NATO fighter jets were scrambled to intercept five Russian military aircraft flying over the Baltic Sea without flight plans or active transponders, the Latvian Air Force confirmed on Saturday.
The Russian planes were identified on two separate occasions, on Friday and Saturday, prompting a rapid response from NATO’s Baltic Air Policing mission.
According to the Latvian Air Force, the Russian jets were detected flying in international airspace near the Baltic states, but had not activated their transponders, an electronic system that helps maintain safe air traffic control.
“Russian jets regularly enter the airspace above the Baltics with transponders switched off, likely to test the response of NATO states,” The Kyiv Independent reported, citing past instances of similar activities by Russian aircraft.
Nothing much. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_Russian_Sukhoi_Su-24_shootdown
That’s a different scenario. That was over Syrian/Turkish airspace and Russia likely knew they don’t have a leg to stand on there considering the close vicinity of the border and conflicting reports over the bomber’s flight path. Not to mention that Turkey is a lot closer to Russia than the average NATO state.
I don’t think it could escalate to a full war, but shooting down aircraft in intl. airspace is much more serious than a bomber that has strayed into your national airspace.
I was thinking about that incident a lot lately.
Putin is ultimately an alley bully. He’s weak and only pretends to be powerful, hoping no one calls his bluff.
Turkey called his bluff. Putin was super aggressive, but Turkey just said, well, terrible tragedy, let’s hope that never happens again, right Vlad?
Well and it never happened again. Turkey is a NATO member. A NATO country shot down a Russian jet and nothing happened.
Cowards like Putin can’t be convinced or tamed, they only respond to strength. And currently, NATO doesn’t exactly seem strong.