Ben Wallace urges respect for international airspace as presumption grows incident was one-off blunder by Russian pilot
The UK defence secretary, Ben Wallace, accused Russia of acting “unprofessionally” in an incident that led to the downing of a $32m US Reaper drone in the Black Sea after it was harassed by two Russian fighter jets.
The comments, made while the minister was visiting Japan, reflect an emerging western view that the extraordinary mid-air incident was a one-off, not immediately meriting anything stronger than diplomatic complaints.
“The Americans have said they think it was very unprofessional,” Wallace said as he was filmed walking around a defence industry conference. “The key here is that all parties respect international airspace; we urge the Russians to do so.”
It is common for Russian jets to harass western military planes flying over neutral airspace by flying at an unsafe, close distance, but the presumption is that on this occasion, one of Moscow’s pilots miscalculated – and struck a propeller on the Reaper.
The incident took place on Tuesday when two Su-27 Flanker jets buzzed an uncrewed US Reaper drone operating over the Black Sea.
