The drones that attacked Russia’s Khmeymim airbase in Syria were operated from the U.S. Poseidon-8 reconnaissance plane, Russian Deputy Defense Minister Colonel General Alexander Fomin said.
"Thirteen drones moved according to common combat battle deployment, operated by a single crew. During all this time the American Poseidon-8 reconnaissance plane patrolled the Mediterranean Sea area for eight hours," he stressed.
The deputy defense minister said that when the drones met with the electronic countermeasures of the Russian systems, they switched to a manual guidance mode. "Manual guidance is carried out not by some villagers, but by the Poseidon-8, which has modern equipment. It undertook manual control," TASS cited Fomin as saying.
"When these 13 drones faced our electronic warfare screen, they moved away to some distance, received the corresponding orders and began to be operated out of space and receiving help in finding the so-called holes through which they started penetrating. Then they were destroyed," the deputy defense minister said.
"This should be stopped as well: in order to avoid fighting with the high-technology weapons of terrorists and highly-equipped terrorists it is necessary to stop supplying them with equipment," Fomin added.
A military observer of the TASS news agency, retired Colonel Viktor Litovkin, speaking with Vestnik Kavkaza, noted that thus the U.S. is trying to compensate for a weakening of ISIS activities (terrorist group banned in Russia) in Syria.
"With this fact, the U.S. has once again demonstrated its support for ISIS. It has been known before that Washington backs ISIS in an attempt to overthrow the legitimate government in Syria headed by Bashar al-Assad. Now ISIS is defeated, and the Americans are trying to provoke Russian military carrying out attacks on the Russian air force base," he said.
At the same time, the expert stressed that we should not expect open military conflict between Russia and the United States. “We just intercept the control of these UAVs and destroy them - that's all for now. The consequences of these attacks are simple - we show the whole world the worth of the American statements that they want peace in Syria," Victor Litovkin stressed.
Russia's Defense Ministry earlier said that militants in Syria first massively used drones in the attack on the Russian Khmeymim airbase and the Russian naval base in Tartus on January 6. The attack was successfully repelled: 7 drones were downed, and control over 6 drones was gained through electronic warfare systems. Russia's Defense Ministry said that the solutions used by the militants could be received only from a technologically advanced country and warned about the danger of repeating such attacks in any country of the world.
