"Dashing" Russian military pilots look clearly redundant
Numerous incidents with the rapprochement of Russian and American aircraft and ships seem to have come to an end. At least, there are signs that the highest military-political leadership of the country gave the Armed Forces a direct order to no longer allow incidents similar to the famous case of the overflight of the American destroyer Donald Cook. Why was this decision made?The Kremlin’s statement on Friday about how Vladimir Putin relates to incidents between Russian and NATO aircraft and ships is so curious that it requires separate reflection.
Recall, presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov did not confirm and did not refute the information that the Russian leader allegedly “laid siege” to the meeting’s participant for “confrontational” words about the incident in the Black Sea, RIA reports.News". According to him, Vladimir Putin is not a supporter of heightening the tension of the international situation and is in favor of following the provisions of international law documents in order to avoid dangerous incidents.
“The closed meetings are held in order to exchange views on the most topical issues in a free mode, so I can neither confirm nor deny this information,” said Peskov. And its non-repudiation looks like a clear signal to the military. According to Bloomberg, Putin called the "high risk" incident when Russian military aircraft flew in close proximity to an American ship in the Black Sea. During the meeting, according to the agency, some of its participants said that the Americans "deserved it." In response, Putin asked: "Are you out of your mind?"
We are talking about overflights of the Russian sea and coastal aviation American warships in the Black and Baltic Seas, primarily about two cases with the long-suffering destroyer Donald Cook, which caused an extraordinary resonance. The American side accused Moscow of violating the provisions of international law of the sea, and a wave of cheer-patriotic emotions arose on the Russian Internet. Then, in the spring of 2016, the position of the Kremlin, voiced by Dmitry Peskov, was much more categorical. Dmitry Peskov then said that he "tends to identify with the explanations that were provided by representatives of the Ministry of Defense." Despite the general similar tone, then it looked like support for the actions of sea pilots, the current comments seriously change the general background.
International maritime law is one of the oldest legal systems regulating legal relations, including between the military fleets non-belligerent states. But precisely because of its antiquity, lacunae constantly appear in it, which need to be filled in the course of the development of technical means and the changing international situation. At the same time, the military component is regulated by civil law - except in cases of open hostilities.
But since 1939, mankind does not remember the “official declaration” of war by one state to another, when an official note is sent through diplomatic channels, embassies are sent and countries are very gentlemenly “go to you”. Even the Argentine-British 1982 war of the Falklands in fact was undeclared, and the legal regime of the sea was regulated by very dubious unilateral acts. For example, London simply declared the two-hundred-mile zone around the islands a “war zone” and “recommended” to foreign ships not to go there. All this did not prevent the British submarine “Conqueror” from sinking the Argentine cruiser “General Belgrano” outside the two-hundred-mile zone, motivating it with “the right moment” and “danger to the British fleet”. The 323 of an Argentine sailor died - roughly half of all Argentine casualties of that war. In fact, the declaration itself of this two-hundred-mile zone was already a violation of international legal norms for conducting military operations at sea, and the sinking of “General Belgrano” was the only one stories attack by a nuclear submarine surface ship - and does a war crime. But Argentina was denied an international court "for the expiration of the statute of limitations."
As a result, existing maritime law is constantly subject to adjustments, mainly through bilateral or multilateral agreements, which seem to be taken as a precedent, based on the Anglo-Saxon interpretation, but ignored by those countries that did not sign these documents. Soviet Union in 70-x and the beginning of 80-ies (and these documents are still in force, in Russia’s succession to the Soviet international agreements) with the United States, Great Britain, Germany, Italy, France, Canada and Greece (the latter is not here for wit, and as one of the largest owners of the merchant fleet in the world) “on the prevention of incidents outside of territorial waters”. These agreements require warships to parties to the agreements in all cases to be far enough apart from each other to avoid the risk of collisions, they oblige warships and aircraft not to undertake imitations of attacks or imitations of use weapons, not to conduct maneuvers in areas of intensive navigation, as well as to prevent some other actions that could lead to incidents at sea and in the airspace above it.
