sad day, preliminary conclusions of internal investigation by armed forces. Human error at time of crisis caused by U.S. adventurism led to disaster. Our profound regrets, apologies, and condolences to our people to the families of all victims and to other affected nations."

So that is the response from the Iranian foreign minister.

Frederik, again, talk to us about --

PLEITGEN: Yes.

LEMON: So, they're saying that this was -- it happened because of the direction, the plane was turning towards it. It was heading in the direction of bases that were housing U.S. troops. Correct -- am I correct? Is that what you said?

PLEITGEN: He said this happened because the plane took off. I don't think that they necessarily saw it taking off. I think they saw it in flight. He said that the plane took a turn, and at that point in time was heading towards, as they put it, a highly sensitive Revolutionary Guard area, and that's when they felt that this -- or whoever was operating the system felt that it was a threat. And then obviously the missile was launched.

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They say that it happened because of a state of high alert, obviously admitting that they must have been quite nervous about America possibly retaliating for those hits on those bases housing U.S. troops by the Iranians.

And so, therefore by accident they say that it was put off. It's quite interesting that you just read that statement by Javad Zarif, saying that the condolences went out to their people also.

One of the big tragic things obviously for the Iranians was that most of the people on that plane were Iranian. And I think that's something here obviously is playing very big.

Because when you look at the passenger list, we saw that it was, I think 82 Iranians, it was 63 Canadians on it, but pretty much all the Canadians who were on that plane were dual nationals. Obviously, the Iranians still considering them to be Iranians.

So this is a big tragedy, obviously a giant error but a big tragedy in general for Iran because not only did they shoot down this passenger jet which obviously is a tragedy in itself, but it was also mostly their own citizens who were on that plane, and then obviously Canada also massively affected as those other countries are as well. I think 11 Ukrainians were on the plane, nine of those Ukrainians were crew members.

And then if you look at a lot of the others who were on that plane, some of the other nations, I think there were some Germans, U.K. citizens also, a lot of those were also dual citizens. And the Iranians don't recognize dual citizenships, they don't let you drop your Iranian citizenship.

So, for them, they shot down a plane that had mostly their own citizens on it. And so therefore it was a big tragedy for them. And I think that's reflected also in Zarif's statement. But he also coming out very early in the morning hours today putting out that statement, admitting, obviously with a swipe towards the United States there, I think U.S. adventurism is what he called it.

LEMON: Yes.

PLEITGEN: But you can see the military there with a very sober statement saying yes, it was us, yes, it was human error, yes, it was because of a state of heightened alert, Don.

LEMON: Frederik, thank you very much. Frederik, go do some other reporting. Again, we appreciate it. Frederik is going to get back to us. Obviously, he'll do some reporting. But this breaking news just coming in to CNN.

Let's bring in now our aviation analyst, Miles O'Brien. Miles, I appreciate you joining us. Again, this is our breaking news, Iran admitting that they shot down that plane. I want to get your reaction to this unintentionally shooting down this Ukrainian plane. What happens next?

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: Well, you know, what happens next is, you know, years of sadness for these people who have lost loved ones.

What's particularly poignant to me, Don, if you recall what happened in this country right after 9/11, 4,500 aircraft were put on the ground, that's a full grounding of all civilian aircraft in very short order.

The prudent thing for Iran to have done in the wake of that attack in Iraq just hours after it, would have been to do exactly the same thing. If you're confused about targets, if you're on hair trigger alert, if you're using equipment that is old and maybe not so well- maintained, if your military is not communicating very well with your civilian air traffic controllers, all those things come into play in that context, why wouldn't you just say, let's take the civilian aircraft out of the mix here for a little while until we sort this thing out.

I will say this, Don, this idea that this aircraft took an unusual turn is not borne out by the radar track evidence. What I've seen of the way this aircraft was flying, it was flying a standard departure procedure which several other aircraft had done just prior to its departure in that morning.

So, you know, this is a horrible example of hair trigger status and perhaps not a lot of great training, and in that context civilian aircraft just shouldn't have been in the air.

