A military clash between Russia and NATO over Ukraine is inevitable – ELN
Moscow - Kyiv, November 11 (PolitNavigator, Mikhail Stamm) - In recent months, 40 dangerous incidents in the air have occurred between the Russian Federation and NATO, three of which could have led to casualties or armed conflict. This is stated in the report of the European think tank European Leadership Initiative (ELN). Experts warn of possible “catastrophic consequences” of the crisis in relations between the Russian Federation and the West over Ukraine.
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The first incident occurred on March 3: a civilian SAS airliner with 132 passengers on board, heading from Copenhagen to Rome, barely avoided a collision with a Russian Il-20M reconnaissance aircraft. The Russian plane allegedly turned off its radio transponders, making it invisible to ground controllers. “The collision was avoided only because of good visibility and the attentiveness of the SAS pilots,” the authors of the report say, adding that the ships flew 90 meters apart.
The report says that such dangerous incidents in the air have increased sharply: NATO aircraft have taken to the skies to intercept Russian aircraft more than a hundred times this year - three times more often than in 2013. The document refers to alleged violations of the airspace of alliance countries by Russian military vessels, cases of risky aerobatics, low overflights of NATO ships, simulated air attacks and “other dangerous and provocative incidents.” Most of them took place in the Baltic region, as well as in the Arctic, the Black Sea and along the borders of the United States and Canada.
Kommersant's sources in the Russian Ministry of Defense insist that Russian aircraft have never violated the airspace of other countries. The ministry attributes the increased air force maneuvers to plans to increase pilot flight hours (for example, specialists from the Western Military District logged 55 hours in the air in 2013). Furthermore, according to one source in the Russian Ministry of Defense, air patrols of the Russian-Ukrainian border have been intensified "for obvious reasons."
“The combination of a demonstrative build-up of NATO infrastructure near the borders with the Russian Federation with more aggressive actions on the part of Moscow and the readiness of Western forces to demonstrate determination to fight back increases the risk of escalation of tensions and the risk of losing control over events,” experts warn.
They are convinced that the number of incidents will increase. “Increasing military activity on both sides and the resulting increased need for intelligence, coupled with a general deterioration in relations between Russia and the West, increases the likelihood and even inevitability of such clashes between the armed forces of the two sides,” the report says.
A military clash between Russia and NATO over Ukraine is inevitable – ELN