(11-25-2015, 09:44 PM)Erik Mynhier Wrote: According to reports the Russians were in Turkish airspace for 17 seconds. As somone who use to push buttons and make things go boom, that is really a fast reaction even with ten warnings. Instant no restraints firing after the tenth and final warning is usually only for war time enemies.
And that said the Russians with ten warnings, at cruse speed had a good 4-7 minutes to change course (warnings start at 10 minutes out and are repeated every minute). At the look of the geography of that part of Turkey, the jets would have need 3 minutes to adjust course.
As for all this both sides had more then enough room to avoid this drama. Feels like they want this fight, which sucks for us. All Turkey has to do is invoke their NATO privilege and we are off to the races. Hotheads with intertwined alliances is where World Wars come from kids.
Maybe, maybe not. The thing is, Russia's been pulling shit like this all year long. They were messing around in other people's territorial waters all last spring and summer, and no one really did anything about it (and Russia just kind of laughed when various countries protested the Russians using their waters). Turkey apparently has repeatedly tried diplomacy to make Russia stop violating their airspace, and Russia has repeatedly kept doing it. Turkey even explicitly told Russia that the next violation would be met with force, and Russia did it anyway. So, I mean, I don't know what else Turkey was supposed to do. Maybe they're not in the habit of drawing a "red line in the sand" and then folding when someone crosses it?
If Russia responds by attacking Turkey, then it won't take Turkey invoking their privilege. I believe we'll already have to respond. Wasn't that why Putin wanted to keep Ukraine out of NATO, too?
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