The key phrase in this document is “at a sufficient distance”. The texts of the treaties (at least in their open articles) do not indicate specific distances in miles and heights in meters that are no longer “sufficient”. Article IV of the Agreement between the USSR and the United States on the prevention of incidents in the open sea and the airspace above it is as follows: “The commanders of the crews of each Party’s aircraft must exercise the greatest caution and prudence when approaching the aircraft of the other Party operating over the open sea and the ships of the other Party in the open sea, in particular to ships engaged in the release or reception of aircraft, and in the interests of mutual security should not allow: imitation of attacks by simulating the use of weapons on aircraft , any ships, performing various aerobatic figures over the ships and dropping various objects near them in such a way that they represent a danger to the ships or a hindrance to navigation ”.
It is worth adding in brackets that the most important document for Soviet military pilots — the Manual on Combat Service — spelled out specific values, the closer of which it was forbidden to approach NATO ships, both in distance and height.
Maritime law is largely based on common sense, as opposed to, say, tax. The captain of the vessel and the commander of the aircraft crew, in theory, he himself must understand that "enough" to "avoid the risk of collisions," and what is no longer, that is, according to the contract, "exercise the greatest caution and prudence." But at the same time, the rejection of “imitating attacks or imitating the use of weapons” is a very specific concept.
The American side just accused the Russian Air Force of “imitating attacks”, and John Kerry after the second incident with the same “Donald Cook” (already in the Baltic Sea - an unhappy ship) suddenly started talking about the “rules of hostilities”, although no war on Baltic is not. “We condemn this behavior. This is reckless, provocative, it is dangerous. In accordance with the rules of engagement, they (Russian planes) could have been shot down, ”said Kerry, adding that the United States would not allow“ intimidation at sea ”and recalled that the Russian side was informed of the US position on the danger of such actions. The Russian side in the face of anonymous sources in the army and navy appealed to the pseudo-patriotic feelings: "there is nothing to swim here", "stay at home", "they drove our urban ones".
But the history of overflights of Western warships from this has not ceased to be very practical and legal, although it threatened to turn into an ideological campaign. On the Internet, a hurray-patriotic wave began. Some sofa craftsmen even ordered a commemorative “Peace Lessons Lesson” token with the image of Su-24 flying over an American destroyer with the inscription: “Grozen, but Disarmed”, which is sold on the Internet for 1000 rubles. You can order any token at the Mint, it is not prohibited by law, but it will not belong to the official list of government awards and this initiative is in no way connected with the MO Prize department.
But one thing is a “couch” reaction, and another is when these actions were at the level of emotions supported by part of senior and senior officers of land origin. A former high-ranking officer of the Russian Air Force, who had a direct connection with naval aviation, commented to the newspaper VIEW on the possible reaction of the president like this. If our pilots not only do not comply with international rules for overflight of foreign warships, putting themselves at risk, and they even boast about it, it is not far from trouble. Under international law, Americans have every right to bring down these cowboys. People will die, and the situation will heat up to the limit. Get out of the situation will not commanders, and already diplomats and politicians. And how events will develop after such an incident in general - only God knows. And the fact that the Americans themselves violate all agreements on the law of the sea will no longer worry anyone. The Russian side will definitely be to blame for the specific episode, and in an environment where decisions are made very quickly, you can even sink this “Donald Cook” with coastal funds, answering two hundred in two deaths. And there and close to World War II.
As the high-ranking officer told the newspaper VIEW, when one of the land commanders was told about the recklessness of the pilots on the Baltic Sea, he actually sanctioned all of this on emotions: type, well done, drive them further. The tanker does not have to be familiar with the international maritime law and the details of such actions, which does not relieve him of responsibility if something goes wrong. And this is not a textbook conflict between the infantry and aviation, but an attack of hurray-patriotism, which has passed the line of reasonable.