LEMON: Well, the military has the most sober and straightforward statement saying that they did it unintentionally. The foreign minister is basically blaming the United States, saying it's U.S. adventurism. What do you think of have?

O'BRIEN: Well, I mean, that -- it's -- how do you begin that, where does that all start? And you know, who is to blame in a tit-for-tat war situation? The prudent thing to do would be to take civilian aircraft out of it.

But you know, in the end this was a case where there was just so much evidence piled on top of evidence, it was impossible for them to go anywhere else. There's no alternative facts in this case. The wreckage bore it out, the way the flight disappeared without a radio call bore it out, the actual video in the public domain that we've all watched.

And then the signals intelligence, the radar tracks, the infrared signatures that the U.S. and others had picked up indicating these SAM missiles were headed toward that aircraft. That was just no way to refute it. So, they really had no choice.

LEMON: Miles O'Brien is CNN's aviation analyst, Miles, thank you very much. Please stand by.

Here's our breaking news tonight. Iran admitting it shot down that Ukrainian passenger plane, blaming human error. We're going to get the reaction live from our reporter in Ukraine, that's next.

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LEMON: Here's our breaking news. Iran admitting, they shot down that Ukraine plane, Ukrainian plane unintentionally in a case of human error. Iran's foreign minister blaming what he calls human error at a time of crisis caused by U.S. adventurism.

All 176 people on board the Boeing 737 900 were killed when the Kiev- bound plane crashed shortly after taking off from Imam Khomeini Airport.

The victims include -- this is who was on the plane. Eighty-two Iranians, 57 Canadians, 11 Ukrainians, 10 Swedes, four Afghans and three Germans. Three British nationals were aboard that plane.

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CNN's international correspondent Scott McLean is in Kiev. He joins us now. Scott, hello to you. What is the reaction in Ukraine now?

SCOTT MCLEAN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): Hey, Don. So, obviously, this is just breaking as we speak and so we're still waiting to see what exactly the authorities are going to say on this.

But for the last couple of days since this story first broke, since this tragedy first happened, this really has been a bit of political tug-of-war between the Americans, the Canadians, the Brits, who were saying look, we have evidence, undisclosed evidence, that they didn't share with the public, that this plane was shot down by a missile. The Iranians actually went so far as to call that fraudulent and a big lie.

And here in Ukraine, this country's government was trying to sort of be the adults in the room saying, look, let's wait for all the evidence to be collected, let's do a full investigation. They haven't even gotten into the black boxes yet. They were just asking everyone to pump the brakes and saying to the European partners, including the U.S., if you do have evidence, come forward and submit it to the investigation.

And you really did get the sense that there were these sorts of competing interests, leaving these 176 families in the middle of this tug-of-war. The Ukrainian president went so far as even to say something along the lines of, human life is more valuable than political motives.

I was speaking to people yesterday about, you know, what they thought of the competing theories, family and friends. Some people didn't really know what to think because of the sort of competing messages between their own country and then with the west and with Iran.

A lot of other people just simply cited the pilot's experience level. These guys had a combined 3-1/2 years of continuous flying experience just on the Boeing 737 alone. And so in their minds, A, they would go down with the plane fighting if something were to happen, and B, there was just no way that this could have possibly been pilot error or anything like that.

They also knew from, you know, hearing from the pilots, being their family, being their friends, they never really heard any complaints about the safety of the aircraft. This one especially was built in 2016 and delivered directly to the airline. And so in their minds, the missile theory was really the only one that made sense. And perhaps for a lot of people, this won't come as much of a surprise, Don.

LEMON: Thank you very much. I want you to stand by. We're getting some new information in that's coming in now. Iran blames increased radar activity and fear of U.S. aggression as a cause for the downed Ukrainian plane aircraft. Let's bring in back our CNN aviation analyst Miles O'Brien. Miles, are you there?

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN AVIATION ANALYST, SCIENCE CORRESPONDENT FOR PBS NEWSHOUR: I am, yes.

