Russia expressed interest in using Cuban airfields during patrol missions of its strategic bombers, Russia’s Interfax news agency reported
“There are four or five airfields in Cuba with 4,000-meter-long runways, which absolutely suit us,” Maj. Gen. Anatoly Zhikharev told Interfax.
Zhikharev, who is the chief of staff of the Russian Air Force’s long-range aviation, said, “If the two chiefs of state display such a political will, we are ready to fly there.“
Zhikharev also told Interfax that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has offered a military airfield on La Orchila island as a temporary base for Russian strategic bombers.
“If a relevant political decision is made, this is possible,” he said, according to Interfax. Zhikharev said he visited La Orchila in 2008 and can confirm that with minor reconstruction, the airfield owned by a local naval base can accept fully-loaded Russian strategic bombers.
Annoying. We got Ivan’s point vis a vis the Monroe Doctrine after the Cuban Missile Crisis, so what’s the benefit here? Ivan’s strat bombers, subs, and rocket forces already have the legs to paint the entire US in a lime-green radioactive glow — so why commit your already limited defense resources to an endeavor that will inevitably drive the Pentagon back into the waiting arms of Lockheed, Boeing, NG and their generous inventory of Russian killing weapon systems?
And, just a reminder, the entire Gulf Coast remains a giant kill box, with F/A-18s, F-16s, F-15s, and F-22s based at (deep breath) Tyndall, Eglin, Homestead AFBs, Naval Air Stations Key West and Pensacola, plus the Florida, Louisiana, Alabama, and Texas Air National Guard fighter wings.
If Ivan wants to test our new President, perhaps he should deploy his high-value bombers to an AO where they’re something more than pricey target drones.
–John Noonan
{ 37 comments… read them below or add one }
Probably being done for Russian domestic consumption than for any real strategic worth.
“pricey target drones” I like it!
OH yeah Obama is tomuch of a coward to do anything about it.GOD help us.
You don’t hanger the bombers in Cuba, you have them refuel there after they make a bombing run starting from Russia, going over the pole, and heading down the East Coast and all this after the first volley of ICBMs and SLICBMs.
It won’t be making the bombers more vulnerable, it will give us one more place to account for with our weapons. Same amount of bombs, more targets.
“You don’t hanger the bombers in Cuba, you have them refuel there after they make a bombing run starting from Russia, going over the pole, and heading down the East Coast and all this after the first volley of ICBMs and SLICBMs.”
Really? Russian bombers have the legs for that? Once they bingo, isn’t the plan for them to turn tail and land at their remaining airfields in places like Russia and Belarus?
Do those things still fly? It would be a miracle for one of those to do a complete training mission let alone a real combat sortie.
Hey, if Ivan wants to put a portion of his obsolete strategic assets in a place where they can be destroyed at will by us, using transit routes well inside the engagement envelopes of our LEAST well performing assets–well, let him.
The reply to this should be very simple–the same continuous tracking by fighter aircraft close along side that we did during the Nixon, Ford, Carter, Regan, and Bush I administrations.
This isn’t anything other than flexing muscle for domesting Russian consumption to take the people’s minds off the fact that their economy just went badly off the rails. If they want to put hours on their airframes to no profit, let them.
Good Evening Folks,
I think Drake about has it right. This would seem to be a valanced threat to the missile defense systems proposed for the former Eastern European countries.
I don’t see October 1962 all over again. Cuba under Raul Castro appears to be a more stable place and I think the is a genuine desire on the part of the Cuban Government to have warmer diplomatic relations with the United States.
The 1823 Monroe Doctrine no longer applies, it was over turned by the Plat Amendment in the 1930′s. In reality this is a rather dumb move on the part of the Russians, as John Nooan said in the article the Gulf of Mexico has the heaviest air defense of any place on the planet. The question of nuclear weapons being based in Cuba was cleared up a couple of generations ago.
At this point this threat can be taken as no more then a rather uncreative action out of the Mind of Putin. It’s stupid, its dangerous, it shows an reckless foreign policy that has no apparent purpose, and could lead to political instability with in Russia.
ALLONS,
Byron Skinner
Countries A and B have carefully negotiated a large reduction in strategic weapons through a series of treaties. This was done in a manner such that not only 1. neither side would be placed at a relative disadvantage to the other, but also 2. neither side would PERCEIVE they were at a significant relative disadvantage to the other in the process.
