What are those Russian bombers up to? Plus: Watching the skies over Syria
European news outlets are buzzing about this:
The UK’s Royal Air Force has launched fighter jets to intercept eight Russian military planes flying in airspace patrolled by Nato, UK officials say.
Four RAF F3 Tornado aircraft were scrambled in response to the Russian action, the UK’s defence ministry said.
The Russian planes - said to be long-range bombers - had earlier been followed by Norwegian F16 jets.
Russia recently revived a Cold War-era practice of flying bomber jets on long-range patrols.
Vladimir Putin had announced the resumption of patrol flights August 17. Defense analysts are calling them “probing missions.”
The Bear Tu95 planes - which can carry nuclear and Cruise missiles - were detected by Nato early this morning.
Tornado intercepts Bear last monthBritish fighters were scrambled from RAF Leeming in Yorkshire and the Russian planes diverted before entering British territory.
They and headed back to their base in north Russia without incident and are still thought to be in the air, with Nato tracking their progress.
Sky’s Defence Correspondent Geoff Meade said: “Diplomatic relations between Moscow and London haven’t been great for some time and I think this is maybe a bit of sabre-rattling on behalf of the Russians.
“This is the biggest formation of Russian aircraft to be challenged in this way since the Cold War and marks a stepping up of Moscow’s challenge to British defences.”
***
Meanwhile, there’s this news:
Syria accused Israel of bombing its territory on Thursday and warned it could respond, but Israel Radio carried a denial there had been an air strike.
The official Syrian news agency said there were no casualties or damage and that Syrian air defenses fired on the incoming planes shortly after midnight.
Israel Radio, quoting an unidentified military source, said there had been no air strike on Syria. But a military spokesman told Reuters: “We’re still checking.”
The Syrian news agency SANA said the aircraft “infiltrated Syrian airspace through the northern border coming from the direction of the Mediterranean and headed towards northeastern territory, breaking the sound barrier.” It added: “The Syrian Arab Republic warns the government of the Israeli enemy and reserves the right to respond according to what it sees fit.”
Local residents said they heard the sound of five planes or more above Tal al-Abiad area on Syria’s border with Turkey, around 160 km (100 miles) north of the Syrian city of Rakka. An Israeli military source earlier said the air force had been carrying out a major exercise this week. Israeli aircraft routinely train over Turkey, a Muslim country friendly with Israel.
See what others have said
Note from Michelle: This section is for comments from michellemalkin.com's community of registered readers. Please don't assume that I agree with or endorse any particular comment just because I let it stand. A reminder: Anyone who fails to comply with my terms of use may lose his or her posting privilege.
Trackbacks
- Neocon News » Looming multi-state Middle East conflict?
- Old War Dogs
- Russian Superbomb - The Father of All Bombs « BUUUUURRRRNING HOT
- Hawaii, American territorial integrity, and Red China « Take Your Cross
Comments
You must be logged in to post a comment.
Categories: Uncategorized
Pundit & Pundette
» Obama's drop in popularity and Michelle's handbag controversy
Pundit & Pundette
» Is the tide turning?Patterico
» Democrats Attack the CIATigerHawk
» The Blue Dogs are barkingRiehl World View
» Classless Paid Sarah Palin Assassin Mike Murphy (R)Weekly Standard
» Anchor MenRedstate
» $18 Million to Redesign Recovery.gov
It seems that the bear is getting restless, and people thought communism had been isolated to places like china and cuba.
Of course a phoenix missle, or a target tone droning in the headset of a russian pilot might get their attention and head back to moscow.
The AIM-54 Phoenix was retired from US service before its firing platform, the F-14, was sent to the boneyard.
It’s nice to see that the Russians, Iranians and Chinese are all cooperating in their anti-Western Democracy shenanigans, though.
Makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.