LEMON: So they're blaming increased radar activity, fear of U.S. aggression as a cause for the downed Ukrainian aircraft. I'm just getting this information. Let me just read the first part of it.

Hours after the missile operation in Iraq, U.S. military flights around the borders of Iran increased and Iranian military officials reported seeing aerial targets that were coming towards Iran's strategic centers, according to a statement released by the Iranian Air Forces Headquarters.

Numerous defense centers around Iran reported seeing increased radar activity which caused a heightened sensitivity in the aerial defense centers of the country, the statement reads. I'm going to go on. I'll just read all of it, Miles, and I'll get to you.

Under such sensitive and crucial conditions, Ukrainian Flight 752 took off Imam Khomeini Airport and while in rotation, the aircraft came close to a sensitive IRGC military center at an altitude and flight condition that resembled hostile targeting.

Under these circumstances, the aircraft was unintentionally hit, which unfortunately resulted in the death of many Iranian and foreign nationals, the statement reads. What do you think, sir?

O'BRIEN: Well, I think that the disconnection between the civilian system of radar and the military system -- this goes the world over, including the U.S. -- is a potential problem. And on a good day and this was a day of great confusion and tension, the fog of war had fully enveloped that part of the world.

And so an aircraft like that 737 has a transponder. It's telling the world that's painting it with radar what it is and some specific -- actually right down to sort of serial number kind of information exactly what that aircraft is and what it is and what it is not.

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O'BRIEN: Unfortunately, that kind of high fidelity radar, that kind of high definition as opposed to on old black and white TV with rabbit ears, is the problem because the black and white TV with rabbit ears is a lot of times what the military has in those mobile SAM-type bases. They don't see the level of specificity and data that you get on the civilian side. So, a little better communication would have been nice, a little more technology in the hands of the people with their fingers on the trigger.

But a decision to fly into that night just a few hours after that attack is a decision that needs to be questioned thoroughly. Why wasn't civilian aviation grounded? Why did the dispatcher of that aircraft or the airline, why did they allow the aircraft to fly in that hostile situation, potentially dangerous situation? And of all people, the Ukrainians know the consequences of that from what happened in 2014 --

LEMON: Exactly.

O'BRIEN: -- when the Malaysia 777 got shot down on to their soil. So they understand this as well as anybody.

LEMON: That's a question, Miles. You bring up a very important question that we have been asking since Wednesday, since this happened and we got news of this plane. At first, they thought it must be a coincidence that this happened. What kind of coincidence? Obviously not, right? But why were civilian aircraft being allowed to take off? Why were airplanes at a domestic airport being allowed to take off when there was conflict?

O'BRIEN: You have a tense, confused situation with, you know, a call to, you know -- everybody's been called out of barracks, so to speak. The level of training can be spotty. All it takes is one person not doing their job well to have a --

LEMON: And Miles, everyone had been warned, by the way. The military had been warned, the U.S. had been warned, Iraq had been warned.

O'BRIEN: Right. And for that matter, the airline should have known, too. So, you know, all this -- the finger pointing -- there's a lot of finger pointing we can do here, you know. The Iranians are trying to pin this on the United States. But there's a lot of finger pointing to go around here. There's a lot of blame. There are some serious lessons learned for the aviation industry writ large here, I think, not be cavalier in these situations.

And the fact that the Ukrainians now -- this was just a few hours after that attack in Iraq. Did the Ukrainian airlines -- people have the infrastructure in place to make that notification? Were their dispatchers properly informed? These are all important questions that the airline should answer, and airlines in general should be considering as they try to navigate a very difficult part of the world with all kinds of places you don't necessarily want to fly passengers.

LEMON: Our Miles O'Brien is joining us. He is our CNN aviation analyst. He is going to stand by. We're going to have much more coming up on our breaking news, Iran admitting it unintentionally shot down that Ukrainian plane, blaming human error. We're back to Tehran right after this break.