Let's talk about the practical feasibility of such shares. If anyone has forgotten, then we don’t live in the 1941 year, and for a long time the bomber doesn’t have to be directly above the enemy ship. Tactical launch of anti-ship missiles is carried out from a distance of tens to hundreds of kilometers to the target. Tactical strike imitation is a permanent element of coastal aviation training in all fleets. Moreover, such training can be carried out even without a missile suspension - electronics allows you to track the data of the simulation start. And the Black and Baltic seas are puddles, even massive use of aviation is not required there, modern coastal defense systems are enough.
“To practice attack techniques” by “sushka” forces is at least strange. The attempt, like in World War II, to attack a rocket destroyer of the Orly Burk class with free-fall bombs and cannons is an amazing idea. In a combat situation, a single plane was shot down immediately; in principle, it cannot be any serious threat. And the stories about the fact that the electronic systems of “Donald Cook” were allegedly suppressed by the Russian EW (specifically, the Khibiny), initially did not withstand any criticism. “Khibiny” were created exclusively for Su-34 and are incompatible with Su-24 avionics. The jamming does not “dampen” the radar and does not make the plane invisible, but rather the opposite - it demonstrates its presence.
Overcome "Donald Cook" "drying" engaged in reconnaissance, not imitation of impact. They apparently received such combat missions, and this is a completely different story. On the one hand, it seems to take them away from the provisions of international agreements to prevent the imitation of an attack, but it “sums up” another article: “performing aerobatic figures on ships”, which is no better and does not eliminate responsibility.
In former times, the recklessness of naval intelligence officers was partly due to the imperfection of equipment. Such a reconnaissance at one of the aviation forums was very vividly described by the former military pilot of the Baltic Fleet, who flew just to Su-24, Igor Larkov: “Colonel Yegoshin, the intelligence chief (gave the order) ... You are a scout, you bring me a photo of their newest weapon what are you scout After such instructions and the words “I believe in you”, you will begin to fly in reverse with the reverse ... So it was tricky if Colonel Yegoshin ordered a new air defense system to be stolen from them. And they did it! ”In Soviet times, filming was generally made by almost two-handed cameras by the pilots themselves, and this technique required an approximation of the minimum distance, because the authorities demanded close-ups, rather than the blurred outlines of something unidentified. But if there came a note of protest about a “dangerous approach”, then the real distance of the image was calculated from the photograph, and the pilot was ruthlessly reprimanded and even removed from office.
But the presence of modern reconnaissance technology does not require anything like this from pilots today. That is, in fact, all such overflights by Russian aircraft of NATO ships are reduced to recklessness, bravado and emotional overheating, created by misunderstood ultrapatriotism. The pilots themselves do not understand where the verge of "manifestation of aggression" is, and in our circumstances it is difficult to blame them. And if we trace the history of such tragic sea episodes from the Soviet time, then they were all mixed up on something similar. And when this nervous atmosphere is accelerated by the command, or simply by emotions, or by ultimatum demands for results at any cost, it only gets worse.
A very characteristic story happened in May 1968. A large group of American ships headed by the Essex aircraft carrier entered the exercise. By tradition, all movements of large aircraft carriers were to be monitored by Northern Fleet aircraft. But the Essex group was in the Norwegian Sea, that is, far from the usual tracking areas. The destroyer “Steregushchy” went out to meet the American carrier group, which was to be guided by the aircraft of the Northern Fleet. But on May 25 they lost the aircraft carrier group, that is, they did not fulfill the assigned combat mission, which threatened trouble. The commander of the fleet aviation demanded an urgent search for an aircraft carrier.
Far from everyone could have organized the search, since air refueling was required (the Norwegian Sea was not a zone of operations for Soviet aviation at all, but the command required finding an aircraft carrier even outside the zone of responsibility), and at the end of the 60's, it was the piece crews that knew how. The first of them returned with nothing, and the squadron commander, Lieutenant Colonel of Naval Aviation Alexander Pliev, who was on vacation at that moment, did not manage to leave Severomorsk, returned to the task.