Russia was headed in the direction of an actual democracy with the people in charge until they elected Putin …
he’s still in denial from his USSR days of glory …
if it looks like the KGB, and it acts like the KGB, and it smells like the KGB … it must be a reincarnation of the KGB …
what better way to update your military intelligence database than to “probe” with your aircraft and watch the reactions …
The people of Russia need to get this guy out of office before he gets any more power and turns back the clock any further … He is no different than Hugo Chavez in terms of his ambitions to become a dictatorial power …
anyone know when they are supposed to have their next national elections?
When the Ruskies put something under 40 years old into the air, then I’ll worry. A lone F-22 Raptor could take out a whole squadron of these old commie bombers in about 3 minutes.
While I agree with Macko’s sentiment, I’d point out the Stratofortress is no spring chicken.
Regardless, sabres only rattle while they are in the scarabs.
This is the ol’ USSR-like testing of air defense readiness (and of the west’s willingness to defend).
They’re seeing how much they can get away with before they’re challenged.
DL,
Unfortunately it was never an actual democracy. The Russian intelligence services increased their ties to organized crime, government control over businesses was changed from direct market control to indirect control, and the military was dramatically downsized. Now with all their petrodollars, the military is being upgraded/updated, and Russia has resumed bullying neighboring (ex-Soviet) nations.
Putin is a lot smarter than Chavez, and has as much power as he wants. As far as the next election - Putin has already chosen his successor. It appears he plans to continue to control things behind the public show.
But then again so are housepets.
I think you’re right on Putin. He can pretty much set up the dictatorial status of the old USSR without any of that pesky Marxism to have to worry about.
If those bombers are accompanied by some Sukhoi Su-37 Flankers, then there might be something to worry about. This is clearly political posturing by Putin, but the western powers cannot afford to let it go unanswered. All these flights must be met, and escorted out of NATO airspace. You don’t want Putin to get the message that NATO is asleep at the stick.
A real good answer is that the US Air Force has deployed a squadron of F-22 Raptors to Alaska. That should send a message that we’re covered on our Northwest flank pretty well. If Cold War cat&mouse games are what Putin wants to play, well we can out play him, if we want to. How about B1b Lancer flights right up to Russian airspace from east and west at the same time? Escort them with Raptors, and force them to meet us, give those Russkies a good look at what we’ve been up to in the aviation world since 1992.
Russian aviation has moved forward with some pretty impressive evolutionary designs like the above mentioned Sukhoi, but Lockheed Martin has left them in the dust with a revolutionary platform, the Raptor. Putin don’t want none of that, I’m sure.
yep, I’m afraid the Russian door of democracy is about to be closed.
Seems to me that Russia hasn’t really been a democracy. When the Soviet government collapsed, it was replaced by the Russian mob. So now we have a non-communist gangster state. Similar to Chicago in the ’20s and ’30s. Except Al Capone did not have a nuclear arsenal decaying all over the place.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
I grew up during the Cold War. To this day I do not trust the Russians and I never will.
I wonder if this will begin some Naval probing, as well. Russian submarines could start showing up around NATO in Europe, Alaska, Japan, maybe even Hawaii. The Russian Navy is in worse shape than the Air Force, from what I understand but they do have some naval capabilities they may want to show off for potential customers. China, Venezuela, Iran, North Korea all want some counter to the U.S. Navy Carrier Battle Groups. Russia is the only option for them.
Methinks the Russians are tipping Iran’s hand.
Things are not going as planned in Iraq. Nor are they going as planned in Lebanon.
Iran has welched on “infrastructure loans” from Russian “businessmen”. Iran had to promise some spoils in Iraq as collateral- say, a captive market for imported Russian techno and technical manpower to re-build the infrastructure.
But Iran has not been able to deliver.
Concurrently, Iranian infrastructure and economy has become so enfeebled that tribal rebellion has continued unabated against the elite troops of the Republican Guard. Kurdish elements within Iran are being armed to the teeth. (Sorry no free blog links to pass on here. Dr. Jack Wheeler is the source.)