Within the treaty parameters both sides would be motivated to draw down their relative forces to a mix of strategic bombers and land-based ICBMS and submarine-launched ballistic missiles. A force mix would be allowed that could be single-dimensional if desired, a balanced
Anybody ever hear of the Open Sky Treaty? Russian planes fly through our air space now for treaty verification purposes. And you think none of these observers could be armed with a nuke? Bombers landing in Cuba is just another dog & pony show. Ninety-five percent of the shipping containers in our major ports are never inspected. If any nuke ever goes off in this great country, it will be smuggled in at a snail’s pace by terrorists working with Russian proxy countries like Iran or North Korea. That is where the real threat lies and how we react in the first minutes of that scenario will determine whether our enemies decide to “pile on” with the real thing. Japan was supposed to fight on to the very last man if we invaded in WWII. Instead, they surrendered after two nukes. Just how tough is America anymore? Are we as tough as the soldiers of WWII or the citizens of back then? I’m talking about the civilian population here and our elected leaders. Our military is the greatest and most powerful in the history of the world and the most positive force in that world. Putin will continue to rattle sabers and incite us with proxies. It is the KGB way and that leopard has not changed its spots. God Bless our troops and God Bless America.
Of course it’s for domestic consumption only. Still rhetoric matters, and a scathing reaction from the US would be helpful (would also be reported on the .ru portion of the web). It could even refer, obliquely, to the fact that Georgia is as close to the R. borders as Cuba to A.
This post has been linked for the HOT5 Daily 3/15/2009, at The Unreligious Right
I noticed this story is filed under the ‘Planes, Copters, Blimps’ category. Which is a little like filing under ‘M’ for ‘Miscellaneous’.
Given the amount of Russian military activity being reported on this site in recent times perhaps a new category could be started. Maybe one called something really witty like “Rusky Watch” to help create a sort of running log of activites as they happen. To create a better way of compiling the info stored on this site for review later if something big happens down the road…
Execute a basing agreement with Georgia for a fighter wing.
A nit that does nothing to change the main point of the post, but isn’t Homestead a air reserve base now?
I remember driving through that part of Florida after Andrew and being shocked at the level of destruction.
Open Skies.
Under the treaty conditions, the planes are inspected by the country being overflown prior to being permitted to perform their mission. There is a specific limit to the type and characteristics of the equipment carried, and both sides have their own team of experts look at the planes before the OK is given to overfly thier territories.
And I agree: IYAAYAS! LOL!
This is almost funny- how sad are the Russians that this gives them an ego boost?
A factor I haven’t seem mentioned is that Russians LOVE to go to Cuba. The military will fight over those plum assignments. The sun, cigars, mojitos, hookers- lots of thing for a officer to like…
If you really have to ask “what’s going on here?” and are really blind to all the politics between Cuba, Russia and the US, maybe you need a new job.
They’re also looking at Venezuela for equally obvious reasons.
It will be great publicity for both host and guest nations and has nothing to do with bombing the US. But no doubt it will draw the usual knee-jerk reactions (see below) and serve to dive the US further.
Maybe President Obama can talk Moscow out of it…perhaps he should write another letter to Medvedev.
Yeah, we have this situation NOW, when Mr. “Let’s site down and talk” is in charge. I hope he sees this for what it is.
Angela
Backlinks
The Prez is no Punk LOL
It is meant to be a political message rather than an actual military threat.
Un-subtle, but… draw the connection.
ABM’s in Poland = Bombers in Cuba
You withdraw yours and I’ll withdraw mine…!!!
Further to my last, here’s the hyperlink, since it didn’t embed in my post:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090314/ap_on_re_eu/eu_russia_bombers_cuba
Apples to apples, people; Russia’s last economic leg was the fresh oil that they’re currently pumping *way* too fast for any kind of realistic economic strategy to take advantage of. Couple that with the global recession causing the price-per-barrel to crash, and you have a Russia that is flailing in every direction to maintain a regional presence in the face of a growing China.
Obama is nothing but another coward liberal that gets its pants wet when there is a conventional war. Obama’s smart power is nothing but coward power.
