tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15257419206468008142024-03-14T02:14:41.506-04:00Vessel of Interest | наблюдаемое судноNews and research about current military history, interesting events, and movements of military assets globally. Army, Navy, Air Force - Not constrained by the official narrative.Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.comBlogger107125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-75531248509263377782023-01-11T12:16:00.000-05:002023-01-11T12:16:11.409-05:00Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's trip to Jamaica (Christmas 2022)<p><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Right Honourable Justin Trudeau is a hard working international leader, and if he wants to take a week off in Jamaica with his family, he sure can - and did.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: inherit;">On 2022-12-26 The Right Honourable Justin Trudeau and his entourage flew from Ottawa to Jamaica on RCAF CC-144D 144620.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: inherit;">The flight to Jamaica kept west of Cuban airspace on the way there.</span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvy7q7mQc8bSF3IvwmGgLfZgfKHx555RKU7Lhyp3OAOjQekUz_LaxsRpauvj9Pg44ZYrRzNPuXu56BcOxvN5HB5Tc4IUwoU9IxCobFMnjvE91q6-YGPCl0oN0z_2T7Bpgl9Xr8zEfxc7wQFDdiHKiHbocz6hFHJaUdVfyRovYmwcU3exx2uYSJa20bjg/s1920/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-11%2011-56-51.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvy7q7mQc8bSF3IvwmGgLfZgfKHx555RKU7Lhyp3OAOjQekUz_LaxsRpauvj9Pg44ZYrRzNPuXu56BcOxvN5HB5Tc4IUwoU9IxCobFMnjvE91q6-YGPCl0oN0z_2T7Bpgl9Xr8zEfxc7wQFDdiHKiHbocz6hFHJaUdVfyRovYmwcU3exx2uYSJa20bjg/w640-h360/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-11%2011-56-51.png" width="640" /></span></a></div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIJMztQxQyMMQtEnI_PT-o8Aq8kzaZR1KJf7wuq8bO2CuaXAr6dTiMKo3kdw12OOwhbEzOf77UJVsKO1EDIjgo3cx96KyvZd0Sgz7cqKdYXhKv4FnOIMSkltihajqSqbIhMrJW7p0k8zVO7X9MbCEeeOhpWkpgGYP_8lu7x4vmyDeNkSQUkAWg_oVXCg/s1920/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-11%2011-57-47.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIJMztQxQyMMQtEnI_PT-o8Aq8kzaZR1KJf7wuq8bO2CuaXAr6dTiMKo3kdw12OOwhbEzOf77UJVsKO1EDIjgo3cx96KyvZd0Sgz7cqKdYXhKv4FnOIMSkltihajqSqbIhMrJW7p0k8zVO7X9MbCEeeOhpWkpgGYP_8lu7x4vmyDeNkSQUkAWg_oVXCg/w640-h360/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-11%2011-57-47.png" width="640" /></span></a></div><p><span style="font-family: inherit;">source: <a href="https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=c2c1fb&lat=21.044&lon=-82.644&zoom=6.9&showTrace=2022-12-26">https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=c2c1fb&lat=21.044&lon=-82.644&zoom=6.9&showTrace=2022-12-26</a></span></p><p><span style="font-family: inherit;">On 2023-01-04 RCAF CC-144D 144620 was picked up by the global network of ADSBexchange receivers at 18:38Z, flying at 38,000ft over Cuba on the way back to Ottawa from Jamaica, which is notable because they avoided Cuban airspace on the way there.</span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgn5ZPd9dDkehjjXZ8UBks928ZAOCz6aQswBpe7Z2DictmC--IxxnBV9eT8tyvGL2QditgblsuotOdRUODiVRuQOxuctR3kLtBFJSM5dGLKFyf_sqSD7k9VjSPXmzG1Y92p1siC7kxCYSPKgGzwenN_Gv82XaiM73zcarP488vFmbcpH2THGXurtZ-CSw/s1920/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-11%2012-07-13.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgn5ZPd9dDkehjjXZ8UBks928ZAOCz6aQswBpe7Z2DictmC--IxxnBV9eT8tyvGL2QditgblsuotOdRUODiVRuQOxuctR3kLtBFJSM5dGLKFyf_sqSD7k9VjSPXmzG1Y92p1siC7kxCYSPKgGzwenN_Gv82XaiM73zcarP488vFmbcpH2THGXurtZ-CSw/w640-h360/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-11%2012-07-13.png" width="640" /></a></div><p>source: <a href="https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=c2c1fb&lat=31.885&lon=-78.772&zoom=4.7&showTrace=2023-01-04">https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=c2c1fb&lat=31.885&lon=-78.772&zoom=4.7&showTrace=2023-01-04</a></p><p>The Canadian Prime Minister's travel is a frequent target for Canadian right-wing media who seek to portray it as excessive and costly, but by using the smallest, most modern, and economical jet in the RCAF fleet, the flight details show quite the opposite.</p>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-26606680569516734252023-01-07T23:34:00.000-05:002023-01-07T23:34:20.667-05:00Aircraft tracking lessons from Zelenskyy's trip to Washington<span style="background-color: #fcff01;">The USAF have a couple of tricks up their sleeve</span> that they can, and do, use to obfuscate aircraft movements, including VIP transport. How seldom they use these tricks to hide VIP travel would surprise you, so when they do, they're identifiable and draw attention to the aircraft. The tricks used by state aircraft to avoid observation by open source methods are not limited to the USAF and can be found being used, with varying levels of success, by other air forces worldwide.