RÉSEAU VOLTAIRE -- La guerra de la información

GANAR LOS «CORAZONES Y LAS MENTES» 

La guerra de la información

por Cyril Capdevielle

En un documento recientemente desclasificado y difundido por la National Security Archive, el Pentágono presenta su estrategia para controlar la información. Titulado Information Operations Roadmap, el documento, rubricado por Donald Rumsfeld con fecha 30 de octubre de 2003, examina las diferentes actividades del Ejército relacionadas con el control de la información. El conjunto de estas actividades va desde la guerra electrónica a la intoxicación masiva de los medios, pasando por la «guerra a Internet» sin contar las operaciones psicológicas (Psyops).

RED VOLTAIRE | 3 DE MARZO DE 2006 

FRANÇAIS 

En un documento recientemente desclasificado y difundido por la National Security Archive, el Pentágono presenta su estrategia para controlar la información. Titulado Information Operations Roadmap, el documento, rubricado por Donald Rumsfeld con fecha 30 de octubre de 2003, examina las diferentes actividades del Ejército relacionadas con el control de la información.

El conjunto de estas actividades va desde la guerra electrónica a la intoxicación masiva de los medios, pasando por la «guerra a Internet» sin contar las operaciones psicológicas (Psyops).

Inmediatamente después del 11 de septiembre, el Pentágono crea, en el mayor secreto, el Office for the Strategic Influence (OSI), una agencia de propaganda encargada de modelar las opiniones públicas a nivel planetario mediante una intoxicación masiva de los medios de comunicación a fin de apoyar la guerra contra el terrorismo. En ese entonces, las revelaciones de la prensa sobre las actividades de la OSI y su impacto en las informaciones difundidas por los medios estadounidenses obligaron a Donald Rumsfeld a anunciar el cierre de esta nueva agencia. En efecto, el Smith-Mundt Act prohíbe la realización de campañas de desinformación que tengan como objetivo el público estadounidense.

Sin embargo, el Pentágono no renunció a sus proyectos y el Office for the Strategic Influence (OSI) fue sustituido por el Northern Gulf Affairs Office. Creada en septiembre de 2002 y supervisada por el subsecretario de Defensa William Luti, esta oficina se dio a la tarea de preparar el terreno para una intervención en Irak, destilando informaciones sobre las supuestas armas de destrucción masiva en posesión de Irak y los vínculos de este país con el terrorismo internacional.

El documento, hecho público a finales de enero de 2006 por la National Security Archive, confirma que el Pentágono no ha abandonado el terreno de la guerra informativa y propagandística. El mismo indica que «La importancia del dominio de la información explica el objetivo de transformación de las Operaciones de Información para hacer de las mismas un arma en su totalidad como son las fuerzas aéreas, terrestres, navales y las fuerzas especiales» («The importance of dominating the information spectrum explains the objective of transforming IO into a core military competency on a par with air, ground, maritime and special operations»).

Con esta óptica, el Pentágono se adentra en un campo cuya competencia correspondía anteriormente al Departamento de Estado, y en especial al subsecretario de Estado para la diplomacia pública y los asuntos públicos (The Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs), en realidad un ministerio de propaganda cuya misión es difundir la doctrina estadounidense, principalmente mediante medios directamente bajo su control como Voice of America o TV Martí. Así, el documento afirma igualmente que «las principales actividades en materia de información del Departamento de Defensa incluyen los asuntos públicos, el apoyo militar a la diplomacia pública y las operaciones psicológicas» ( «Major DoD "information activities" include public affairs, military support to public diplomacy and PSYOP»).

