The Russian military scrambled an Su-27 fighter jet armed with six air-to-air missiles when a Navy Poseidon reconnaissance aircraft approached the Russian airspace over the Black Sea. The encounter, which lasted over an hour, consisted of a slow approach of the Russian jet (in essence to warn off the Navy aircraft) to within a mere 20 feet of the U.S. plane.
While both Russian and U.S. military officials say that this is a normal procedure and has happened many times over the years, it does appear to have happened more frequently as of late, especially in light of the fact that the USS Porter, which was operating in the Black Sea in February as it pulled into a Romanian port nearby to drop off tanks and soldiers, was also approached by a Russian aircraft.
Now, only months later, President Trump ordered a Tomahawk missile strike on a Syrian airbase that reportedly was the originating source of planes carrying chemical weapons. One of the vessels, the destroyer USS Porter, launched some of these Tomahawks.
Just weeks ago, Alaskan Air Force jets, two F-22 fighters, were scrambled quickly in response to Russian incursions.
The latest Russian provocation comes a week after a pair of Russian Bear bombers and fighter jets flew near Alaska on several consecutive nights, prompting the U.S. Air Force to dispatch F-22 stealth fighter jets to intercept the Russian formation.
There was a point in the 1980s when I was stationed overseas and was involved in a REFORGER (Return Forces to Germany) exercise where the United States and the Soviet Union (soon to collapse) exchanged officers with “sister units.” We, as American enlisted soldiers, were fully expected to accord Russian officers with the same respect and salutes as we did our own. And vice versa with the Russian enlisted.
I bring this up because at the time, in speaking with my friends back in the States, there was a certain frenzy about all things Russian. If I had mentioned Russians, my friends reacted by saying, “Oh my God, those Russians are going to bomb us!”
It was confusing because here I was saluting Russian officers in military exercises in the forests of West Germany and my friends thought that the U.S. was on the verge of nuclear war. Of course, after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1985, things calmed down as the former states of the Soviet Union attempted to become more Westernized and integrate into a capitalistic economic system.
It doesn’t feel like that anymore.
With the Russians pairing with Iran, China and North Korea, etc., not to mention all the Muslim nations involved in the Shanghai Cooperative Organization (SCO) where a full one-half of humanity’s population falls under its umbrella, there is a sense that Russia’s impertinence is not just territorial posturing. These encounters are becoming more frequent and more potentially dangerous.
We’ll have to wait and see how this pans out.
Source: Fox News
USA crew said it was a safe and professional intercept. Just like we do Russia when they fly by our coast. Stop fear mongering…
Joe Burnias no it was not. The us crew said they pulled up next to them in a very safe , professional intercept.
The encounter occurred on Tuesday and was described by the US Navy as “safe and professional.”
“Distance is only one of many variables considered when defining what is safe and professional,” Pentagon spokesman Navy Capt. Jeff Davis said. “For aviation interactions, distance, speed, altitude, rate of closure, visibility and other factors impact whether an event is characterized as safe or unsafe, professional or not professional.”