<br><h3 style="text-align: left;">The Trip</h3>On December 21, 2022 Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy flew to Washington on an American plane. The plane carrying him was distinctly operating outside the norm, providing the public with a fingerprint of what "abnormal" aircraft operations look like.<br><h3 style="text-align: left;"><b>Disembarking</b></h3><img border="0" height="427" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2-yEXk0mn-d3FreptKhiYuXzm6YVxtzJc4mo4_W5c5FhU8-wyUlN1Cc61jfHxtlMTDsjexn567TfWzMfJmy3026G_QDBdPRrS1BFoyHQr2bWo4t6IG-3malLBU04HupcGRsaiwIULlf8oM-pRTgvx9EJ6kg1BE1kRxX2y8UB36370L3jQSfuIVoxBZQ/w640-h427/FkhadL_WAAwPDND.jpeg" width="640"><div><br></div><div>The aircraft shown by the press which Zelenskyy disembarked from is a USAF C-40 Clipper decorated in executive livery (an "Air Force One"-like paint job). The USAF have ~12 Clippers in different configurations, but we can identify them all. The US Navy have their own fleet of C-40 Clippers used frequently to move personnel domestically and internationally.<br><br><h3 style="text-align: left;">The USAF C-40 Clipper fleet</h3><div><google-sheets-html-origin><table border="1" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" dir="ltr" style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 10pt; table-layout: fixed; width: 0px;" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><colgroup><col width="100"><col width="100"></colgroup><tbody><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-numberformat="{"1":5,"2":"mm-yyyy","3":1}" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":14611}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">01-1940</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"AE0945"}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">AE0945</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-numberformat="{"1":5,"2":"mm-yyyy","3":1}" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":42005}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">01-2015</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"AE115D"}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">AE115D</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-numberformat="{"1":5,"2":"mm-yyyy","3":1}" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":-620514}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">02-0201</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"AE1165"}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">AE1165</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-numberformat="{"1":5,"2":"mm-yyyy","3":1}" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":-620149}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">02-0202</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"AE1167"}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">AE1167</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-numberformat="{"1":5,"2":"mm-yyyy","3":1}" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":14977}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">01-1941</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"AE11F6"}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">AE11F6</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-numberformat="{"1":5,"2":"mm-yyyy","3":1}" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":15373}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">02-1942</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"AE11F8"}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">AE11F8</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-numberformat="{"1":5,"2":"mm-yyyy","3":1}" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":-619784}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">02-0203</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"AE11FA"}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">AE11FA</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-numberformat="{"1":5,"2":"mm-yyyy","3":1}" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":-427212}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">05-0730</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"AE17EF"}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">AE17EF</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-numberformat="{"1":5,"2":"mm-yyyy","3":1}" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":991025}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">05-4613</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"AE189A"}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">AE189A</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-numberformat="{"1":5,"2":"mm-yyyy","3":1}" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":-353432}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">05-0932</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"AE189C"}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">AE189C</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-numberformat="{"1":5,"2":"mm-yyyy","3":1}" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":-496484}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">09-0540</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"AE503D"}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">AE503D</td></tr></tbody></table>(<a