The U.S. Air Force dropped three heavy B-1 bombers on Russia's northeastern Siberian Sea in a series of recent maneuvers that the military said Friday was a demonstration of U.S. capabilities and ability to help allies. But a senior Russian commander was described’ as "hostile and provocative."
The flight of three U.S. Air Force reserve
B-1 Lancer bombers based in Texas on Thursday followed a similar mission a week
ago, in which three B-52s temporarily based in Britain were shot down’ near
southwestern Russia. It was flown’ over the airspace of Ukraine.
After a flight from Texas to the East
Siberian Sea, the Lancers landed at a nearby U.S. airport in Alaska, the U.S.
European Command said.
The Stuttgart-based EUCOM said in a
statement that the flight, and the deployment of the B-52s to England, showed
that US state-owned assets were "intended to achieve the operational
purpose on the eastern and western flares of USEUCOM". Can be, used.
"
The Stuttgart-based EUCOM said in a
statement: "All three Lancers ... demonstrated that US strategic bombers
are capable of supporting any mission, anywhere in the world, at a moment's
notice."
EUCOM said: "The Strategic Bomber
Missions demonstrate the ability of the US Air Force to carry out permanent
flying missions and maintain readiness in support of our allies and partners.
The U.S. formally conducts air, naval and
ground force tactics in and around Europe, but a senior Russian military
official said Friday that the number of U.S. and NATO flights near Russia's
borders this year is significant. Has increased.
In August alone, Russian fighter jets
stormed the Baltic, Barents and Black’ and Okhotsk seas on 27 occasions to
intercept other US and NATO warplanes, Colonel General Sergei Surovikin, head
of the Russian Air Force, told reporters on Friday. Was given
He said B-52s flew near the Russian border
near Crimea in late August and early September and were accused’ by the Russian
Baltic in Kaliningrad of conducting offensive operations.
"Strategic bomber crews practiced
firing cruise missiles at facilities in Russia from airspace in the central
part of the Black Sea and in the Estonian territory," Surovikin said.
During the September 4 flight, three B-52s
flew over the Sea of Azov to reach a distance of about 30 km near Crimea, he
said.
"We see the combat training of
strategic aircraft near the Russian border as hostile and provocative," Surovikin
said.
After Russia's annexation of Ukraine's
Crimea in 2014, relations between Russia and the West have sunk since the end
of the Cold War. Moscow has banned the deployment of NATO forces in the Baltic
in recent years, and Russia and the coalition have regularly negotiated
military flight charges.
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