El reciente escándalo que implicó al Pentágono y a uno de sus subcontratistas, el Lyncoln Group, sobre el tema de los artículos periodísticos que presentan la ocupación de Irak desde un punto de vista favorable, redactados por militares estadounidenses y luego difundidos por la prensa iraquí, constituye un ejemplo de esta estrategia. Por otra parte, el Pentágono no excluyó desarrollar los medios al servicio de la propaganda. Se menciona la voluntad de «desarrollar un sitio web global al servicio de los objetivos de comunicación de los Estados Unidos. Los contenidos provendrían fundamentalmente de terceros y por lo tanto serían más creíbles para públicos extranjeros que si fueran producidos por oficiales estadounidenses» («Develop a global web site supporting U.S. strategic communications objectives. Content should be primarily from third parties with greater credibility to foreign audiences than U.S. officials»). En realidad el Pentágono administra directamente, a través del US European Command los dos sitios siguientes: el Southeast European Times sobre los Balcanes y Magharebia.com sobre el Magreb, y muestra su voluntad de «identificar y difundir los puntos de vista de terceros que apoyen las posiciones estadounidenses. Estas fuentes podrían no estar totalmente de acuerdo con las posiciones norteamericanas como lo desearía el DSG, pero podrían ejercer una influencia positiva» («Identify and disseminate the views of third party advocates that support U.S. positions. These sources may not articulate the U.S. position the way that the DSG would, but they may nonetheless have a positive influence»).

En este documento Internet es un enemigo a combatir. Así, el «el Departamento luchará contra Internet como lo haría contra un sistema de armamentos» («the Department will "fight the net" as it would a weapons system»). Efectivamente, el control de las diferentes redes de comunicación e información se ha convertido en un elemento estratégico de la mayor importancia para asegurar la victoria tanto en los campos de batalla como en la opinión pública.

Sin embargo, el Pentágono reconoce que «la información destinada a un público extranjero, incluidas la diplomacia pública y las operaciones psicológicas, es consumida cada vez más por un público doméstico» («information intended for foreign audiences, including public diplomacy and PSYOP, increasingly is consumed by our domestic audience and vice-versa»), lo que la sitúa en el terreno de la ilegalidad. Para remediar esta situación, el Departamento de Defensa propone una mejor coordinación interagencias para garantizar la coherencia global de las acciones de propaganda estadounidenses.

Violaciones de los derechos humanos en Ucrania, el Libro Blanco -- FREE PDF

Violaciones de los derechos humanos en Ucrania, el Libro Blanco

RED VOLTAIRE | 6 DE MAYO DE 2014 

FRANÇAIS  РУССКИЙ  ENGLISH  DEUTSCH 

El ministerio ruso de Relaciones Exteriores publicó un Libro Blanco sobre las violaciones de los derechos humanos y del estado de derecho registradas en Ucrania desde noviembre de 2013.

El documento se divide en 6 capítulos:
 Violaciones de los derechos humanos;
 Injerencia de la Unión Europea y de Estados Unidos;
 Armamento y actos de violencia de los manifestantes;
 Persecución contra los defensores del orden institucional;
 Discriminación basada en el origen étnico;
 Persecución de naturaleza confesional.

Cada capítulo contiene una cronología detallada de los acontecimientos.

Este documento indispensable está disponible en ruso y en inglés.

The White Book on Violations of Human Rights and the Rule of Law in Ukraine, Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de la Federación Rusa, 5 de mayo de 2014, 81 pp.

 

From F. William Engdahl Newsletter -- An excerpt from A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics.