Putin, being the ham fisted crook that he is, will not allow the Iranians to snooker his gangster pals at his expense. A show of force is in order to save face and to let the Iranians know that not only the USA will send them further into the stone age.
Could Russia bomb Iran and get away with blaming the US or Israel for such an attack?
Probing for intel? Any move generates intel. The move however was more for Iranian and Syrian consumption than ours. It could very well been a move to complicate US strategic concerns about attacking Iran.
Would the Russian bombers strike US bases in Europe?
There is something for everybody in the Russian move. There is saber rattling; and, then there is a show of force in the face of enemies they perceive to be weak in the face of any kind of resistance (thanks to our Congress).
This axis of criminals (for me this works better than axis of evil)believes the USA is too weak to respond. They definitely know this about Britain since the boat debacle earlier this year.
What our enemies fail to accept about the reality of the Gulf region *as it is today* is the presence of US military strength that could obliterate Tehran faster than Hezbollah cells could respond to take out bridges and subways in Manhattan.
What they fail to accept is that the US military command is receiving so much actionable intel inside Iraq about Iranian involvement in the “insurgency” that they are failing to assimilate all of it into a coherent strategy due to the sheer volume (Michael Ledeen today on The Morning Show -KSFO- with Lee Rogers and Melanie Morgan).
What they fail to realize is that their big pawn in Iraq, Muqtada al-Sadar, is, as Ledeen has concluded based on his discussions with US command in Iraq, “out of bullets”.
In short, Iran and Syria are becoming increasingly isolated in the region with their Chinese and Russian “partners” nervous about the next play.
The axis of criminals had huge momentum when the Pelosi Dhimmicrats were swinging from the chandeliers going into the 2006 elections about the war and “changing the course.”
Now the Pelosi Dhimmicrats are going to be turned against by a) the Peace crowd- should they get in line about the war; or, b) a concerted majority of the American people if they push for withdrawal based on useless al-Reuters polling in Iraq. The Dhimmicrats might have hung themselves over the war.
How can a Hillary Clinton get elected President by promising the American people defeat in Iraq?
So the axis of criminals are not quite thrilled with the changes wrought by Petraeus’ surge. It has done more than anything other than the shock and awe campaign that opened the war.
And to any Moon Loons reading this who want to engage with the usual horsecrap don’t waste your time. Geopolitical reality has erased the rhetorical slush you have proffered here for too long in the name of honest debate about the war.
It’s the war, Stupid. And who’s winning it. Advantage: USA.
Bear1909’s 2 cents before breakfast.
Chavez is a vulture waiting for Castro’s beard to show up on e-Bay.
He wants the socialist mantle.
Good luck with that, Hugo.
The markets will starve Venezuela as they have other “projects”.
Plus, the downside to all that capital flowing in from Russia and China is a sharp cliff for incompetents like Hugo.
The Chinese and Russian loan sharks he is counting on- the vig is more than you can afford. Just ask the Jew hating monkey Prez of Iran.
Simply put, we won Cold War I, this is Cold War II (or maybe the seeding of WWIII).
What happened is simple. President Reagan built a military force capable of world domination (if necessary). The Soviet Block went broke trying to compete. The plan worked.
Where things went wrong. Eight years of Clinton polictics that took the focus off the former Soviet Union, the peaceful decline of our superior military forces, the inability of our nation to properly respond to terrorists threats, the seeding of UN and EU corruption and the failure of the Clinton administration to negotiate with others from a power position. I could go on, but basically, we appeased our enemies and endangered our allies.
Enter President Bush, 9-11, Katrina, Iraq, the anti-war-anti-US media, the surrender monkey congress, the Bush hating crowd, a broken anti-US UN, the list goes on.
Russia with assistance from US dollars, the EU and UN has once again become a dominate anti-democratic world power that threatens peace and democracy.
