Russian aircraft intercepted US Navy patrol planes in an "unprofessional" way three times over the weekend, US officials said Wednesday, amid fears over a possible invasion of Ukraine.
According to the Navy, the Boeing-built P-8A aircraft are designed for anti-submarine and anti-surface warfare, as well as intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance tasks.
Russian Aircraft Intercepts US Navy Plane
A US official said that the events all occurred in the same approximate area of the eastern Mediterranean over many days. It is unclear whether the large-scale Russian naval drills being undertaken there had anything to do with it. According to DOD spokesperson Capt. Mike Kafka, the US has tried diplomatic channels to express its concerns to Russian authorities, according to ABC News.
A top US official has warned that a Russian strike on Ukraine would result in "body bags returning to Moscow" and that the guilt for the subsequent bloodshed will fall directly on Vladimir Putin's shoulders.
According to Derek Chollet, a US State Department advisor, the Ukrainian military is significantly stronger than it was during the 2014 fight between the Kyiv government and Kremlin-backed rebels and would be "capable of exacting a brutal toll" if Russia invaded and occupied Ukraine.
Chollet is one of the Western diplomats who believe that Moscow's pullback of some soldiers was not a real attempt to settle the current conflict. On Tuesday, the Kremlin announced the withdrawal of some soldiers from Ukraine's borders, citing the action as an example of how it was attempting to de-escalate tensions while the west was threatening war.
The US and its allies, on the other hand, maintain that a clear and present danger still exists. Jens Stoltenberg, NATO's secretary-general, said during a meeting of member states' defense ministers in Brussels that the alliance was considering sending more battle groups to eastern Europe to supplement the ones currently stationed in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland, which are led by the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, and the United States, Independent reported.
US Believes Russia's Military Build-Up in Ukraine Continues
World powers are embroiled in one of the most serious crises in East-West relations in decades, squabbling over post-Cold War dominance and energy supplies while Russia seeks to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO.
To alleviate the deadlock, Western governments have proposed armament limitation and confidence-building measures, prompting them to advise their residents to flee Ukraine because an assault may occur at any time. Russia denies any intention of invading.
According to Mikk Marran, director-general of the Estonian Foreign Intelligence Service, Estonian intelligence is aware of roughly ten combat units of troops marching towards the Ukrainian border, where it thinks about 170,000 men are already posted.
After drills in the southern and western military regions near Ukraine, Russia's defense ministry claimed its personnel was drawing back. It released a video purporting to show tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, and self-propelled artillery units departing the Crimean peninsula, which Moscow annexed from Ukraine in 2014.
However, NATO military leaders are preparing preparations for new combat troops that might be deployed in Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, and Slovakia, according to diplomats. As part of the NATO deployment, Britain would treble the size of its military in Estonia and send tanks and armored battle vehicles to the small Baltic nation bordering Russia.
Ukraine has also raised the number of border guards on its border with Belarus, a Russian ally where 9,000 Russian troops are thought to be participating in military drills, as per The Straits Times.
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