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LEMON: So here's our breaking news tonight. Iran admits they shot down that Ukrainian plane unintentionally in a case of human error. Iran is blaming what they call increased radar activity and fear of U.S. aggression.

I want to go to CNN's Frederik Pleitgen. He is in Tehran for us. Fred, in the statement released by the Iranians, they essentially described the following scenario.

Here is what they say. After Iran attacked the U.S. base in Iraq with missiles, the U.S. increased flights around Iran's borders. Military officials reported aerial targets coming toward strategic centers. There was increased radar activity. The Ukrainian flight took off and then came close to a sensitive military center. It looked hostile and was unintentionally hit.

So, that's Iran's explanation. Is that correct?

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, you're absolutely correct. The Iranians were essentially saying, Don, that they're in a heightened -- I have the statement in front of me right now as well -- that they're in a heightened state of alert after those strikes on bases housing U.S. troops in Iraq. They're obviously saying that their radar centers were seeing a lot of U.S. flights going around their areas and they obviously fear that the U.S. might strike back.

It's interesting because the beginning of the statement, they say, following the threats made by the U.S. president and U.S. military to attack a large number of targets in the territory of the Islamic Republic of Iran in the event of a counter-operation and in view of the unprecedented increase in air traffic in the region.

So the Iranians are saying that they were on heightened alert because they had just struck the U.S. They heard from President Trump, that President Trump would hit back if the Iranians conducted a counter- operation to the killing of Qassem Soleimani. So clearly they were on heightened alert.

They were then saying that this Ukrainian airlines flight took off and because of their heightened alert, because they were seeing a lot of things on their radars, obviously, I think, as Miles was just saying, not monitoring the civilian radars or planes taking off, they saw this flight coming into a flight path, a rotation, I think they call it, in their statement, that made it appear as though from the angle that it had, from the direction that it had, that it was coming directly towards a sensitive, as they put it, revolutionary guard base area.

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PLEITGEN: And so therefore, because of that heightened state of alert, because of human error, they then pulled the trigger. It's interesting because I'm reading the bottom end of that statement. They are also saying that they're going to come and give a wider explanation as soon as possible. They say that they are going to find the culprits, that there is going to be there's going to be military judiciary here in Iran involved as well.

They also say that they are now going to have a fundamental reform, as they put it -- I'm just reading that from the statement -- to make sure that new procedures are in place to ensure that something like this does not ever happen again, obviously a big tragedy for the Iranians.

We were talking before, Don, about that statement put out by the foreign minister, Javad Zarif, where he clearly says that he issues apologies to "our own people." Obviously, he's referring to the Iranian people, because a lot of those people on that plane were dual citizens and Iran does not recognize dual citizenship. So to them, those people on board are Iranians, which obviously makes this all the more tragic for Iran, especially with this country's history, Don.

Of course, one of the things really defining for the Islamic Republic of Iran is the anger that's still felt here over the shooting down of an Iranian jetliner by a U.S. warship in 1988. I've come here so many times and every time, there's a memorial here, they'll show you a film about it. It's something where they felt they were wronged. They felt that there was never an apology by the U.S.

To have something like this happen to them now, I also, by the way, think that's one of the reasons why you're seeing them admit this so fast, why you're seeing this come clean so fast, because in this nation, the shooting down of a civilian airliner is really something that hits at the heart of the Iranian nation, Don.

LEMON: Frederik Pleitgen in Tehran. Frederik, thank you very much. We'll be getting back to you as needed in this broadcast throughout the evening here on CNN, morning there where he is.

Joining me now are CNN political commentator Catherine Rampell, Washington Post's Philip Bump, and senior political analyst Ron Brownstein. Philip wrote a column for the Post today on how investigators quickly identified Iran's role in the crash, by the way. Good evening, everyone.

Wow, so here we are. Here we are. Iran is essentially now saying that they shot it down, saying it's unintentional. But if you read between the lines, they're blaming this on the United States and --

CATHERINE RAMPELL, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, OPINION COLUMNIST FOR THE WASHINGTON POST: I think you don't need to read between the lines.