The best line from last night’s debate tells the whole story. President Reagan won the cold war peacefully, while pointing 1000 nuclear missles at the Soviet Empire.
Peace with anti-democratic nations can only be maintained by the ability to project devestating power in their direction and the world’s knowledge that, if forced, we will use that power to protect ourselves and our allies.
Without that ability, we will ‘always’ be challenged.
I’ll bet they lose more than a few of those old Bears (and their crews). That platform is ancient, and unlike the B-52’s, hasn’t received regular updates to the avionics and airframe in recent years. Their military simply hasn’t had the cash to conduct in-depth monitoring and maintenance programs (like fatigue cracking checks etc. etc.)
And as for their newer aircraft, like the SU-37. . .last I heard they had exactly TWO of them. Not exactly a major threat. IIRC, they’re not set up for long distance patrols anyway. . .NONE of Russia’s fighters are.
The Chavez-loving kids of today are sure to idealize the corruption and ultimate failure of a communist system. Heck, Scarlet Plague is spreading like wildfire in the US even as I type this - how many of the Democratic US presidential hopefuls would consider themselves “democratic socialists” (read: communist) or “progressive socialists” (read: communist)? HRC is on the top of that list, for sure.
I guess my ignorance of Russian aircraft capabilities post-Cold War shows.
If democracy is running the government according to the will of the people…
85% of Russians approve of the way President Vladimir Putin is running the country…
PRESIDENT BUSH – Overall Job Rating in recent national polls
FOX..33% Pew..31% Gallup..32%
Considering the aggression of Bush and the expansion of the Cold war relic NATO that serves no purpose except to entangle the U.S. in protecting every little dinky country on earth who offer less than nothing in return, what is Putin to do? An icy stare from those hooded cobra eyes of Dr. Rice and a lecture on democracy would put the fear of God in lesser men.
bear-
Ignorance of russian aircraft is ok since you that they are still a threat that still needs to engaged.
I might have to pull Jane’s book of fighting aircraft out to get a quick refresher on the ussr.
Is it just me, or are the Syrians looking for a Gulf of Tonkin type event?
Of course, our friends in the press would never insinuate such a thing, because Israel is a Zionist nation that must be obliterated, etc., etc.
As far as WW3, I think the first shots were fired back in 1993…
Or maybe in 1989
Isn’t this interesting:
There are not many Su-37’s in existance yet, but the previous model is being used by the Russian Air Force, and exported widely. It also is made for long range patrols, deep penetration missions. From Wikipedia
These aircraft are something to be concerned about, but the F-22 Raptor can handle several at once, thanks to stealth and high performance in one package. We need some more.
And that’s the main point of the resumption of Bear flights. Not so much to make us tremble with the best of 1950s Soviet avionics technology - turboprops, oooh, I’m soooo scared - but to build up Putin’s “strongman” aura among the Russin people.
Consider that after losing the Cold War the Russians went from military superpower to third-rate power in just a few years. That’s humiliating, especially for a people who have for centuries considered themselves a great power.
With oil prices up, and with Russia exporting oil, the Russians finally have some money to play with. This gives Putin - an unreconstructed KGB cold warrior from the old Soviet glory days - an opportunity he couldn’t afford earlier: the chance to do some good old-fashioned muscle-flexing.
And not just by taking off his shirt for the cameras.
Russian foreign policy has since the 1990s amounted to little more than, “We can still make trouble, so we matter.” Now that they’ve got some money in their pockets, they’re simply better able to walk their talk.
The corollary to that philosophy is, if your self-declared “Enemy #1″ is the USA, then you really matter.
I don’t think that Putin is under any illusions that he’s intimidating anybody with his flying dinosaurs. But it plays well to a people still smarting from losing the Cold War and much of their former empire, and who long for a sense of past greatness. That’s why he’s retrogressing back to his no-goodnik ways.
Again, Israel’s self-control is astonishing. Syria would be a gaping crater right now if I ran Israel.
