Russian bomber buzzes U.S.S. Nimitz

[satyen]

from CNN:
"American fighter jets intercepted two Russian bombers, one of which buzzed a U.S. aircraft carrier in the western Pacific over the weekend, U.S. military officials told CNN Monday. A Tupolev-95 flies over the Izu Islands, just south of Tokyo, Saturday.





One of them twice flew about 2,000 feet over the deck of the USS Nimitz Saturday while another flew about 50 miles away, officials said. Two others were at least 100 miles away, the military reported."

What do you guys think of this? I find it very surprising that such a huge aircraft could come this close to the carrier group and that too do a Buzz. I mean was it not detected or what? Isn’t this stupid on Russia part?

[baggygreen]

From what i've seen, hey were intercepted by 4 F18s at about 1000km and escorted all the way.

just muscle flexing imo

[bookworm_020]

I wonder how tempting it would to be to let loose the Phalanx CIWS

[Marriott]

yeah muscle flexing is what it seems. pretty much every country with even a small amount of influence does something like this every once in a while. Flying fighters into another countries airspace, launching a few missiles, carrying out large military excercises, military parades, military vessels coming close or just barely entering another country's waters. It seems some media makes a bigger deal out of things like this then what is really required, but thats just my opinion.

[FIREWALL]

Anyone have any links to news articles?

[satyen]

does any one have a link as to what is going on i dont trust cnn

[AkbarGulag]

Originally Posted by FIREWALL

Anyone have any links to news articles?

BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7240197.stm

Article on Al Jazeera also http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exer...9842D9A475.htm

Anyway, it doesn't mean anything. After all, it's international waters. If they didn't want to play bombers and carriers together they would all be in port/base.

Other sources can be informative, but usually they suddenly stop functioning (i.e Hezbolah news) .... unless you set up a proxy server in a third country (to mask your own location). This seems fairly effective against state censorship of websites.

[geetrue]

Flying at 2,000 feet is a funny choice ... unless they were on a visual bombing run.

Todays weapons are lauched far away from a visual contact ...

All that leaves is a desire to cause an international snafu to embarass the enemy.

The Russians are getting oil rich funny ... returning to the, "we are better than you are", cold war days.

It keeps Putin in power to make his fellow countrymen think that he is doing something to justify his plan to increase their aging military machine.

[swifty]

Russia has restarted flying the Bear cold war like air patrols last year. One recently was escorted by Japanese F-16s when it "wondered" into Japanese air space. On thanksgiving one was escorted by F-22 when it started to approach US air space in Alaska. (Photos Attached)

During the cold war it wasn't uncommon for carrier flyovers operating in international waters how ever there was always a US fighter escort.

I find it disturbing Russia is going back to it's old ways. In part it is due to Russia, Canada and Japan fighting over northern territory for mineral rights.

View from an IL 38 flying over a USN CV, intercepted by a USN F 4E

[swifty]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/russia/art...155974,00.html

Moscow flexes its military muscle again, but few in west say it is fit for a fight

· Putin's sabre-rattling meant for home audience
· Bombers and tanks too old to worry cold war rivals

Luke Harding in Moscow and Ewen MacAskill in Washington
Saturday August 25, 2007
The Guardian

From the ground it looked an impossible manoeuvre. The Russian Sukhoi-35 shot vertically into the sky before flipping forward in midair. It then raced downwards with an ear-ripping roar. The crowds were impressed. Even the seasoned US pilots standing on the tarmac next to their grey-painted B-52 bomber looked on admiringly. Nearby an array of lethal Russian missiles had been laid out. Next to them Russian pilots chatted under the shade of a formidably armed MiG.

The Maks-2007 international airshow near Moscow was the biggest in Russia's post-Soviet history - and an apparent symbol of Russia's resurgent military might. Last week, President Vladimir Putin announced that Russia's ageing fleet of strategic bombers had resumed "combat missions". On Tuesday, the MoD said the RAF had sent out two Typhoon fighters after spotting a Tupolev-95 bomber heading towards British airspace.

The encounter seemed to symbolise Russia's renewed military threat and follows a tumultuous eight months in which a hawkish Mr Putin has denounced US power, torn up a conventional arms agreement with Nato, grabbed a symbolic chunk of the Arctic, and accused Britain of "stupidity" in its handling of the Alexander Litvinenko murder.

And yet defence experts were yesterday dismissive of Russian strength, branding its air force a "Potemkin village". Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia has been forced to slash defence spending, leaving an ill-equipped conscript army to fight in Chechnya. The army's tanks are old; Russia's ships and submarines have seen better days; the navy's much-vaunted sea-launched Bulava missile still doesn't seem to work, despite a decade of development.

"In terms of military threat they are a joke," Robert Hewson, the editor of Jane's Air-Launched Weapons, said, assessing the array of Sukhoi and MiG fighters on display at the airshow, held at the former Soviet Zhukovsky air base. "Everything is a relic from the Soviet era. The level of technology you see in the UK, Sweden and the US is much higher.

