Pentagon sees ‘spike’ in armed Russian flyovers of US troops in Syria
CENTCOM commander Michael “Erik” Kurilla told Congress about ongoing 'aggressive' behavior by Russian pilots, following the downing of a US MQ-9 drone over the Black Sea.
WASHINGTON — Russian combat pilots have been flying weapons-laden attack aircraft over US bases in Syria with increasing frequency over the past several weeks, in what Pentagon officials suspect is part of a wider pattern of deliberate provocation.
“They fly over our bases with ground attack-aircraft with weapons on them in an attempt to try to be provocative,” the top commander of US forces in the Middle East, Army Gen. Michael “Erik” Kurilla, told Senate lawmakers on Thursday.
Kurilla called the interactions “unsafe, unprofessional, and not what we expect of a professional air force.”
“They want to try and renegotiate the deconfliction protocols that they violate every day,” he said.