Count on it.
Fleet reconstruction is an integral part of Putin’s re-investment in the Russian military. It’s taken them a while to build up the shipyard and maritime industrial capacity that they lost when their empire fell apart, but the Russians are back in the warship building business again.
Not that they ever really gave up on trying to challenge us on the seas. Remember the Kursk, that submarine that sank with all hands a few years ago off Norway? It was one of a class of subs the Russians built for no other purpose than to attack our aircraft carriers. They’re building more of them. Along with a new generation of ballistic-missile subs and a new SLBM to go along with them.
The Kursk itself was playing cat-and-mouse with one of our battlegroups in the Mediteranean throughout the Serbia-Kosovo conflict.
The Russians are back. The embers of their paranoia and resentment of the West in general, and the USA in particular, never completely died out; and now that they’ve got some oil revenues to fan the coals, they’re heating up again.
A second cold war? Probably not. But they’re definitely interested in making our lives a lot more complicated, and they’re regaining the capability to make it happen.
This may have consequences in the near future:
oops, forgot link
Alphonse: You do realize the link you included was over three years old, right?
Putin is old school. He doesn’t like the fact that missile defense will eventually be deployed in countries the Soviet Union had to roll tanks through to keep them “in line.”
Thursday Greetings Mrs. Malkin and loyal community. Appreciate the diverse efforts above to divine the meaning of the renewed patrols of Tu-95s over the North Atlantic. Is it also possible that they are of a piece with other glitzy recent announcements, such as a projected Russian base on the moon, etc.? There is a widespread Russian consensus to discourage American criticism of Russia’s bandit suppression campaign in Russian Chechnya. Also, Russians from across the political spectrum regret American support for detaching Kosovo from Russia’s historic ally Serbia. Yet perhaps there is a domestic political purpose in these “Russia is back, Russia is great, Russia is going forward” announcements. The Russian President is constitutionally forbidden from seeking a third term in office. Perhaps plan “B” is for him to seek to overturn the ban. It could be that his plan “A” is to arrange the election of one of two pliant successors he has groomed, and then to play in Russian political life a role similar to that played by Deng Xiaoping in China until his death in 1997, or Lee Kwan Yew in Singapore ever since his retirement from the Prime Minister’s job in 1990. If there is substance to either scenario, the glitzy announcements could be part of the background music of the campaign to put such into effect.
It appears the Cold War is back on, but nobody bothered to tell us. Takes me back to the days of pulling alert a Keflavik NAS, Iceland to support fighter aircraft scrambling to intercept Soviet Bear bombers testing the Area Defense Intercept Zone (ADIZ), the fighters would get the bomber’s serial number while we provided tanker support to keep in contact until they turned back home or passed on through to Cuba. If this level of contact keeps up it is past time to accelerate activation of the missile defense system and reactivate some NORAD Fighter Interceptor Squadrons.
You mean, it was playing the role of mouse. Regardless of what The Hunt for Red October might have you believe, Russian passive detection never able to adequately locate our submarines over the sound of their own engines. A surface fleet ship would be easier, but then, our battlegroups typically run with escorting attack subs at all times. . .which could hear the Russian subs just fine.
Who said anything about “The Hunt for Red October?”
You could say that the Kursk was playing “mouse” in that instance, yes; although it wasn’t tracking one of our subs, but trailing one of our carrier battlegroups.
The point of the ritual is for the Russian sub to get within range to launch anti-ship cruise missiles, and for our ASW escorts - SSNs, aircraft and surface ships - to try to keep the sub more concerned for its own survival prospects than with getting into good firing position.
I didn’t hear about which side was doing its job better… I doubt that the Navy would want to talk about that anyway. We just knew it was there, stalking the carrier.
Our best ASW weapon remains the Russians themselves, as the Kursk so tragically demonstrated; the point of my earlier post in this regard was that the Russians are building more subs like her, and we can’t count on all of them to sink themselves.
