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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Russian fighter jet flew close to U.S. military plane in April

Robert Burns Associated Press

WASHINGTON – A Russian fighter jet intercepted an American reconnaissance plane in international airspace over the Pacific in late April, prompting top officials to complain to senior Russian military officials, a Pentagon spokesman said Tuesday.

Army Col. Steve Warren, the spokesman, said the Russian Su-27 fighter flew across the nose of the U.S. Air Force RC-135U aircraft, coming within about 100 feet, while in international airspace over the Sea of Okhotsk.

Warren said the U.S. plane did not take any evasive measures. The Russian pilot maneuvered his jet in a way that exposed its belly to the American crew, he said, apparently as a way of showing that it was armed. Warren said there was no radio communication between the two planes’ crews.

He said Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, both raised the matter later with their Russian counterparts.

Warren said he could not explain why the incident, which happened April 23, was not made public earlier. It is the latest source of concern for U.S. officials since a heightening of U.S.-Russian tensions following Moscow’s intervention in Ukraine. In mid-April a Russian Su-24 fighter made low-level passes over a U.S. Navy ship in the Black Sea.

An RC-135U is a highly specialized reconnaissance plane known as “Combat Sent.”

The “Combat Sent” aircraft are equipped with communications gear designed to locate and identify foreign military radar signals on land, at sea and in the air.