click  upon the picture Hello Again Dear Reader, This issue of my free newsletter I would like to share with you something I wrote but have not published, in a sense exclusive content for readers of my letter. I deal with the extraordinarily successful in political terms and extraordinarily destructive in terms of wars and economic pillage, system of British Balance of Power and the later systematic development begining 1904 of what has come to be called British geopolitics. That word is thrown about with little care for its original definition as developed by British Royal Geographer, Sir Halford Mackinder. To better understand how little the fundamental axioms of geopolitical power have changed from 1904, I share this fragment with you. For those of you who find this historical perspective interesting, even useful, I strongly recommend buying a copy of my best-known work, A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics. As always I converted the text to a pfd-file for a better reading which you can find in the attachment of this mail. It's 10 pages in A4 format.             I hope you enjoy your reading and again I thank you for your interest,                                                                                     -- F. William Engdahl                                                                                     www.williamengdahl.com England's Fine Art of Using Rivals                                                                                                           © F. William Engdahl A special sense of tradition Like all British Prime Ministers within memory, Margaret Thatcher, although born as an ordinary grocer's daughter, a commoner in the very class-conscious British society, was educated at the elite schools and steeped in a very special sense of British "tradition." Thatcher's insistence on restoring a British version of balance of power after the collapse of communist control in Eastern Europe, and the unification of Germany was rooted in such tradition, shaped by centuries of British political practice. English diplomacy had been remarkably successful in such manipulations, since the time of the alliance of England with the King of Portugal against Philip II's Spain in the 1580's. England  always sought a situation in which she could win over the weaker of two opponents, in order to get them to join with her against the stronger rival, in pursuit of what Lord Palmerston termed, British "interests." Preferably, this weaker new ally would also take the brunt of any actual fighting on behalf of England's interests. All, of course, in the name of the glorious alliance with brave England against the common foe. Decades later the impressive term "balance of power" was given to this peculiarly British practice. This was the tradition of British foreign policy. Over the decades it became more subtle, or more devious, but always it came back to this fundamental principle.

THIERRY MEYSSAN -- Islam et cléricalisme au Moyen-Orient élargi

Islam et cléricalisme au Moyen-Orient élargi

par Thierry Meyssan

Il est de bon ton de disserter en Occident sur « la compatibilité de l’islam et de la démocratie » ou sur « l’islam et la laïcité ». Ces problématiques laissent entendre que par nature l’islam serait clérical. Ce ne serait donc pas une religion, mais un courant politique. Ainsi, les musulmans les plus « radicaux » seraient des terroristes et inversement. 

Pourtant, depuis un mois, le Moyen-Orient élargi, à population majoritairement musulmane, est en train de se diviser entre fidèles de cette religion et partisans d’une politique qui les manipule.

RÉSEAU VOLTAIRE | DAMAS (SYRIE) | 27 JUIN 2017 ESPAÑOL  ENGLISH 

Un homme politique peut être athée, agnostique ou croyant. Le fait qu’il prétende servir Dieu ne fait pas de son parti politique une Église.

Certains de nos lecteurs ont mal compris une précédente chronique sur l’évolution du monde musulman. Je vais donc déblayer les questions relatives à l’islam avant de décrire le plus précisément possible sa situation actuelle.

En premier lieu, si vous avez une idée tranchée sur l’islam, c’est que vous n’en connaissez qu’une seule de ses formes tant cette religion est différente du Maroc au Xinjiang. Que ce soit au plan liturgique ou juridique, il n’y a guère de ressemblance entre l’islam de Sharjah et celui de Java.

Cette religion peut être abordée à partir d’une lecture littérale du Coran ou à partir de sa lecture contextualisée ou encore à partir d’une critique de l’authenticité du texte coranique actuel.

Durant les quatre premiers siècles de l’islam, tous les musulmans s’accordaient sur la nécessité d’interpréter le Coran, ce qui se traduisit par l’élaboration de quatre systèmes juridiques distincts (hanafite, malékite, shafiite et hanbalite), selon les cultures locales. Mais à la fin du Xème siècle, constatant l’expansion de cette religion et craignant qu’elle ne finisse par se diviser, le calife sunnite interdit que l’on poussât l’interprétation plus loin. Seuls les chiites la poursuivirent. Depuis lors, l’islam s’adapte comme il le peut aux exigences de son temps.

A MUST -- The Reason Behind the US Government’s Secret Hatred of Europeans

ERIC ZUESSE | 21.06.2017 | WORLD

The Reason Behind the US Government’s Secret Hatred of Europeans

The reason for the US government’s hostility — at least since 4 February 2014 —toward Europeans, has been a mystery, until now.

This hostility wasn’t even publicly recognized at all, until it leaked out, on that date, from a tapped phone-line of arguably the most powerful person at the US State Department, the person whom American President Barack Obama had personally entrusted with running his Administration’s most geostrategically sensitive secret foreign operations (and she did it actually throughout almost the entirety of Obama’s eight years in office, regardless of whom the official US Secretary of State happened to be at the time): Victoria Nuland.

