Poland set for Baltic air patrols

BBC News ^ | 30 December 2005 | Adam Easton

[lizol]

Poland set for Baltic air patrols

By Adam Easton BBC correspondent in Warsaw

Poland has become the first former Warsaw Pact country to take responsibility for patrolling the air space of the three Baltic states.

Polish pilots took over the rotating Nato mission from the US at a ceremony in northern Lithuania. Seventy Polish air force personnel will serve there.

Poland joined Nato six years ago and it is the first time its pilots will patrol air space bordering Russia.

Four Russian-made MiG-29 jets will be flown during the three-month mission.

The planes have been specially upgraded by Nato to meet the alliance's standards.

Nato member states have taken it in turns to patrol the Baltic skies since the three nations joined the alliance in March last year.

But it is the first time a former Warsaw Pact member has taken over the job and it has caused fears here that the Russians may take advantage of it to test the Polish pilots' skills.

Relations between the two countries are at their worst in years following Poland's support of the Orange Revolution in Ukraine.

In September, a Russian fighter breached Lithuania's air space during Germany's watch and eventually crashed.

Earlier this week one newspaper in Warsaw printed a large picture of the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, on its front page and asked "is confrontation imminent"?

The MiG-29 is used widely across the former Soviet bloc

[lizol]

Yep, definitely.

Like the sun rises in the east.

I'll bookmark it too, we're going to need this reference pretty soon probably.

[68skylark]

If Russia is going act aggressively toward these air patrols, then I hope the the US and UK and other NATO countries are ready to lend assistance. Russia doesn't want to tangle with all of us together.

[kaiser80]

You got that right! Hope our fighters and airmen will do the job!

[lizol]

Not even that. They don't have to act agresively (I mean actively).

It will be enough, if Russian plane violates the air space of - let's say - Estonia, and then doesn't follow the commands of Polish pilots, who will intercept him.

I'm not a military guy, but my impression is, that in such a case Polish pilots should do the thing, that they were trained to.

If they do - then Russians will come lamenting about "agressive, irresponsible Poles", destroying mutual relations and blah, blah, blah, like that.

If they don't - then Russian will take a p**s at NATO and Polish air protection.


Poland took the task of protecting the Batlics' sky from the hands (wings?) of USAF.

The Russians wouldn't dare to perform such a provocation against US.
But Poland? What Poland means for Vladimir "the Great"?

Remember my words.

[kaiser80]

Poland took the task of protecting the Batlics' sky from the hands (wings?) of USAF.

I think we took it from the hands of Luftwaffe. Luftwaffe took it from USAF. I'm 90% sure of that.

[lizol]

Rely on the 10 % :-)))

Poland will replace a US team in providing air defense over the Baltic states. It is the first time that an ex- soviet satellite country will patrol airspace in the Baltic region.

[68skylark]

Well, you may be right when you speculate that Russia will try to provoke a reaction.

Whatever happens, I'm sure the Polish pilots will act in the appropriate way.

Russia may try to create in incident out of any action that the Poles take -- we can't stop them from saying what they want. But I doubt that anyone takes their statements very seriously, even their own people.

[lizol]

It's mentioned even in the thread article above.

[GarySpFc]

In September, a Russian fighter breached Lithuania's air space during Germany's watch and eventually crashed.

Any idiot should be able to see this violation of Lithuania's air space was unintentional. That said, I can see the Polish pilot shooting down a Russian plane now out of revenge.

[Matrix33]

Shooting down Su27 would be extremely difficult. Although Russian pilots lacks training nowadays (what was indirect reason of Lithuanian affair) Russian planes are far more advanced than polish MIGs, and Mig 29 old avionics can be easily disabled by Russian electronic warfare.

[Michael81Dus]

No, the USAF succeeded the Luftwaffe, and now it´s your turn. Have fun! :-)

[Tommyjo]

No. The Polish MiG-29s deployed will probably be the ex-Luftwaffe full-NATO compatible variant. Russian military are allowed to transit Baltic nation airspace under agreement. This allows them to deploy to Kaliningrad Special Defense Region.

Any aircraft of this class would be able to shoot down each other. There is no magic button to defeat an opponent. For example the MiG-29 can purely use its infra-red search and track seeker to cue its missiles. No need to use radar.

Anyway the aircraft are there to escort and shadow airspace violaters - not shoot them down. NATO is not going to order the shootdown just because an aircraft simply strays. Think events after 9/11. The quick reaction alert is still very much in force in NATO countries for this very reason.

[lizol]

Any idiot should be able to see this violation of Lithuania's air space was unintentional.

Sure it was, everything Russia does, it does it unintentionally.


We'll see a significant increase of such "unintentional" violations during following months, when Poland is in charge of protecting the Baltics' airspace.

BTW -it was really kind of you to use personal insults, like "idiot".
Just like a true Christian, teaching everybody around about love and hatred should. (sarcasm)

[lizol]

But they have new avionics, adjusted to NATO standards.

[GarySpFc]

Yeah, lizol, the pilot crashed his plane intentinally too.

[kaiser80]

Ok, I stand corrected. Damn, could have sworn I'm right...Well, looks like too many of my brain cells died during past few days ;)

[Grzegorz 246]

Almost all of their SU-27s were produced in 80's and are not much better than MiG-29s.

[Grzegorz 246]

No, they only changed a few details.