Russian planes 'buzzed US carrier three times'

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Wednesday 15 November 2000

Russian planes 'buzzed US carrier three times' By Marcus Warren in Moscow

Interfax News Agency Russia Online Cold War International History Project RUSSIA revived the spirit of the Cold War yesterday with claims that its military pilots had "buzzed" the American aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk in the Sea of Japan. Russian reconnaissance and fighter planes swooped low over the ship after evading its battle group's radar systems three times over recent weeks, the Moscow media boasted.

Not only did the planes, operating in pairs, feign an attack on the aircraft carrier, but they were able to take detailed photographs of what was happening on its deck, claimed press reports. Such "duals" were common in the Cold War.

Izvestiya commented: "If these had been planes on a war mission, the aircraft carrier would definitely have been sunk." Only after a second pair of Su-24 and Su-27 planes buzzed the Kitty Hawk on Oct 17 did the carrier scramble an F/A-18 fighter to intercept the intruders, the Interfax agency reported.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=003819455505390&rtmo=QwHHaSaR&atmo=rrrrrrrq&pg=/et/00/11/15/wbuz15.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), November 14, 2000

Answers

FRIDAY NOVEMBER 17 2000 Russian jets catch US ships off guard FROM MICHAEL BINYON IN MOSCOW TWO Russian naval reconnaissance aircraft twice swooped down on American ships off guard in the Sea of Japan, Russian commanders have claimed triumphantly, and the pilots were able to photograph the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk. The US Navy denied that it had been caught off guard, saying that it had tracked and identified the two aircraft, which were escorted away by US fighters. A spokesman said that such encounters often took place without incident.

Anatoli Kornukov, head of the Russian Air Force, said two Su24MR planes spotted the Kitty Hawk on October 17, swooped down while escorted by Su27 fighters and slipped under American radar defences. The stunt was repeated on November 9, he said. The US ships were due to begin a joint exercise with Japan when the second incident took place.

Meanwhile, in the Barents Sea the Russian missile cruiser Peter the Great launched depth charges and exploded grenades over the site where the nuclear submarine Kursk sank in August to stop any foreign vessels snooping. A spokesman for Russia’s Northern Fleet said the exercise to guard the Kursk was fully in keeping with international practice and did not damage the ecology of the Barents Sea.

The Russian Navy admitted for the first time yesterday that one of the two explosions on the submarine was caused by a torpedo exploding on board. Admiral Vyacheslav Popov, Commander of the Northern Fleet, said, however, that the cause of the first, smaller, explosion, was not yet clear.

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,37280,00.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), November 16, 2000.


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