Her official title was «Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs» and she was appointed to that post by the President himself, but nominally she reported to him through the Deputy Secretary of State William Joseph Burns, who reported to the Secretary of State, who, in turn, reported to the President. 

She ran policies specifically on Ukraine (and, more broadly, against Russia). In the famous leaked phone call that she made on 4 February 2014 to the US Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt, she instructed him to place in charge of Ukraine’s government, once America’s coup in Ukraine would be completed (which then occurred 18 days later and overthrew the democratically elected Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, entirely in violation of Ukraine’s own Constitution), «Yats» or Arseniy Yatsenyuk. He did, immediately after the coup was completed, receive this crucial appointment — basically, the power to control all other top appointments in the new Ukrainian government. With this appointment, the coup, which had started by no later than 2011 to be planned inside the US State Department, was effectively completed.

In this phone call, Nuland said «F—k the EU!» and no one, at the time, paid much attention to what this outburst was all about, but only that it sounded shockingly undiplomatic. Finally, however, clear evidence has now emerged, concerning what it was actually about. 

This crucial evidence consists of a refusal (at long last) by both Germany and Austria, to ratchet-up further, as the US regime now demands, economic sanctions against Russia, sanctions that are a key part of America’s plan ultimately to conquer Russia — a plan that’s been carried out consistently by all US federal governments since the moment, on the night of 24 February 1990, when US President George Herbert Walker Bush himself secretly announced it to West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, and afterward to other US vassal-heads-of-state — that, though the Soviet Union was already irrevocably in the process of ending the Cold War against the US and its allies, the US and its allies would secretly continue that war, henceforth, against Russia, until Russia itself would be conquered. He was implicitly informing them, there, that the Cold War, on the US side, wasn’t really about ideology (capitalist versus communist), but instead, was actually a long war for conquest, of the entire world (now it would be to strip Russia of its allies, and then to go in for the kill), by the US aristocracy and its vassal aristocracies (whom those European leaders represented).

On 15 June 2017, the Associated Press headlined «Germany, Austria slam US sanctions against Russia», and reported that both of those US vassal-nations, while paying obeisance to the imperial master, were not going to proceed further all the way to destruction of their own major oil and gas companies, in order to please that master:

In a joint statement, Austria's Chancellor Christian Kern and Germany's Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said it was important for Europe and the United States to form a united front on the issue of Ukraine, where Russian-based separatists have been fighting government forces since 2014.

«However, we can't accept the threat of illegal and extraterritorial sanctions against European companies», the two officials said, citing a section of the bill that calls for the United States to continue to oppose the Nord Stream 2 pipeline that would pump Russian gas to Germany beneath the Baltic Sea. Half of the cost of the new pipeline is being paid for by Russian gas giant Gazprom, while the other half is being shouldered by a group including Anglo-Dutch group Royal Dutch Shell, French provider Engie, OMV of Austria and Germany's Uniper and Wintershall. Some Eastern European countries, including Poland and Ukraine, fear the loss of transit revenue if Russian gas supplies don't pass through their territory anymore once the new pipeline is built.

Gabriel and Kern accuse the US of trying to help American natural gas suppliers at the expense of their Russian rivals. They said the possibility of fining European companies participating in the Nord Stream 2 project «introduces a completely new, very negative dimension into European-American relations».