href="https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ae0945,ae115d,ae1165,ae1167,ae11f6,ae11f8,ae11fa,ae17ef,ae189a,ae189c,ae503d" target="_blank">link</a>)</google-sheets-html-origin></div><br>The The USAF C-40 Clipper fleet also use ACARS; example courtesy of <a href="https://acars.adsbexchange.com">https://acars.adsbexchange.com</a><br><br><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXLPTKBuJKY23Ygox50_AK45smjpb7Xc4ZgL-aYK79NRB5z7PPerimhSaV1ahxEmSAiWB9gUbJ9FDZQ13UpTx7XEtcbczdGHROp3fYtMm0oULsjVvWHwfnU3lFkGkHCvhJCn4IZPc74Z0nq8ZNuvpd5C5MpSsUL8xfWf3XZ7gx5au1Ayke_Yrdzz7DWg/s1027/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-07%2022-00-31.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="130" data-original-width="1027" height="81" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXLPTKBuJKY23Ygox50_AK45smjpb7Xc4ZgL-aYK79NRB5z7PPerimhSaV1ahxEmSAiWB9gUbJ9FDZQ13UpTx7XEtcbczdGHROp3fYtMm0oULsjVvWHwfnU3lFkGkHCvhJCn4IZPc74Z0nq8ZNuvpd5C5MpSsUL8xfWf3XZ7gx5au1Ayke_Yrdzz7DWg/w640-h81/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-07%2022-00-31.png" width="640"></a><br><br><h3 style="text-align: left;">The Day Before</h3>On the day before Zelenskyy was picked up and flown to the United States, his would-be plane took off from Joint Base Andrews, but didn't show up to open sources until they were over the Atlantic at ~02:14Z, entering British airspace, when they enabled ADS-B; USAF C-40B Clipper 01-0041 was flying as call sign SAM910, and laded at Ramstein Air Base in Germany.</div><div><br><span style="background-color: #fcff01;">Trick #1; don't fly using a transponder mode that's commonly visible to the public; from the time they departed JBA and arrived in UK airspace they likely flew using Mode-3A/3C; visible to ATC, but not commonly visible to the public. </span>👇<br><br><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5Wio5NPKbfzuBdWQ_24N7uJKsD7SjTNDEHFw2kr8iv0F9q3n5l1kbHQBROtZP_J81Vv8HVw0FCehSNqRONWkeUqnLcuQHXhx3Yudwt-IU_E9s1bcnisY4TkZ6mkK-VlRyEL1oWDWMKqkEXGysUBGhol3ic1ee2XnxJTKJqxEy3tt1-a5W-NcBrCvyNA/s1920/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-07%2021-03-39.png"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5Wio5NPKbfzuBdWQ_24N7uJKsD7SjTNDEHFw2kr8iv0F9q3n5l1kbHQBROtZP_J81Vv8HVw0FCehSNqRONWkeUqnLcuQHXhx3Yudwt-IU_E9s1bcnisY4TkZ6mkK-VlRyEL1oWDWMKqkEXGysUBGhol3ic1ee2XnxJTKJqxEy3tt1-a5W-NcBrCvyNA/w640-h360/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-07%2021-03-39.png" width="640"></a><br><br><h3 style="text-align: left;">December 21, 2022</h3></div><div>The next day the plane flew to Rzeszów-Jasionka Airport, in Poland, and apparently picked up Zelenskyy to fly him back to Joint Base Andrews. 👇</div><div><br></div><div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcd0ll0NQUAQif2xVyO7xR-Hb_Owdg4KHjzwh_XV_Zd893l9FYolE661qYK9Au9UF-f5aQ-p-F2vwRSzkSwuIMmasn9jQe9oHS7cj4B5HDqo67CmVq2RQidW7ULIpYDCpwscJXJgewCRKDTJMv21woaK5gXUIWGjNQhgaD2iuuuxdDX0Wdso9XCOc5OQ/s1920/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-07%2021-04-35.png"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcd0ll0NQUAQif2xVyO7xR-Hb_Owdg4KHjzwh_XV_Zd893l9FYolE661qYK9Au9UF-f5aQ-p-F2vwRSzkSwuIMmasn9jQe9oHS7cj4B5HDqo67CmVq2RQidW7ULIpYDCpwscJXJgewCRKDTJMv21woaK5gXUIWGjNQhgaD2iuuuxdDX0Wdso9XCOc5OQ/w640-h360/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-07%2021-04-35.png" width="640"></a><br><br>On the way back, after they passed through British airspace over the Atlantic Ocean, they reduced the amount of data being transmitted by their transponder to exclude their precise location data with ADS-B, and fell back to using simple Mode-S. 👇</div><div><br></div><div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjR5wbADV3fmxvzVkDPB2a5HwZIzRaTwlu5O5Q46GURtSU2C7QSUvWM0yVZCUDRHi87V0oj9zm2a0mELEbvkfVg8W4Tt0mv4PesZXe81MC0mU0H5KU-_pV_cAeuqy1uke8K7fVwyYWMeq8_ZujyF-xBa568Z8J74-UlDehkBGmlc_sPIAlqJcRKtG8wZw/s1920/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-07%2021-05-00.png"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjR5wbADV3fmxvzVkDPB2a5HwZIzRaTwlu5O5Q46GURtSU2C7QSUvWM0yVZCUDRHi87V0oj9zm2a0mELEbvkfVg8W4Tt0mv4PesZXe81MC0mU0H5KU-_pV_cAeuqy1uke8K7fVwyYWMeq8_ZujyF-xBa568Z8J74-UlDehkBGmlc_sPIAlqJcRKtG8wZw/w640-h360/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-07%2021-05-00.png" width="640"></a><br><br><span style="background-color: #fcff01;">Trick #2, stop transmitting precise location data when visibility isn't desired. Without precise ADS-B location data, the aircraft is only transmitting its altitude and identity using Mode-S, which would require multiple receivers to precisely geolocate using MLAT.