[MilCom] U.S allies scramble jets almost daily to repel Russian incursions

[ric5]

U.S allies scramble jets almost daily to repel Russian incursions...

Moscow's military provocations signal return to Cold War-era gamesmanship

By Guy Taylor and Maggie Ybarra - The Washington Times - Thursday, October
23, 2014

Russian military provocations have increased so much over the seven months
since Moscow annexed Crimea from Ukraine that Washington and its allies are
scrambling defense assets on a nearly daily basis in response to air, sea
and land incursions by Vladimir Putin's forces.
Not only is Moscow continuing to foment unrest in Eastern Ukraine, U.S.
officials and regional security experts say Russian fighter jets are testing
U.S. reaction times over Alaska and Japan's ability to scramble planes over
its northern islands - all while haunting Sweden's navy and antagonizing
Estonia's tiny national security force.
The White House months ago leveled economic sanctions on several Russian
businesses and political players, and recent weeks have seen President Obama
intensify his rhetoric toward Moscow. But many in Washington's national
security community say the response is simply not firm enough and that, as a
result, Mr. Putin actually feels emboldened to push the envelope - Cold
War-style.

 "What's going on is a radical escalation of aggressive Russian muscle
flexing and posturing designed to demonstrate that Russia is no longer a
defeated power of the Cold War era," says Ariel Cohen, who heads the Center
for Energy, National Resources and Geopolitics at the Institute for the
Analysis of Global Security in Washington.

"The more we retreat, the more we are encouraging Russia to behave in a more
aggressive way," Mr. Cohen said. "We need to be engaging more deeply with
our Central Asian allies, but instead we are in the process of abandoning
turf to Russia, and it's wrong - it's against our interests geopolitically
to let Russia feel that they all of a sudden have won all the turf without
firing a shot."
The Obama administration resists such characterizations, asserting that the
White House is doing anything but "retreating."


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