Currently, and for a very long time, the leading energy-supplier to the EU has been Russia, in the forms of oil and, especially, natural gas, both of which are transported into the EU via an extensive network of pipelines, most of which travel through Ukraine, which is a major reason why the US rulers wanted to take over Ukraine — in order to stop that, or at least to cause a necessity for Russia to build alternative pipelines (which the US regime would likewise do everything to block from happening) — but now both Germany and Austria are saying no to this US effort. 

sThe US regime wants fracked US natural gas to fill an increasing portion of Europe’s needs, and for natural gas from US-allied fundamentalist Sunni royal regimes to fill as much of the rest as possible, so as to squeeze-out the existing top supplier, Russia. (Until recently, the plan was for US ally Qatar, owned by the Thani royal family, to become Europe’s main supplier, via pipelines which would traverse through Syria, for which reason Syria needs to be conquered (so that those pipelines through Syria can be built, perhaps even by American firms). However, the Sauds, who usually run US foreign relations — often with assistance from the Israeli regime, which is far more popular in the United States and also in Europe (and thus serves as the Sauds’ agents in the US and Europe) — have now blockaded Qatar because of Qatar’s insufficient compliance with the Sauds’ demand for total international isolation of Iran and of any other nation where Shia are or might become dominant. (For example, the Sauds bomb Yemen to impose fundamentalist Sunni leadership there and kill the Shia population.) And, so, now, after the break between Saudi Arabia and Qatar, even more than before, the main beneficiaries of cutting off Russian gas-supplies to the EU would be US fracking companies.

However, the big European oil and gas corporations would then play a smaller role in the European market, because those firms have mutual commitments with Gazprom and other Russian giants. The only big winners, now, of increased sanctions against Russia, would thus be US firms.

«Europe's energy supply is a matter for Europe, and not for the United States of America», Kern and Gabriel said.

Europe already has suffered considerable economic harm from complying with the US on taking over Ukraine, and from absorbing millions of destitute and alien refugees from Syria, Libya, and other countries where the US CIA, and other agencies, fomented the «Arab Spring» to unlock, in those countries, the oil and gas pipeline potential, which, if controlled by the US, would go to US oilfield-services firms such as Halliburton, and not to European ones such as Schlumberger. 

Kern and Gabriel — and the local national aristocracies (respectively Austrian, and German) whom they represent — are now speaking publicly about the limits beyond which they will not go in order to obey their US masters.

Consequently, back in February 2014, when the European aristocracies complied with the US aristocracy’s coup in Ukraine even though knowing full well that it was a barbaric and very bloody coup and nothing ‘democratic’ such as the US-manufactured story-line alleged it to have been, those aristocracies accepted the heist because they thought and expected to be cut in on enough of the looting of Ukraine so as to come out ahead on it. But that’s no longer the case. Because of the Sauds’ campaign against the Thanis (the owners of Qatar), the gang are starting to break up. The US gangsters are no longer clearly in control, but are being forced to choose between the Sauds and the Thanis, and have apparently chosen the Sauds. The Sauds financed the 9/11 attacks in the United States, but are the largest foreign purchasers of US-made weapons.

The US aristocracy hate Europeans because the US aristocracy are determined to conquer Russia, and because Europeans aren’t fully cooperating with that overriding US government goal — many EU billionaires want deals with Russia, but America’s billionaires are determined instead to take over Russia, and so the US (and the Sauds) might be losing its traditional support from the EU.

International affairs — US, Russia, Sauds, Thanis, Iran, Germany, UK, etc. — are in unpredictable flux. But Europe seems gradually to be drifting away from the US

And resistant European aristocrats seem to be digging in their heels on this. Here is a translation of a report dated June 17th from the most reliable source of news regarding international relations, Deutsche Wirtschafts Nachrichten, or «German Economic News»:

Eastern Committee: US sanctions against Russia are a threat to Europe

German Economic News | Released:17.06.17 00:36 Clock

The Eastern Committee of the German economy is indignant at the new US sanctions against Russia.

The German companies have sharply criticized the US sanctions against Russia. «The sanctions plans of the US Senate are deeply alarming and, in principle, a threat to the European and German economy», said Klaus Schäfer, Deputy Chairman of the Eastern Committee of the German Economy, on Friday evening in Berlin. «America first is a new dimension to open up international markets to US providers at the expense of European jobs. Furthermore, we consider an extraterritorial application of economic initiatives generally wrong, «he said. In the Eastern Committee, the German companies active in Eastern Europe are organized. The federal government had also clearly criticized the sanction decision.

