The U.S. military on Tuesday labeled as an “incursion” the Russian fighter jet that was shot down by Turkish aircraft over the Syria-Turkey border.
Army Col. Steve Warren, the top military spokesman in Baghdad, confirmed the Turk’s version of events in saying they repeatedly warned the two Russian SU-24 pilots to back off.
Turkey and Russia have longstanding hostilities. Russian invasion of Turkey during World War I led to Armenian collaboration with the invaders, and this was the excuse for the Armenian genocide (not that Muslims need much reason to behead Christians). Turkey being a member of NATO, this leads to an emergency meeting:
Brussels (AFP) - NATO allies will hold an "extraordinary" meeting Tuesday at Ankara's request to discuss Turkey's shooting down of a Russian fighter jet along the Syrian border, an alliance official said."At the request of Turkey, the North Atlantic Council will hold an extraordinary meeting at (1600 GMT). The aim of this extraordinary NAC is for Turkey to inform Allies about the downing of a Russian airplane," the official told AFP.
I am sure Obama is going to spin this as either a need for Russia to disengage, or as an excuse to not fight ISIS:
President Obama said the shoot-down “points to an ongoing problem with the Russian operations” in Syria, including attacks against moderate Syrian opposition groups near the Turkish border.
The Russian fighter was attacking anti-Assad ethnic Turk rebels, who live in Syria but want to annex their ethnic area to Turkey.
ReplyDeleteNot ISIS.