LEMON: Yeah.

RAMPELL: I mean, in one of the tweets, there was an explicit comment about -- I forgot what the exact phrasing was, but it was something about --

LEMON: Because of U.S. adventurism.

RAMPELL: Adventure. Yes, U.S. adventurism. I think that doesn't require a lot of, you know, doesn't require an English degree basically to figure out who they're trying to blame here. And look, I would say that chances, probability of an accidental shooting probably do increase when there is maximum stress on missile command because they're worried about a war with the United States.

LEMON: Yeah.

RAMPELL: I understand their thinking. It doesn't mean that we actually obviously are directly responsible, but we did set in sequence a set of events that contributed to it.

LEMON: Stand by, everyone. I will get the rest of you, guys, in. Just stay with me. I got to get to break. We got more to come on our breaking news. Iran admits to shot down that Ukrainian passenger plane, blaming human error on the night of the Iranian airstrikes on bases, house of U.S. troops in Iraq.

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LEMON: Here is our breaking news tonight. Iran is admitting they unintentionally shot down a Ukrainian passenger plane on the night of the Iranian airstrikes on bases housing U.S. troops.

Back with me now are Catherine Rampell, Philip Bump, and Ron Brownstein. Philip, I mentioned you wrote to how investigators figured out that Iran was responsible for this. What can you tell us about that?

PHILIP BUMP, NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT, THE WASHINGTON POST: Just very briefly. I spoke with the head of a group called Bellingcat which did a lot of open source analysis of some of the images that are out there. I think it's really fascinating to think that, you know, there are a lot of reasons Iran might want to come forward and say that this is what had happened.

But it was very hard for them not to do so given the fact that we had all these publicly available evidence, these videos and these photographs. They were really pretty clearly --

LEMON: Do you think they were under pressure?

BUMP: Yeah, absolutely.

LEMON: How can Iranians, Ron, say that it was unintentionally hit? I mean, isn't it correct to say that they were -- they fired at it and they hit it intentionally but it was the wrong target?

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: It was the wrong target, right. I mean, look, I think it's hard to blame this on anything but the failures of the Iranian regime. But I think there is a warning in here for the U.S., Don, in that, you know, this week, everyone was struck by the precision, the calibration of the Iranian response where they hit the base in Iraq but didn't cause any casualty.

I think this is a reminder that this may not be as finally oiled a machine of a military as might be perceived from the outside. And if you put them under pressure and sustained military back and forth, there can be accidents of war. That can really send a message different than perhaps they intended and lead to escalation. So, I mean, this is just a reminder that when you are in conflict, things don't always go according to plan. They don't go according to plan from first minute on usually.

LEMON: I wonder how this impacts -- just quickly, Ron -- how Trump handles the situation in Iran.

BROWNSTEIN: Look, I mean, you know, it allows him to say that they were the ones who were being untruthful originally at the same time that he is facing all of these questions about his kind of, you know, cascading allegations of imminent attack on this end. In that sense, I think it kind of, you know, blurs the equation a little bit internationally.

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BROWNSTEIN: But the fact that they have come forward and now done this -- I believe Russia never has acknowledged its role in the shoot down of the passenger jet over Ukraine -- I think that it conversely put some pressure on him because they have stepped forward, as Frederik Pleitgen said before, kind of perhaps in the signal they want to be kind of more accepted at least somewhat in the community of nations.

LEMON: Catherine, as you pointed out, you don't really have to read between the lines. I was trying to be kind there but it's true because they're saying it was because of heightened sensitivity because of U.S. aggression, and then they're saying it was also because of American U.S. adventurism that this all happened.

So, we'll see where this leads and what happens when the president wakes up and when folks here in the United States wake up to see this and see what the president's response will be.

Thank you all. I really appreciate it. Thank you for watching. Our live coverage of tonight's breaking news, Iran admitting shooting down Ukrainian passenger plane, it continues now with Michael Holmes.

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