</span> 👇</div><div><br><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih4SqEA38eN_mMJYOimJxRK9jioKoOFJzmVcd3yfisKNB_CxcvO9kfdAz78BMhX9vyvmW37s081s_jI-L-Q-9gKORVUPLTxZm1-yxGC1S3SnNQ2LkZ65JY2wyZhRJ2wF40hWwiPPtS_X3n5xO2m-g2VKSnxLtD_64wovv1nfJsSPQ-lNGPyMl9wmB0eA/s1920/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-07%2021-05-07.png"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih4SqEA38eN_mMJYOimJxRK9jioKoOFJzmVcd3yfisKNB_CxcvO9kfdAz78BMhX9vyvmW37s081s_jI-L-Q-9gKORVUPLTxZm1-yxGC1S3SnNQ2LkZ65JY2wyZhRJ2wF40hWwiPPtS_X3n5xO2m-g2VKSnxLtD_64wovv1nfJsSPQ-lNGPyMl9wmB0eA/w640-h360/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-07%2021-05-07.png" width="640"></a><br><br>You can see the same trick used by the RCAF when they fly operations over Iraq; they stop transmitting their precise location data and fall back to Mode-S reducing the precision with which they can be quickly geolocated.<br><br>Example: 2022-11-09 from 15:10Z to 18:22Z RCAF CC-130J Hercules 130604 flew over Iraq using Mode-S, not transmitting their precise location. 👇<br><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPdbzyF8J1eDiDkYsOeKNUgGc2jyz2n8uf0WiZalGCfmdJOmluzrJVnZImNP4AsASXbqMro32aq1M-IctBWpIbSPiIZMvF3KVRlDbl3awc0tb2NvyldR9F5JN-Xc65fYCnEoyLq8pVJQwtWvxTgel0D7zPy0Xtrxxfow2Z2sFN95_na969XMBL7YMI4g/s1920/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-07%2022-53-45.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPdbzyF8J1eDiDkYsOeKNUgGc2jyz2n8uf0WiZalGCfmdJOmluzrJVnZImNP4AsASXbqMro32aq1M-IctBWpIbSPiIZMvF3KVRlDbl3awc0tb2NvyldR9F5JN-Xc65fYCnEoyLq8pVJQwtWvxTgel0D7zPy0Xtrxxfow2Z2sFN95_na969XMBL7YMI4g/w640-h360/Screenshot%20from%202023-01-07%2022-53-45.png" width="640"></a></div><br><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Those are the two obfuscation techniques that I noticed were used and stood out to me. Looking for those tricks, they can be used as a behavioural fingerprint to identify the next VIP flight.</div><br>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-31243823776752733502023-01-07T20:38:00.003-05:002023-01-07T20:46:01.011-05:00"Santa Tracker" stories perpetuate public ignorance.<p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Yes, bah humbug indeed. NORAD and other worldwide military organisations like having a little fun with the idea that Santa is flying though their airspace, and make cute videos depicting their planes intercepting him, his sleigh, and nine reindeer. Adorable.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">However, the public can track almost all of the planes mentioned; most of the public don't know that.</span></p><p></p><blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p dir="ltr" lang="en">BREAKING NEWS: According to our <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NORAD?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#NORAD</a> Radars and Satellites, Santa🎅 has been spotted approaching Canada! He should be here very soon! <a href="https://t.co/FgBSHpoDv5">pic.twitter.com/FgBSHpoDv5</a></p>— Royal Canadian Air Force (@RCAF_ARC) <a href="https://twitter.com/RCAF_ARC/status/1606771704688103424?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 24, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Let's take NATO and allied tankers that are frequently used for refueling QRA intercepts. Portraying aircraft that use a publicly viewable transponders as involved in a Santa escort mission isn't just a bit of fun, it reinforces existing misconceptions about the visibility of military aircraft. For the RAF their Voyager tankers are almost always visible by their transponders, same with the RCAF, and the RAAF. Many, most of the public even, don't know that.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>More than being a party pooper, I'd like to raise the bar; have the public discover almost all aviation is trackable in real time, and stop pretending we're living in a pre-internet age.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Just as a sample, you can click any of the hot links below and see right now if any of the following aircraft have been in the air in the past day. The list is a super-set of tankers and transport aircraft (eg RCAF 15004 and 15005 are the only tankers, the other three are just transports)</span></p><p><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">🇦🇺 </span><a href="https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=7cf864,7cf865,7cf866,7cf867,7cf868,7cf9c8,7cf9c9" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">RAAF Airbus KC-30A (A330-203MRTT)</span></a><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><div align="left" dir="ltr" style="margin-left: 0pt;"><table style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none;"><colgroup><col