Russian Bombers Buzzed US Aircraft Carrier
February 12, 2008
US Navy fighter jets were scrambled to shadow and intercept a Russian bomber which buzzed and circled over an American aircraft carrier over the weekend in a Top Gun-style incident in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.
One Russian Tupolev 95 buzzed the USS Nimitz twice on Saturday, the Associated Press has reported an anonymous source as saying.
The plane flew over the carrier at an altitude of just 600m, similar to the “fly-bys” depicted in the Tom Cruise film. A second Russian bomber circled nearby.
The Russians had been tracked since they took off from Ukrainka and were monitored as they broke off from the rest of their formation and flew into Japanese air space.
The two Tupolevs continued on a course towards the Nimitz and a US guided missile cruiser, USS Princeton.
Four F/A-18 fighter planes were sent to intercept them when they breached an 800km perimeter. Two stayed with the Tupolev circling at altitude about 80km from the Nimitz while two followed the other bomber as it approached the carrier.
The US fighters trailed the Tuoplev as it buzzed the Nimitz. No words were exchanged between the US and Russian pilots throughout the entire incident.
If this is your first time visiting Bible Prophecy In The News, I'd like to invite you to subscribe to our RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
Russian Bomber Violates Japan Airspace
February 9, 2008
Japan has accused Russia of violating its air space and demanded an explanation.
The Russian warplane, a Tupolev strategic bomber, flew over a Japanese island about 650 kilometres south of Tokyo just before dawn.
Japan’s air self-defence forces were alerted and 22 fighter jets were scrambled to deal with the incursion.
The bomber left Japanese air space after just three minutes.
The last time a Russian military aircraft prompted an alert like this was in January 2006. On that occasion, a transport aircraft was spotted in Japanese air space off the northern island of Hokkaido.
After this latest incursion, Japanese officials lodged a protest with the Russian embassy in Tokyo.
Russia Plans Buildup In The Mediterranean
February 6, 2008
Russia has completed a two-week naval exercise in the Mediterranean and plans to re-establish its footprint in the region.
Russian navy commander Admiral Vladimir Vysotsky said his force would establish a presence in areas deemed by Moscow as strategic. Vysotsky said this would include the Mediterranean and the neighboring Atlantic Ocean.
“What is important is that we have arrived [in the Atlantic and the Mediterranean] at a scheduled time and not just that we appeared there,” Vysotsky said on Feb. 3. “We’ll do all we can to build up our presence where Russia has strategic interests.
Putin’s Russia Armed With Oil Menaces West
February 5, 2008
The big question about Russia these days is whether her domestic backsliding and international obstreperousness are transitional or terminal: Is this a bend in the road to democracy or journey’s end?
Edward Lucas, an Economist correspondent who specializes in Russia, gives a pessimistic answer in his book, “The New Cold War: How the Kremlin Menaces Both Russia and the West.”
Russia in his view has embarked on a course of authoritarian, nationalist rule. Antagonistic to open debate and determined to keep Eastern Europe in its sphere of influence, Vladimir Putin’s government retains the old Soviet desire to drive a wedge between Europe and the U.S., Lucas says.
Only the means have changed, he argues: Kremlin leaders today are simply hoping to secure by economic muscle oil and gas what they failed to achieve by ideological exports and military bullying, though there could be some of the latter, too.
Upheaval was of course unavoidable after the fall of Soviet communism. And the craziness under former President Boris Yeltsin — notably how he sold off utilities for derisory sums and enriched the oligarchs — has given freedom a bad name.
But how eager were Russians for the real thing? Lucas says many are comfortable with an old-fashioned, autocratic, chauvinistic regime, complete with a father figure, who in this case presides over a rising standard of living.
Fighter Jets Halt Russian Bombers Entering British Airspace
January 27, 2008
Fighter jets were scrambled to intercept two Russian bombers as they headed for British airspace yesterday.
Tornados and F-16 jets escorted the long-range Tu-160s bombers south towards the Bay of Biscay where Russia is staging its biggest military exercise since the Soviet era.
Their navy is currently test-firing missiles from warships there in a show of strength by President Putin before the presidential election.
The MoD said it was a “routine” response but angry Foreign Secretary David Miliband added: “Russia’s action is reminiscent of the Cold War.”
The incident reflects the rise in tension between the countries after the murder in London of ex-KGB officer Alexander Litvinenko.
Last week the Government was forced to close the British Council offices in Russia after a “campaign of intimidation” against staff.
Russia Bombers To Test Fire Missiles In Atlantic
January 23, 2008
Russia on Tuesday sent two long-range bombers to the Bay of Biscay, off the French and Spanish Atlantic coasts, to test-fire missiles in what it billed as its biggest navy exercise in the area since Soviet times.
British and Norwegian Tornado and F-16 jets were escorting the Russian ‘Blackjack’ bombers, Interfax reported, quoting the Russian Air Force.
However, the French Defence Ministry spokesman said his country had been informed about the Russian exercises.
Firing missiles off the coastline of two members of the NATO military alliance is the latest in a series of Kremlin moves flexing Moscow’s military muscle on the world stage.
The Russian bombers joined aircraft carriers, battleships and submarine hunters from the Northern and Black Sea fleets for the Atlantic exercises, which come as the country enters an election campaign to choose a successor to President Vladimir Putin.
“The air force is taking a very active part in the exercises of the navy’s strike force in the Atlantic,” Russia’s air force said in a statement.
“Today, two strategic Tu-160 bombers departed for exercises in the Bay of Biscay, which … will carry out a number of missions and will conduct tactical missile launches,” it said.
Putin, widely popular as his second four-year term draws to a close, has sought to use such moves to revive domestic and international respect for Russia’s armed forces which were shattered by the chaos of the 1990s.