"The Russians are very good at radar. They understand missiles and aerodynamic design. They are terrific engineers. But since the end of the cold war their military has got worse."

The Russian tabloid Trud-7 came to the same conclusion on Thursday, describing the state of Russia's armed forces as "lamentable". Pronouncements that Russia had got back its old Soviet military glory were mere "armour rattling" it said.

The state of Russia's air force is indicative. It has gone an entire decade without a single new plane. Its military aviation industry fared better than its civilian manufacturers, mainly due to large orders from China and India. Until recently the air force could not afford its own products. Its bombers were almost all built decades ago, although it has 60 to 80 Tu-90 "Bear bombers" built in the 90s.

Few experts believe the Bears could ever penetrate British defences. "[The Bear bomber] can carry a load of cruise missiles. But it sticks out like a sore thumb on the radar. It's slow and cumbersome," Douglas Barrie, of Aviation Week, said. "What has been portrayed as a return to strategic operations is really sabre-rattling of the most laughable cold war kind. Before Russia returns to Soviet military levels you are looking at a decade-plus of sustained, high-level military investment."

It seems clear Mr Putin is determined to restore Russia's status as a global power. Earlier this year Mr Ivanov - Russia's first deputy prime minister, the man most likely to succeed Mr Putin - announced a £97bn revamp of the armed forces. From now until 2015, Moscow plans to modernise and exceed the Red Army in "combat readiness", he said. Russia's current defence budget is £16bn, almost four times the 2001 figure, all paid for by soaring oil and gas revenues.

Russia held wargames last week in the Urals involving troops from Russia and China and four central Asian states. Moscow has infuriated Georgia after a Russian missile landed on the outskirts of its capital, Tbilisi. Much of the military posturing is for internal consumption, ahead of parliamentary elections in December and a presidential poll in spring. Pictures showing a shirtless Mr Putin on a fishing trip have been a source of national pride.

The US appears relaxed about this newfound Russian machismo. After all, Washington's defence budget is at least 20 times bigger than Moscow's. And US generals are unperturbed by the Russian Bears close to its airspace. Brigadier-General Richard Sherlock, director of international security operations, was asked at a Pentagon briefing on Thursday about Russian flights close to Guam and Alaska. US planes had been scrambled, but he played down the significance: "Militaries all over the world conduct a variety of operations. This is not something new."

Sean McCormack, the US state department spokesman, said last week: "If Russia feels as though they want to take some of these old aircraft out of mothballs and get them flying again, that's their decision."

Anatol Lieven, a Russia specialist at the Washington-based New America Foundation, said it was clear Moscow was going to ramp up its response to President George Bush's controversial missile defence project in eastern Europe.

"It indicates to the US that this move is not cost-free and shows the Russian population that the government is still acting toughly to defend Russian prestige abroad," he said. "It is depressing but it is not a new cold war."

[AkbarGulag]

Originally Posted by swifty

I find it disturbing Russia is going back to it's old ways. In part it is due to Russia, Canada and Japan fighting over northern territory for mineral rights.

America is also involved in the resource 'grab' in the arctic circle, north from Alaska. It is not isolated to three countries.

It is resource grabbing like this (including whaling by japan in the southern hemisphere), that fuels the desire of those that live here, in the south, to have all nothern hemispherical countries leave the southern seas... Permanently. It sets a dangerous precedent for Antarctica. The only answer is for a southern grouping of nations to do the same, involving claiming all seas south of them to the pole. Maybe this 'dangerous' precedent may also be our savior.

[TarJak]

I love the fact that Russia are still using the same plane they used in the 60's to do the fly by's. The old Bear is still as ugly as sin, but still a good weapons platform even 55 years down the track. I understand the ones in current service were built in the 80's and 90's.

From a political standpoint, I think it's just the same old same old. If you are in international waters there is not much you can do to prevent a peaceful fly past with no overly malicious intent. If there was any real malice intended they would have stood off and launched cruise missles rather than close to point blank range. Only iron bombs still need you to do that and these things would not be sent on a seek and estroy mission against a carrier group with those.

[XabbaRus]

I don't see the big deal that the press is making of it.

It's a game that they all play. Hell it gives the USNAF something to do in the middle of the Ocean now.

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by XabbaRus

I don't see the big deal that the press is making of it.

It's a game that they all play. Hell it gives the USNAF something to do in the middle of the Ocean now.

Agreed

Reminiscent of the Cold War years. If the Russians had any real balls they'd have painted the carrier with their target guidance radar.
I reckon the escorting fighters would then have been given swift clearance for appropriate counter measures

Probably just a couple of young pilots taking bravado shots to sell back home for an extra blanket or loaf of bread

[sonar732]

Personally...I think it's for photo ops. :hmm:

Gotta love pictures like those! Speaking of which...the last one isn't Russian. I'm not familiar with that flag, so anyone want to take a stab at it?