In Russia, the surge in U.S. bomber flights close to Russia’s borders is seen as a definite threat, especially as they come in addition to a surge in flights of reconnaissance aircraft. Colonel-General Sergey Surovikin, the commander of Russia’s Aerospace Forces, said during a briefing for military attaches in Moscow yesterday that NATO has “significantly increased the intensity of the use of reconnaissance aircraft. Compared to last year, the number of such flights in August increased by more than 30%.” Only in August of this year, the Russian VKS aircraft rose 27 times to intercept them over the Baltic, Barents, Black and Okhotsk Seas. “Previously,” Surovkin stated, “we recorded mainly the actions of reconnaissance aircraft, but recently the number of combat aircraft flights has increased.”
While the B-52 has certain electronic capabilities of its own, the Russians believe that their intrusions so close to Russia’s borders are about more than that. On Aug. 31, as part of combat training flights from advanced air bases in Europe, three B-52s from Fairford air base flew over the territory of the Netherlands, Germany, Poland, and the Baltic states to the area of the Estonian “Tapa” test site and back over the waters of the Baltic and North seas, Surovkin reported. “According to our assessment, during this event, the B-52 crews worked out how to reach the threshold of using cruise missiles with a simulated missile strike on objects in the Kaliningrad region and other western regions of our country.”
There was the same type of operation near Russia’s southwestern border (near Crimea) on Sept. 4. “According to our assessment, objects located on the territory of the Southern Military District were considered as targets,” he said.
The Americans and the British ensured the actions of strategic bombers by conducting an unprecedented reconnaissance operation over the Black Sea, Surovikin continued. Five reconnaissance aircraft and one strategic unmanned reconnaissance vehicle were in the air at the same time. Their minimum approach to the Russian border was 15 km, and exploration of the territory of Russia was conducted to a depth of 600 km.
“We believe that working out the issues of combat use of strategic aircraft in the immediate vicinity of the state border of the Russian Federation is hostile and provocative,” Surovkin warned. “In the air, the state border is not as clearly defined as on the ground. A combat aircraft performing maneuvers near it, given the speed of modern aircraft, can be in the adjacent territory in a matter of minutes. This can lead to a serious incident.”
“The actions of the U.S. and NATO Air Force fundamentally contradict the statements of Alliance officials about the desire to prevent incidents during combat training events. They can be avoided only due to the high level of professional training of Russian VKS pilots,” he continued. (As Helga Zepp-LaRouche said recently, if war avoidance depends on the skills of pilots we’re already in trouble.) “I also note that flights of any combat aircraft over the territory of Ukraine do not contribute to defusing tensions in the region.”
“We are not interested in escalating the situation, so most of the operational and combat training activities of the Armed Forces are carried out in the interior of the country,” Surovikin said. “We are committed to constructive cooperation to create conditions for safe operations in the airspace and prevent incidents.”
