Are you for real? I take it that you are aware of the Russian out of area flights since their re-activation in the late 1990s?
The only time that they haven’t been pre-announced was immediately after the Kosovo crisis.
Ever since then they have been pre-announced. The long range out of area flights normally take part at the end of an exercise involving strategic forces. The Russians were conducting those routing exercises only last week. The Russians last year conducted similar long range out of area heavy bomber flights last year into the US&Canadian ADIZ.
All those flights were conducted in international airspace. You do realise that they would have to have broken the 12 mile limit to actually have been outside of international airspace?
These are basic facts. The Russians still maintain laison offices with offices in Brussels and Moscow. Every major military exercise involving strategic forces is announced as part of the deconfliction. The Russians also do the same for their ballistic missile tests with a time-window. The out of area flights are announced with a similar time window. Nobody wants to make a mistake with such strategic assets.
The Russian strategic aviation exercises are monitored. Over the years it has been routine for them to end their exercises with such long range out of area flights. They have been expected ever since their re-emergence in the late 1990’s.
I’ve just retired from the RAF. Although these flights are never in the numbers as during the Cold War, they are to be expected at the end of an exercise.
“All those flights were conducted in international airspace”
The article clearly states that the bombers entered british airspace “briefly”.
The brits should have shot it down as the communists have shot down passenger flight in the past.