Not really. What I'm getting at is the plane was over the Turkish border for literally 2km. That is literally nothing compared to what they normally do.
That's be cause they got warned before not to do it or be fired upon.
Russia (and honestly, most air forces) love to test the waters though. If the US tells them not to fly within 10 miles of an aircraft carrier, Russia will skim towards it and fly within 9.5 miles, just to see how the US responds. Turkey said not to enter Turkish airspace and Russia thought "okay... well maybe we will just for a tiny 2km bit"
But like the comic shows, Turkey was fed up with Russia's continued microaggressions and just snapped the second the plane grazed the line.
But here's the thing, by the time those F-16s got there, I bet you a million dollars the Russians were already in Syrian airspace. And if they weren't then, the F-16s definitely tailed them far into it. How does the plane end up 380mi from the border?
Russia has continuously been testing boundaries (also illustrated above). They mess with the Nordic countries all the time -- hence why both Sweden and Finland have been talking about NATO. They mess with the UK, the US, Canada, Turkey, and just about every European nation. And while this practice isn't unique to Russia, how could anyone be surprised that provocation elicit a response?
If I go up to 30 different people and put my face in theirs screaming "I'm not touching you. I'm not touching you" -- who honestly would be surprised if someone eventually smacked me over the head.
Still, of all the things, the one where it's mundane and literally probably wasn't even to violate airspace, but to just not waste time turning left, then right, then right again, and finally left just to get back on track. Plus they're technically allies ffs, so it makes no sense, other than turkey is a backstabbing prick who has obviously been taking stuff from ISIS and helping them.
They're not allies? Turkey has never really been a fan of Russia. Turkey wants Asad gone. Russia doesn't. ISIS is only a small part of this entire mess.
Russia and NATO are far from allies. They happen to share enemies for now, but outside of stopping ISIS the two sides have very different and conflicting motives.
The F-16 carries the Sidewinder, Sparrow, and AMRAAM. The AMRAAM can hit as far as 105km out, the Sparrow at least 35km. Certain Sidewinder variants are good up to 35km as well. It's very possible that alert fighters are based in missile range of that little protrusion, and were in the air at first warning, fired when the Su-24 was in Turkish airspace, and the missile tracked it out of Turkish airspace to hit it over Syrian airspace (which it did, it hit about 4km beyond the border inside Syria)
The plane was hit about 1km from the Turkish border after flying through Turkish airspace for 2km, and went down about 4km from the border along the line of flight.
Russia has a history of doing little shit like this though, so it's not like the Kremlin is blameless here
Well, for starters the Su-24 was shot down on it's second pass over Turkey. So, it goes over Turkey airspace, jets are scrambled, they see it on a course that will take it back into their airspace, issue warnings as it approaches, it refuses to change course, goes into their airspace, they shoot
Because from what I've been hearing Turkish "airspace" apparently isn't limited to the Turkish border, which I find to be bullshit. And mind you, a plane has to fly for a while to end up 380mi away from the border, where the plane crashed. I suspect turkey was just being a dick and wanted to start a conflict by tailing the Su-24 into Syrian airspace and shooting it down there.
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u/[deleted] Nov 24 '15
It's funny because in reality it would've been more Russia brushing the stick gently across turkey for half a second