«Every further turn at the sanctioning screw increases the danger of new trade wars and the uncertainty of the world economy», warned Schäfer. The solution of the Ukraine conflict is not a step closer. A de-escalation on all sides was necessary. He pointed out that the US-Russia trade represented only one-tenth of the EU-Russia trade. «We pay the price of sanctions to Europeans», he criticized. «Implementation of the planned sanctions would make Europe more difficult to provide with favorable energy and inevitably lead to higher prices».

The most remarkable thing about this intensification of economic aggression by the US aristocracy against some of the European aristocracies, is that instead of the aggression being spearheaded this time by the US President, it’s being spearheaded by an almost unanimous US Senate: 97 out of the 100 US Senators voted for this bill. One cannot, this time around, reasonably blame «Donald Trump» for this ‘nationalism’ — it is instead clearly a Cold War, this time, by the US aristocracy (who are represented by the US government), against some European aristocracies, which are paying insufficient obeisance to the demands by the imperial aristocracy: the US gang.

Whereas, at the time of the US coup in Ukraine, the EU swallowed in silence their shock at how brutal and bloody it had been, and stayed with the Americans because the Americans claimed that the takeover would benefit European aristocracies too (‘expand the EU’), the lie about that is now clear to all (and Ukraine has been too wrecked by America, to be of much use to anyone but the Americans as a staging base for their missiles against Moscow), and therefore «the Western Alliance» might finally be breaking up.

The vassal-governments have put up with a lot from the US aristocracy, such as when German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s phone was revealed to be tapped by America’s NSA, and the case was quietly dropped because, «Prosecutors say they can find no actionable evidence to support claims German chancellor’s mobile phone was tapped by US National Security Agency» even though everyone knew that the refusal by Germany’s prosecutors was based upon a lie, and that Germany «remains heavily reliant on the US», and that the US government’s knowing everything that German politicians do, provides against those politicians a blackmail-potential against themselves, that cannot be taken lightly. On the other hand, perhaps there now exists a countervailing force that can outweigh even considerations such as that. Maybe Germany’s billionaires have, somehow, finally become able to turn the tide on this.

RÉSEAU VOLTAIRE -- Construction de Turk Stream

Construction de Turk Stream

RÉSEAU VOLTAIRE | 24 JUIN 2017 

ESPAÑOL 

Le président russe, Vladimir Poutine, a inauguré, le 23 juin 2017, les travaux de construction de la section en eaux profondes du gazoduc Turk Stream.

Cet ouvrage, décidé lors d’une visite du président Poutine en Turquie, le 1er décembre 2014, et dont la construction avait interrompue en août 2015 pour des motifs tarifaires mais dans le contexte de la guerre en Syrie, devrait permettre de livrer du gaz russe à la Turquie. Partant de là, il pourrait également servir à un transit de gaz russe vers l’Union européenne en remplacement du projet South Stream stoppé par Bruxelles.

Estimé à six milliards de dollars, le projet prévoit la construction de deux conduites d’une capacité de 15,75 milliards de mètres cubes de gaz par an chacune, la première devant être achevée dès 2018 et la seconde fin 2019.

Ainsi que l’a souligné le président Poutine, il est extrêmement rare que de tels travaux soient si rapidement mis en œuvre. Ceci n’a été possible que par l’investissement personnel du président Recep Tayyip Erdoğan qui cherche ainsi à s’affranchir de la tutelle économique états-unienne.

Romîna -- Ajustari în Orientul-Mijlociu de Thierry Meyssan

Ajustari în Orientul-Mijlociu

de Thierry Meyssan

În timp ce Statele apartinînd Orientului-Mijlociu înlargit se separa între partizanii si adversarii clerului, Washington, Moscova si Pekin, negociaza o noua afacere. Thierry Meyssan masoara impactul acestui cutremur de pamînt, asupra conflictelor palestiniene, iraco-siriene si yemenite.

