The US Department of Defence has released footage of what it said was a Russian aircraft pouring fuel on a US Air Force surveillance drone and clipping the drone’s propeller in international airspace over the Black Sea.
The 42-second video, shared on Thursday, shows a Russian Su-27 approaching the back of the MQ-9 drone and beginning to release fuel as it passes, the Pentagon said. Dumping the fuel appeared to be aimed at blinding its optical instruments and driving it out of the area.
“It is not uncommon at all for us to release imagery of these intercepts,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said. “We’ve done it plenty of times before – I think you all know that – to lay bare and to make clear to the rest of the world the manner in which the Russians have been just flat-out lying about their accounts.”
Russia and NATO member countries routinely intercept each other’s warplanes, but the drone incident marked the first time since the Cold War that a US aircraft went down during such a confrontation, raising concerns it could bring the US and Russia closer to a direct conflict. The Russian Defence Ministry said in its report of the call with Austin that Shoigu accused the US of provoking the incident by ignoring flight restrictions the Kremlin had imposed because of its military operations in Ukraine.
“I personally think that our response in such situations should be tougher,” Aksenov said on his messaging app channel. “We realise that attempted attacks on Crimea have been launched with Americans’ guidance. In fact, they are a warring party.”
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