Alphonse #20:
You slay me, guy.
You trot out a public opinion poll in a country where your opinion might cause you to up and disappear without a trace if you give the wrong answer not to mention news that is filtered through a government owned monopoly (there’s some independent news in Russia but most get their information from TASS)that guarantees flattering, fawning coverage of Putin and expect us to take anything you say after that seriously?
BWA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
The Bear bombers have long been used to probe air defenses, test response time, and collect electronic intelligence. For decades, there was a regular Bear flight every two weeks from the Soviet Union down the East Coast to Cuba where the Bear collected ELINT.
It’s hard to take this seriously. Russia is a bankrupt, chaotic mess where they can’t afford the electrical bill to keep their missile bunkers lit. Where are they gonna come up with the cash to wage a war against a Western country? Decades of Communism has caused economic osteoporosis of Russian assets. Diverting assets from rebuilding Russia to the military will only keep Russia weak and impoverished. For Pete’s sake, look at all the Russian bride sites where Russian women, some of them knockouts, want to get the heck out of Russia. If I were Russian, I might want to invest some resources on keeping them happy and at home.
I did
Beware Old Dogs Who Know New Tricks
Chuck Yeager said something to the effect that you can always underestimate a plane but never underestimate what a pilot can do with it. Superior weapons technology does not mean invincible or impenetrable, just more difficult to overwhelm. Properly exploited, old or “ordinary” aircraft and ships can be very formidable. A lowly bush plane with a nuke can sneak and dodge right under Raptor air cover. One of the greatest threats to our nuclear submarines and aircraft carriers in Asian are old diesel submarines sold to China because they’re so damn quiet. The Russian bombers need not be anywhere near NATO interceptors to do serious damage with modern cruise missiles. The North Korean or Chinese armies are relatively “primitive” next to the U.S. Army but that’s more than made up for by sheer numbers, a fact General MacArthur solemnly respected and dreaded even back then. This country is spending tens of billions of dollars and altering lifestyles to defend itself here against terrorists with a war chest of a few paltry millions if that. So one shouldn’t diminish threat potentials merely by age or even cost.
James Greenidge
Queens NY
Its a very vicious cycle, our money goes to China, China buys Iranian oil and Iran buys Russian and Chinese weapons and high tech.
Russia is under especially heavy pressure to join the anti Iran blockade, Russia doesn’t want the gravy train to get derailed and is pushing back.
Iran by the way has Russia’s best anti ship missiles and Russia claims to have perfected rocket torpedo tech. which (reportedly) gives underwater rockets supersonic capability.
Perhaps Putin is hoping for an international incident so he can barter the best deal in exchange for cooperation.
Else wise what does Russia or China owe us? Zilch.
What do we owe China and Russia? A lot.
If Russia goes communist look at the global spread of communist sympathizers including here.
Who will stand up to them this time?
The Bear Tu95 planes may be outdated by our standards but the cruise missiles it can carry are not.
If we under estimate the Russians because of our high tech we do so at our own peril.
When the press declared the “cold war” over they ignored one basic fact. The Russians still had the ability to destroy the US and of course we them. Nothing has really changed since. It only takes a few minutes to retarget and when there are only two players with that kind of firepower it is stupid to try to give Russia second class status.
Nothing has changed except our knowledge of what a decrepit shithole Russia is, and how hilariously backward and dysfunctional their society and military are.
That changed…for some of us.
Still, it might be interesting to shoot down one of their bombers, over the Atlantic, and see what kind of reaction we get from the KGB dunce.
When I was in the Navy in the 1970’s, the “Bears” would fly out from eastern Russia to greet the 7th Fleet on their WestPac cruises. We would send up some F-4s (it was the 70’s) and do some fly bys. It was all part of the game of show and tell.
They have always been our enemy
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/02/12/us-carrier-intercepts-russian-bombers/index.html?hp