REŢEAUA VOLTAIRE | DAMASC (SIRIA) | 23 IUNIE 2017 

DEUTSCH  ENGLISH  ESPAÑOL  FRANÇAIS  РУССКИЙ  TÜRKÇE  ITALIANO  عربي  PORTUGUÊS  ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΆ 

Criza diplomatica din Qatar, a înghetat diferite conflicte regionale si a mascat încercarile de a reglementa cîteva altele. Numeni nu stie cînd va avea loc ridicarea cortinei, însa aceasta va trebui sa faca sa apara o regiune transformata profund.

1 – Confictul palestinian

De la expulsarea majoritatii palestinienilor departe de casa (Nakhba, 15 mai 1948), si refuzul popoarelor arabe asupra acestei curatenii etnice, numai pacea separata israelo-egipteana a acordurilor de la Camp David (1978), si promisiunea unei solutii a doua State, a acordurilor de la Oslo (1993), au modificat afacerea partial.

Su-27 and F-16NATO-Russian Aerial Intercepts Intensify Amid Escalation in Europe

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NATO-Russian Aerial Intercepts Intensify Amid Escalation in Europe

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13:25 22.06.2017(updated 14:27 22.06.2017)Get short URL

The attempt by a NATO fighter aircraft to approach a Russian plane carrying Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu became only the latest episode in a string of similar incidents as the alliance’s warplanes continue to test Russia’s defenses amid growing military escalation in Europe.

© SPUTNIK/ DAVID B. GLEASON

Close Intercepts of US Units by Russia Could ‘Unnecessarily Escalate Tensions’

On June 21 a NATO F-16 fighter aircraft made an attempt to approach the plane carrying Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu over neutral Baltic waters, but was promptly chased away by a Russian Su-27 warplane.

This incident, however, wasn’t a singular occurrence, to put it mildly, as only a day prior to that, on June 20, Russia scrambled its fighters to intercept a US Boeing RC-135 surveillance plane, and on June 6 Russian fighters intercepted a US B-52 strategic bomber which attempted to approach Russia’s borders; both intercepts also took place over the Baltic Sea.

It should be noted that while the Pentagon officials sought to gloss over the incident involving Shoigu’s plane, claiming that the NATO fighter was merely following standard procedure, they blasted the RC-135 intercept, branding the Russian pilot’s actions as unsafe, according to RT.

However, Ret. Lt. Gen. Aytech Bizhev, former Deputy Commander of the Russian Air Force, said the attempt to ‘escort’ the Defense Minister’s plane looks like a deliberate provocation.

"It was a violation of flight rules over international waters. The US Air Force aircraft created a dangerous situation over the Baltic Sea by approaching (Shoigu’s plane) at an unacceptable distance according to international law. Anything could’ve happened: the planes might’ve collided, the pilot’s hand could’ve slipped, and the fighter’s slipstream could’ve caused the plane to stall. There were many risk factors involved," he said.

General Bizhev also remarked that while the NATO F-16 obviously didn’t intend to attack the Russian Defense Minister’s plane, the F-16 pilot was showing off.

Meanwhile, the Russian Defense Ministry pointed out that during the past week NATO surveillance planes had attempted to approach Russia’s borders on at least 15 occasions.

The number of incidents involving Russian and NATO military aircraft has continued to steadily increase since 2014, when the relations between Moscow and Washington took a turn for the worse amid the crisis in Ukraine.

While NATO surveillance aircraft continue to probe Russian borders, the alliance also keeps funneling troops and military hardware to Eastern Europe, effectively creating a sizeable strike force right on Russia’s doorstep while claiming that this military buildup is a purely defensive measure.

While Russia moves to create adequate countermeasures to NATO’s new strategy, the alliance seeks to gain more intelligence about Moscow’s military preparations, which results in a steadily increasing number of surveillance flights near the country’s borders and therefore in an increasing number of aerial intercepts.

It should also be noted that while in September 2016 the Pentagon claimed that US military aircraft conducting flights over the Baltic Sea would keep their transponders on – a move that might’ve helped to deescalate tensions and avoid potentially dangerous incidents – it appears that the US leadership chose to renege on this promise.