Reality, A Change we can’t believe in!
Nobody thinks this may be pay back for Cheney’s great adventures in Georgia and NATO’s moving into the ex-Soviet states?
Pedestrian:
pe?des?tri?an? [puh-des-tree-uhn]
:)) just wish the dump russian do that, because it would suck their already pathetic defense budget to the last dime while they still have lots and lots of others worth spending. A pricey, wasteful PR. Could anyone wake them up from their cold war dream?
It was plenty suspicious that the leak regarding Marine One just happened to occur as the procurement decision was getting made. Of course, we are getting played and a lot of people fully accept it. We will not get into an overt shooting war with Russia or China for the same reason we did not during the Cold War when tensions were much higher and monetary ties much lower: we all have too many nukes to make it worthwhile! We will all continue to play the Great Game, but that is as far as it will go.
The Great Game is as far as it will go… as long as we continue to play. We long ago reached “stalemate” with Russia and China. And we can stay there, as long as we continue to play. But if we make the mistake of assuming the game is over, and we let our guard down, that’s when problems arise.
This is just an empty threat by Russia. Nothing to worry about. Just remember that the game is still on.
TO pedestrian:
The “liberal” Democrats have been the greatest force of military expansion and have shown the greatest use of military force in all of American history. Read a book please. EX: WWII, Vietnam, Korea, the ATOMIC BOMB, bay of pigs, and shamefully: the civil war.
Also, only idiots want war, let alone nuclear war. So all you people can talk trash about negotiation, but it was deal that brought us back from defcon2 and saved maybe the world from the brink of nuclear war. There are thousands of nukes in Russia’s depots and probably more loose ones out there from the fall. MADD is the only thing keeping us safe, so I suggest all you people insulting diplomacy learn to hide under a lead lined desk real soon or shut up. We prepare for war so that we never have one.
The Russians are just handing us an incredible intelligence gathering opportunity. We will be able to observe their strategic aircraft performing takeoffs and landings from all sides as they approach and leave Cuba. We could go so far as to fly through their contrails and see how much sulfur is in the fuel they are burning.
Every equipment malfunction, pilot error, and electronic radiation
Good Morning Sea,
I see your point on have Russian aviation just 90 miles away, but in reality there is little or nothing to be gained by U.S. intelligence by watching Russian military aircraft in Cuba. We have seen and climbed inside these old birds for decades. The only purpose of the Russians doing this is to get the full mooners of the U.S. right wing nuts excited.
It appears that there is another Byron posting here, welcome aboard. To those who want to bi**h at me you will always get my full name.
My personal opinion of Obama, he is rather right wing for me. I neither supported nor voted for him in the last election, I supported and voted for Ralph Nader. Like crazed right wing nut and Republican the term Liberal and Democrat don’t go together.
The last true Liberal President America had was Richard M. Nixon. Anyone who cares to debate that you know where I’m at.
ALLONS,
Byron Skinner
This is indeed a strange plan for the Russians. I dont really see how there is a gain for them to bring some strategic bombers down our way. Suffice it to say I do not really see a benefit to them as much as there is to Mr. Chavez. Personally I do not like how eager he is to house these aircrafts. However if the Reds want us to look up there skirt with such easily available surveillance opportunities so be it.
For those of you who watch the national news programs, be it on broadcast or cable when you start seeing ad space bought by Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, Northrop Grumman… it budget season at the White House. The First one usually out of the chute is the China Lobby, both sides, then comes the drug companies and then the big Defense Contractors.
My personal view is that the U.S. is now a Colony of multinational corporations. The manufacturing base is gone. The defense industry owns the media and the politicians. Deployments are in defense of the profits of the extraction industries. Cheap resources are the goal. American wages have stagnated, unions are busted yet the value of the connected industries are doing quite well.
Its more posturing by Comrade Putin. Cuba should be engaged by diplomacy, it is time for change there. Cuban people are the ones that suffer, the Castro Bros. should be deposed-by thier own people. One day soon, they both will be DEAD.
Tu-22 is a typical anti-aircraft carrier weapon so, it is not surprising that Russia wants to get more airbases all around the World. China has bought also lots of Tu-22s in the hope of controlling the carriers (in the case of a Taiwan crisis for example).