Turkey Shoots Down Russian Fighter

 

"Turkish fighter jets shot down a Russian warplane near the Syrian border on Tuesday after repeated warnings over air space violations, but Moscow said it could prove the jet had not left Syrian air space.

It was the first time a NATO member's armed forces have downed a Russian or Soviet military aircraft since the 1950s and Russian and Turkish assets fell on fears of an escalation between the former Cold War enemies.

A Kremlin spokesman said it was a "very serious incident" but that it was too early to draw conclusions.

Footage from private Turkish broadcaster Haberturk TV showed the warplane going down in flames in a woodland area, a long plume of smoke trailing behind it. The plane went down in area known by Turks as "Turkmen Mountain", it said.

Separate footage from Turkey's Anadolu Agency showed two pilots parachuting out of the jet before it crashed. A Syrian rebel group sent a video to Reuters that appeared to show one of the pilots immobile and badly wounded on the ground and an official from the group said he was dead."  Reuters 

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Perhaps the time has come to suspend Turkish membership in NATO before Erdogan drags us all into war with Russia.  pl

http://in.reuters.com/article/2015/11/24/mideast-crisis-syria-turkey-idINKBN0TD0P020151124

Comments

[wisedupearly]

Even if Turkey were to be expelled from NATO, could President Obama stand aside and let Russia 'punish' Turkey? I don't think so.

[jld]

For good measure the pilots have been gunned down while parachuting
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPmmtrMJyHs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVJ7Q097gXM

[William R. Cumming]

How exactly do the Russians prove the fighter was in Syrian airspace? Or the Turks in Turkish airspace?

[BostonB]

Turkey is and has been a ardent supporter of ISIS and all Islamic terrorists. First thing Russia must do is pull back going after ISIS, who is bigger threat to the West. Focus solely on going after "rebel" forces, including Turkmen. Go after ALL of their infrastructure, especially near Turkey's border. Apart from that Russia needs to send in cruise missiles and target Turkish military assets in Turkey.

[LondonBob]

Reading around seems the likely Russian response will be:
Kurds just got a very powerful sponsor, no more Turkish bombing raids over Syria and Iraq, will be shot down as soon as they cross the border.
Accelerated military action against Turkish proxies in Syria, no more talk of safe zones.

I would also guess an increased squeeze on Russian-Turkish trade. Russian tourism has gone, building contracts in Russia will at best not be renewed or initiated, Turkey is dependent on Russian and Iranian nat gas etc.

Robust but pragmatic.

Our response, forget about it Erdogan I should hope. Absolute lunatic.

[Abu Sinan]

I am starting to wonder if Turkey's Islamist government has not been sold on the end of times beliefs swirling around in the takfiri community and actually wants to start WW3 to bring the Mahdi and yawm al qiyamah.

[Former 11B]

Our goud buddies the FSA showing their true colors. That pilot alive would have had value, but dead on you tube like that? Those akbar chanting primitives will regret that little display very soon.

[Jim]

I admit to ignorance on exactly how NATO works in a case like this - purely an innocent question: does it make a difference that Turkey was not actively attacked (i.e. if the Russians weren't engaged in combat with Turkish forces at the time)? I thought that the "Didn't all those mutual support treaties help kickstart WWI?" clauses focused on aggression *against* member states, not member states initiating hostilities.

And yes, I know this is very very bad and haggling over wording is not some kind of get out of jail free card. I'm struggling to see why we here in Canada would want to get pulled into this mess simply because we're in NATO. Especially with Russia on our (poorly/sparsely defended) northern border.

[JJackson]

How about a no fly zone? No NATO planes in Syrian air space and a buffer zone inside Turkey's boarder.

This is interesting it is RT footage of field commanders giving Putin a sitrep - with maps (dated Nov 17th). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20pyZbCYxOg

jld, I notice the first of your links is classified as 'comedy'.

[Allen Thomson]

Perhaps it's just as well that the US and Germany recently removed their Patriot batteries from Turkey.

http://www.defensenews.com/story/defense/2015/10/11/us-begins-removing-patriot-missiles-from-turkey/73787688/

[turcopolier]

WRC

US and other satellite reconnaissance will show the exact location of the shootdown. There should be a heat signature when the plane starts to burn and perhaps the location of the parachutes on the ground. Since the pilots were captured and then killed by a Turkmen group operating in Syria is it not appropriate to think this happened in Syria. the same group is demanding that the Syrian government ransom the Russians' dead bodies. pl

[ISL]

WRC:
Russia has been willing to declassify satellite data in the past (aka MH17), I would imagine this falls in that category.