Alexander Z. Pliev, a native of the village of Vakhtana in South Ossetia, was famous for risky maneuvers. First of all, flying at ultra-low altitudes, which was justified by the departure from enemy radar. According to eyewitnesses, on returning to the base, white streaks from salt water were often visible on his plane. In those days, the radar was thin, and the tactic of ultra-small flights was not worked out. So, Pliev's experiments were “innovation” and were secretly encouraged by the naval aviation command, although they violated all instructions.
Pliev’s crew (and the second Tu-16, commanded by Popov) quickly discovered the Essex. According to the vice-admiral, and then the commander of the destroyer “Steregushchy” Dymov, he received the coordinates of the aircraft carrier group after a few hours and went towards a rapprochement. After that, nothing more was required of Pliev's “two”. He was supposed to turn around and go to the base, but suddenly he gave the order to Popov’s slave crew to rise to a great height — and he himself began approaching the Essex at ultra-low altitude. Lieutenant Colonel Pliev decided to make his discovery of the American aircraft carrier group demonstrative, although no such task was assigned to him.
A huge 35-meter bomber sweeps over the deck of an aircraft carrier at a speed of 500 km / h at an altitude of about 15 meters (Americans record it on videotape). Further, according to the American version, when leaving the Tu-16 maneuver, it touches the water with a wing and falls into the sea. Pliev's crew — seven people — is killed on the spot. Later, a version appeared that the bomber could have been shot down by the air defense of one of the Essex escort ships, which were either reinsured or lost their nerves. But the then commander of this regiment of reconnaissance aviation of the Northern Fleet Dudarenko and his fellow soldiers testified: “A. Z. Pliev was undoubtedly a good, even a very good pilot. But, unfortunately, prone to recklessness ... Flying at extremely low altitudes is common for scouts. But Pliev had his own “handwriting” - unnecessarily long flights at extremely low altitudes, which required a lot of pressure from the pilot. ” “The most pernicious is that when the course changed, the height did not change, although it was necessary to gain some height when turning the plane so that when it tilts, it does not catch the water with the wing. Sooner or later, the slightest mistake could lead to death. And she led. " The wreckage of the Tu-16 lie at inaccessible depth, and it will not be possible to definitively establish the truth.
The Americans behaved very gentlemanly. The bodies of the pilots were raised from the water and with full honors handed over to the Soviet side. The destroyer "Conscious" got on board the aircraft carrier "Essex" - a unique case in the history of confrontation between the Soviet and American military fleets. Four American fighter jets flew over the "Conscious", and was given a salute. Lieutenant Colonel Pliev was first buried in Severomorsk, but then, at the request of his relatives, he was reburied in the Zguder cemetery near Tskhinval.
This case is far from being a single one, it is simply extremely indicative. In 1964 and 1980, two Tu-16 disappeared in the Sea of Japan immediately after they discovered the American aircraft carrier and the Japanese squadron. In 1973, another Tu-16 was damaged by an F-4 fighter jet that took off from the John F. Kennedy aircraft carrier. Only by luck, the Soviet aircraft did not crash and returned to the base.
If the Supreme Commander now really had to harshly stop such maneuvers of the Russian Air Force, then this does not mean at all some kind of “retreat” or notorious Internet “putinsley”. Normal common sense has not been canceled. Pilots strive to do better - or how they understand this “better”. There are really more questions for fathers-commanders, who, by definition, must understand not only tactical schemes, but also the whole range of problems, including international law and the strategic environment. It is not without reason that naval officers, and especially naval aviation officers, were always considered to be multi-skilled specialists with a lot of humanitarian knowledge that went beyond the traditionally narrow military education. And without fail, this understanding of the international situation should prevail over the emotional impulses inherent in Internet communities rather than people on the first line of confrontation.
A new cold war has come to a dangerous point. The supreme commander just demands to stop. It is possible that a new negotiation on the concretization of agreements on the avoidance of incidents at sea could be a way out of the deadlock in international maritime law. And the process of these negotiations itself could serve as a basis for the resumption of interaction between the Russian Federation and the United States, if only on the issue of the law of the sea.
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