Russian Jet Fighters Intercept Massive U.S. Bombers Over the Baltic Sea

After two United States strategic bombers flew in the direction of the Russian border, the Russian Ministry of Defense reported that Russian Su-35 combat planes were reportedly scrambled over the Baltic Sea to intercept them forcing them to move away from Russian territory.

Following the diplomatic uproar that was caused by the downing of a U.S. surveillance drone in the Black Sea by two Russian Su-27 fighter jets the previous week, the two countries had their first known direct military contact since Russia invaded Ukraine in February of last year.

Monday’s encounter was the first known known direct military contact between the two countries since Russia invaded Ukraine.

According to the state-owned Russian news outlet TASS, the National Defense Control Centre of the Russian Ministry of Defense allegedly determined that the two planes belonging to the United States and allegedly intercepted close to Russian airspace were giant B-52H strategic bombers, which are known to be nuclear capable.

Meanwhile, the two Russian jet pilots who were engaged in the downing of the United States MQ-9 Reaper surveillance drone that ended up crashing into the Black Sea a week ago were honored by the Russian government on Friday.

Sergei Shoigu, Russia’s Minister of Defense, congratulated the pilots of the Su-27 jet fighters on their success in preventing the drone from flying into a region close to Crimea to which Moscow has restricted access.

He said so while presenting the honors to the pilots of the jet fighters.

Moscow has accused the United States of gathering intelligence during surveillance aircraft and then providing that information to Ukraine so that it might attack Russian targets.

Moscow has also accused the United States of inciting the drone incident by disregarding flying limitations established to defend Russian land.

The United States has stated that it is unknown whether the Russian pilots intentionally caused the drone to crash or whether their risky maneuvers around the spy aircraft were the cause of the crash.

This appears to be an attempt by the Biden to de-escalate the situation following the loss of the multimillion-dollar drone.

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