Or they could use social media...

Would be interesting if Russia was to extend its S400 to cover say a narrow border strip including Turkish airspace.

[Patrick Bahzad]

This is indeed a very serious incident. No doubt, Turkey was unhappy about Russian action against Turkmen rebel groups in the 'Jabal Turkman' mountain range, just South of the Turkish border in Syria's Latakia province.

R+6 has been carrying out offensive action in the region for several days now and are slowly closing the border areas and rebels supply routes in the region. Additionally, France has been trying lately to bridge gaps with Russia over action against ISIS and any rapprochement would weaken those in Turkey (and in the US) who are opposed to a large international coalition both the Western and GCC coalition and R+6.

If someone wanted to 'sabotage' an attempt at bringing everybody together over Syria, they wouldn't do it otherwise. Now NATO faces a dilemma and compromise with Russia over the fight against ISIS seems less likely. Hollande is meeting Obama today and was supposed to meet Putin the day after tomorrow in an effort to mend fences. I wonder what is going to happen now.

I'm not sure those "experts" who predict Russia will do anything in retaliation have a clue about how serious this is. I've also checked flight tracking of the alleged breach of Turkish airspace. If anything it was very short and could be linked to mistake. This was not a aggression against Turkey, whose reaction is very very very out of proportion ...

Finally, the two pilots seem to have been gunned down as they were parachuting inside Syria (which strengthens the point about the border breach). Some people are playing with fire here ...

[Ishmael Zechariah]

All,
Turkish press is reporting the downing of a Russian helicopter in the area as well.
Things may get interesting soon. Incirlik is on high alert.
Ishmael Zechariah
p.s. My heartiest congratulations to those who supported "tayyip-the-democrat's" ascension to power.

[Origin]

Col,

"Since the pilots were captured and then killed by a Turkmen group operating in Syria is it not appropriate to think this happened in Syria."

Did you mean Turkey?

[Tyler]

Wonder if this ends with Russia reclaiming Constantinople.

[Balint Somkuti]

I wonder whether this was a deliberate action to derail a Russian-French/EU/ cooperation against ISIS?

Or a message before the russian FM Lavrov to Turkey tomorrow?

Anyway in my humble opnion the escalation of the ME crisis have begun. WW3 raises its ugly head in the background. We will be lucky if it is Cold War 2 only.

[shaun]

Link to Choppper story

http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/621677/Reports-Russian-helicopter-shot-down-while-searching-downed-jets

[Stueeeeeeeee]

Would the Turks shoot down the Russian warplane without consulting us? I imagine there must have been conversations regarding air space violations.

[robt willmann]

WRC, pl,

Russia may also have placed transmitters and receivers in Syria to monitor the location of their airplanes as well as to communicate with them. Plus types of radar.

As an aside, a friend told me some years ago that Russian planes used a 400 degree compass rather than a 360 degree one. I do not know if that is true, but it would make calculations easier.

[A. Pols]

It would appear the Russian plane MIGHT possibly have conducted a transient technical border violation at most, probably while turning. while the Turkish response (assuming it was sponsored and not an independent initiative of the pilot) is assuredly not in the same category. The fact the pilots were executed in Syrian space suggests it couldn't have been otherwise. The truth will out. The pilots ejected in Syrian airspace in all likelyhood.If they did not and the jihadist videos were shot in Turkey, then we have another problem.
Absent a Turkish mea culpa and promises for the future, this will cause problems for them going forward.
Allowing Turkey to join NATO was always a mistake. If I rented my basement apartment to a drug dealer and he got busted, my house could be subject to "civil forfeiture". Mutual defense pacts with Erdogan are a serious liability, but of course when they joined NATO it was always intended as a thumb in Russia's eye.
"Games without frontiers"...

[LondonBob]

Once again we can give thanks that the Russian President is a very cool and pragmatic individual, Erdogan on the other hand...

[Kunuri]

And start WWIII?

[eakens]

Frankly, it doesn't matter if they were in Turkish airspace or not given what Russia is doing in Syria. But of course, by shooting down this plane, it pretty much cements who those 500-1000 oil tankers that were shot down last week belonged to.

[Kunuri]

Been saying that here for a long time, in so many words. Everybody should start seeing this guy for what he is, ridiculous that he had statesman face time during the last G20 summit. The shoot down was absolutely unnecessary.