Russia Could Use Nuclear Weapons as Preventive Measure
January 19, 2008
Russia’s military chief of staff said Saturday that Moscow could use nuclear weapons in preventive strikes in case of a major threat, the latest aggressive remarks from increasingly assertive Russian authorities.
“We have no plans to attack anyone, but we consider it necessary for all our partners in the world community to clearly understand … that to defend the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Russia and its allies, military forces will be used, including preventively, including with the use of nuclear weapons,” Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky said.
The comments from the hawkish Baluyevsky did not appear to mark a policy shift for Russia, whose leaders have stressed the need to maintain a powerful nuclear deterrent and reserved the right to carry out preventive strikes to counter existential threats. But in most of their public remarks about preventive strikes, President Vladimir Putin and other officials have not specifically mentioned the use of nuclear weapons.
Baluyevsky’s remarks came at a time of increasingly strained relations between Moscow and the West, which are at odds over a range of issues and are embroiled in persistent disputes over U.S. plans for missile defense facilities in former Soviet satellite states that have joined NATO as well as alliance members’ refusal to ratify an updated European conventional arms treaty.
Russia To Have 50 Silo-Based Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles By The End of 2008
January 17, 2008
Russia will fully equip a fifth strategic missile regiment with new silo-based intercontinental ballistic missiles in 2008, a spokesman for the Strategic Missile Forces (SMF) said on Thursday.
At present, Russia operates 48 Topol-M systems (NATO reporting name SS-27) and will deploy another two with a missile regiment in the Saratov Region in southern Russia this year, bringing the total number to 50.
“Rearmament of the Tatishchevo missile regiment with two silo-based Topol-M systems will be completed in 2008,” Colonel Alexander Vovk said, adding that each regiment has 10 missile complexes.
The missile, with a range of about 7,000 miles (11,000 kms), is said to be immune to any current and future U.S. ABM defense. It is capable of making evasive maneuvers to avoid a kill by the use of terminal phase interceptors, and carries targeting countermeasures and decoys.
It is also shielded against radiation, electromagnetic pulse, nuclear blasts at distances more than 500 meters (1,650 feet) away, and is designed to survive a hit from any form of laser technology.
Gen. Nikolai Solovtsov, SMF commander, earlier said that Topol-M systems would be equipped with multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (MIRV) in the next two or three years.
RIA Novosti - Russia - Russia to have 50 silo-based Topol-M ICBM systems by end of 2008
Free Press Under Siege In Russia
January 14, 2008
It was the same question at the end of every class.
“Yes, but is there really a free press in Canada?” asked a young Russian student slouched in the front row of my journalism and public policy course at St. Petersburg State University.
“Can Canadian reporters really write what they see?” a young woman asked at the end of a lecture about political reporting.
Each time I said yes, there was a tiny groan and students rolled their eyes. Some things don’t need translation. The concept of a free press seemed as far-fetched to these Russian journalism students as the tooth fairy, or Santa Claus.
When I was invited to teach at the journalism school of St. Petersburg State University as part of a program run by the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada, I knew that things were bad for journalists in Russia, but I did not appreciate quite how bad.
Diana Kachalova, editor-in-chief of a chain of community weeklies in St. Petersburg, helped me understand.
“United Russia is like a tank coming down on the people,” she said, referring to the ruling party.
“I feel like I’m returning to when I was young, in the 1970s.”
In the Soviet era, censorship was simple and complete. An official censor vetted every word and image that appeared in the media. The current system of censorship is more complex, more dangerous and harder to expose.
There was an international outcry when Russian President Vladimir Putin indirectly took control of major television networks several years ago.
There was also an international outcry when a prominent investigative journalist was killed in 2006 and the editor of Forbes (Russia) was killed in 2004.
But many of the constraints on reporters and editors here are not the stuff of dramatic public headlines, they are daily difficulties that make it harder and harder to find and print the truth.
Kachalova said one magazine that ran irreverent photos of officials mysteriously disappeared from every newsstand in the city before it went on sale.
A newspaper that distributes in the subway was warned it would lose its distribution agreement if it is critical of the government.
Russian Plane Violates Finnish Airspace
January 4, 2008
A Russian plane violated Finnish airspace on Wednesday near the coastal town of Porvoo in southern Finland, according to the ministry of defense. The ministry said a Tupolev Tu-154 flew half a kilometre into Finland’s airspace at around 11 in the morning and remained in it for about three minutes.
Reuters reported that Russia denied any airspace violation had taken place although a Russian plane had been close to the Finnish border at the time. The Russian embassy in Helsinki refused to give the Finnish News Agency (STT) a comment, but said that the matter would be thoroughly investigated.
Prophecy In The News Ads
Did God Send A Prophet In The Last Days?
Latest Bible Prophecy In The News Headlines
- 7.8 Earthquake Strikes China
- Israel At 60
- 3rd-graders Asked To Help Classmate In Gender Change
- Ark of the Covenant Altar Found In Sheba’s Palace
- Beijing and Riyadh Will Call The Shots On Ailing Dollar’s Future
- The Threat Mr. Putin Sees
- Blood Moon Eclipses, Signs In The Skies
- Israel at 60: Will Israel Strike Iran Before Bush Leaves Office
- Child Viral Death Toll Up to 34 In China - 25,000 Infections
- Radio Talk Show Host Bernie Ward Admits To Child Porn in Plea Deal
Sections
- A Perilous Planet
- Coming Economic Collapse
- Disease & Pestilence
- Israel Gods Timepiece
- Moral Decay, Iniquity, Love Waxes Cold
- Prophecy In The News Featured Story
- Prophecy News Misc.
- Science and Technology
- Wars, Rumors of Wars & Terrorism
- Watch Russia
- World Religion, Spirituality & Atheism
