 The Russians call them White Swans. NATO calls them Blackjacks. Pic: Sergei Karpukhin
September 25, 2008 10:54 AM
By Dmitry Solovyov
ENGELS, Russia - Lieutenant-Colonel Alexander Khabarov looks tired but surprisingly chipper for a man who has just piloted a nuclear-capable bomber jet on a 12-hour flight "somewhere over the Atlantic."
He makes a post-flight inspection of his Tu-160 bomber and then reflects on the deadly payload he may one day be ordered to launch. "Pilots have a toast: 'May our efficiency, knowledge, skills and performance capabilities never be used'," he said.
Khabarov and his bomber squadron are the frontline troops in a campaign the Kremlin has been waging to project its newfound confidence into parts of the world where, since the collapse of the Soviet Union, Washington has had unrivalled military dominance.
Two Tu-160 jets, known to Russian pilots as "White Swans" flew this month from this base on the Volga river to Venezuela, a mission calculated to show Russia was not afraid to flex its military muscles right under the nose of the United States.
That mission capped a 12-month period when Russian bombers resumed the Soviet-era practice of flying long-range patrols over the Atlantic, the North Pole and even Alaska - often shadowed by NATO fighter jets wary of the visitors' intentions.
Military analysts disagree about what Russia is trying to achieve with the flights.
Some argue they are a threat to the security of Western
states, others that they are just chest-thumping by a
Kremlin anxious to please voters at home. Russian pilots,
with tongues in cheek, call them friendship missions.
But what is clear is that the flights demonstrate the Russian
bomber fleet - for many years a laughing stock which
grounded its pilots for weeks at a time because there
was no money for fuel - is once again a force to be reckoned with.
The long-range flights are "both a symbolic show of might
and good will," said Colonel Dmitry Kostyunin, deputy
commander of the 22nd Air Division which has its base in
Engels.
WHITE SWANS
Russia is usually wary of letting foreigners close to its military.
In what may be a sign of its new-found confidence, the air
force invited a group of foreign journalists to visit the base
at Engels in early August.
The visit took place a day before Russia's military mounted
a massive counter-attack to defeat an attempt by Georgia
to retake a separatist region - showing the world in the
process the Kremlin will be resolute in defence of its interests.
About a dozen Tu-160 bombers, codenamed "Blackjacks" by
NATO, stood near the vast runways, which were ringed by a
concrete fence and checkpoints.
Brought into service in 1987 and since modernised, the Tu-160
is the world's largest supersonic bomber, capable of carrying
over 40 tonnes of conventional or nuclear munitions and with
a range of up to 14,000km.
With refueling in the air, that enables the Tu-160 to reach
virtually any point on the globe and return safely.
Nearby stood a dozen Tu-95MS "Bear" turboprop nuclear-
capable bombers. At the other end of the sprawling airfield
was a group of Tu-22M3 "Backfire" supersonic bombers -
the same type as one that was shot down over Georgia.
In a display laid on for the visiting television cameras, a pair
of Tu-160s flew low over the ground with a deafening roar
from their turbofan engines.
FLYING HOURS
Colonel Kostyunin said things started to change for the better
in August 2005 when Vladimir Putin, who at the time was
Russian president and is now prime minister, took a flight on
board a Tu-160 and test-fired a missile.
"After that symbolic event, the role of strategic aviation
was considerably revised," Kostyunin told reporters in the
room where pilots are briefed before heading off on their missions.
"Some of our pilots now spend 100 hours and even more -
up to 200 hours - in the air annually. But we still have a long
way to go, because our US colleagues fly up to 250 hours."
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