Please explain precisely why you use that age-old manipulative technique.
I have every reason to believe that you did not have any evil or manipulative intention, but why think in terms of "conspiracy route" and the suggestion of conspiracy thinking? Should we just state that "Nine bodies were found, but we cannot understand why anyone would want to kill them, so therefore they were probably not murdered and every suggestion that they might have been murdered is conspiracy thinking"?
Because we don't have evidence of anyone else being on the mountain that night. It appears they died of the elements. As for their injuries, I'm not qualified to determine whether they could have happened from falling out of trees and collapsing snow dens, or from something else. Also, it was in the wilderness in the middle of winter involving a group of people whose goal was to achieve an advanced hiking rating. That's hardly a reason to go out of your way in those conditions to murder them.
Possibly the Mansi were incensed at having women camping on their mountain which they lied about not being sacred, or the loggers were insulted enough to go to such lengths, or the KGB thought some CIA meet up was happing. But I'm not aware of evidence for this. Same with the group stumbling across something they weren't supposed to see. So what was it that would have gotten them killed? They were by all accounts good soviets.
Thank you for your answer. It is a basis for further reasoning for us all.
Also, everybody is encouraged to go through this page, read in analytically, and try to decide for yourself whether it is probable that the nine died of the works of the natural elements:
https://dyatlovpass.com/death Then we go to the core of the matter here:
"Because we don't have evidence of anyone else being on the mountain that night."
We do not have evidence of anyone else being on the mountain that night. We can all agree about that.
- But does that imply that we should dismiss the possibility that the nine Dyatlov hikers became victims of murder?
- Realistically, given the circumstances we could hardly expect there to be any decisive evidence of anyone else having been there. From February 2 to February 26 when the tent was found, no less than 24 days passed. If there were other people there who killed the Dyatlov group, these people would either have been locals from the area or they were resourceful professionals who knew what to do. They would know how to camouflage their mission in such a way that it would appear that the nine who perished died as a result of exposure and some unfortunate accidents. Significantly, that was also the conclusion that the Soviet government wanted. Moscow dictated to the investigator Ivanov that the investigation be closed with the conclusion as mentioned above with the added suggestion that Igor Dyatlov made some "mistakes."
If there indeed was a group on a deadly mission there, that group of resourceful and trained people would be careful not to leave any obvious evidence. But it would be difficult to avoid leaving footprints around the tent. Alas, footprints around the tent were not analyzed because the first rescuers who came to the Dyatlov pass on February 26 did not think of the area as a crime scene. If we think rationally about this, we quickly realize that the chances of finding any intact footprints after 24 days would be slim. Most of the traces made by the Dyatlov group were evidently gone. Few if any other footprints than the relatively well protected ones they made when they left the tent on their very last night in life were clearly visible. We can reasonably assume that if the murder theory is correct, the group of murderers would only leave footprints at the camp site. And these footprints, if they were at all distinguishable from those of the Dyatlov group, must have been largely destroyed by the first rescue team members who did not expect anything criminal.
When the killer squad approached the tent and when they later hunted down the students to make sure that all were dead, they would in all probability have used mountain skies. The trails made by such broad mountain skies are erased much faster in the landscape than are footprints, and also faster than the common narrower skis used by most tourists. Even granted that there were such evidence of the presence of another group, it stands to reason that such evidence would almost certainly have disappeared by February 26. Based on these observations, I find it rash and unfounded - and above all irresponsible towards those who died and their families - if we conclude that no crime was committed because there is no evidence of the presence of killers. Given the situation and the area combined with the time passed, the most unmistakable evidence would be irretrievably gone. The significant evidence we still have are the bodies and the autopsy reports, and bodies do not lie. Therefore it seems wise to concentrate our attention upon the bodies and what we can find out from them.
Are we to interpret the many severe and lethal injuries, the objectively strong indications of having been attacked by other humans, and the nine deaths as a result of non-criminal series of accidents (as the Soviet government wanted and dictated) because we have not caught the murderers in the act or found definitive evidence of their having been there?
My answer is "no." Others are free to think otherwise. I cannot and do not want to dictate conclusions, but let us remember that there were those who did just that in 1959.
As for theorizing around the precise identity of the murderers: If we were to cast suspicion on specific ones, we run the risk of condemning innocent people. In the absence of proof of a precise identity of the murderers, I prefer to refrain from stating who I may think were responsible. But I think we can take for granted that they were not loggers.
And after all the identity of the killers may not be the most important thing here. Those who decided to take the nine lives and those who accomplished their mission would now likely be long gone. But personally I would like to see an end to the denial of murder, and a more realistic approach to all the unsubstantiated theories of highly unlikely series of accidents, unproven effects of natural forces, yetis, UFOs, infrasound, ball lighting and fighting among the students themselves.
The theory of murder can explain the injuries and the deaths. No other theory can do that with a high degree of probability.
We are obliged towards the deceased nine students, their families and their friends, to carefully consider the most likely but also worst and most unpleasant possibility.