On July 3 , 1988 , the USS '' Vincennes '' shot down Iran Air Flight 655 killing 290 passengers and Cockburn set out to cover the story with Ken Silverstein . The Pentagon claimed that the incident came about because the USS '' Vincennes '' misidentified the Airbus A300 for an F-14 Tomcat about to attack . Cockburn challenged this account in his '' Wall Street Journal '' column . Later , Alexander and Ken Silverstein would research and co-author an article on the incident for '' Harper 's Magazine '' in September 1988 . The '' Harper 's '' piece concluded " A pair of binoculars could have told the officers of the '' Vincennes '' what was flying overhead . But binoculars do n't cost half a billion dollars . The more complex the weaponry , the deeper the pork barrel and the more swollen the bottom line . " Cockburn denounced the economic and political sanctions imposed on the Iraqi government by the United Nations , but Cockburn was more aggressive than most in his criticisms of American and British actions during the 12 years between the formal resolution of the Persian Gulf War and the 2003 invasion . In a column published in 2000 , Cockburn averred that the economic embargo imposed upon Iraq was " demonically designed to prompt gnawing , endless suffering throughout Iraq 's social economy " . In the same column , Cockburn concluded that every major Republican or Democratic nominee running in the 2000 presidential election was supportive of Iraq sanctions , and was therefore complicit in mass murder
Iran Air Flight 655
Iran Air Flight 655
Alexander Cockburn