In Ukrainian news, it's been reported that a Malaysian B777 was shot down at around 10km by a separatist operated Buk system, probably captured from the Ukrainian air defence forces. Is this plausible, that is, is it plausible that they could have, independently from Russian aid, gotten the battery operational enough to make a simple engagement like this?
Why not? It's not like more than a few Ukrainian servicemen haven't sworn allegiance to Russia and/or imaginary separatist republics. Besides, IIRC Ukraine has conscription, so even among the civilian population it shouldn't take long to find people trained on various SAM systems.