width="77"></col><col width="77"></col></colgroup><tbody><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">A39-001</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">7CF864</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">A39-002</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">7CF865</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">A39-003</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">7CF866</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">A39-004</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">7CF867</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">A39-005</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">7CF868</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">A39-006</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">7CF9C8</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">A39-007</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #999999 1pt; border-color: rgb(153, 153, 153); border-left: solid #999999 1pt; border-right: solid #999999 1pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #999999 1pt; border-width: 1pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">7CF9C9</span></p></td></tr></tbody></table></div><p><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">🇬🇧 </span><a href="https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=406b79,406d26,406d27,406e9f,43c6f3,43c6f4,43c6f5,43c6f6,43c6f7,43c6f8,43c6f9,43c6fa,43c6fb,43c700" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">RAF Airbus Voyager KC2 (A330-243MRTT) </span></a></p><div align="left" dir="ltr" style="margin-left: 0pt;"><table style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none;"><colgroup><col width="77"></col><col width="79"></col></colgroup><tbody><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">G-VYGJ</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">406B79</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">G-VYGK</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">406D26</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">G-VYGL</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">406D27</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">G-VYGM</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">406E9F</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">ZZ330</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">43C6F3</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">ZZ331</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">43C6F4</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">ZZ332</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">43C6F5</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">ZZ333</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">43C6F6</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">ZZ334</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">43C6F7</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">ZZ335</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">43C6F8</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">ZZ336</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">43C6F9</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">ZZ337</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">43C6FA</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">ZZ338</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">43C6FB</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">ZZ343</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">43C700</span></p></td></tr></tbody></table></div><p><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">🇨🇦 </span><a href="https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=C2B355,C2B35F,C2B3B9,C2B3C3,C2B37D" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">RCAF CC-150 Polaris (Airbus A310)</span></a></p><div align="left" dir="ltr" style="margin-left: 0pt;"><table style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none;"><colgroup><col width="60"></col><col width="82"></col></colgroup><tbody><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">15001</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">C2B355</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">15002</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">C2B35F</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">15003</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">C2B3B9</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">15004</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">C2B3C3</span></p></td></tr><tr style="height: 0pt;"><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">15005</span></p></td><td style="border-bottom: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-color: rgb(183, 183, 183); border-left: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-right: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-style: solid; border-top: solid #b7b7b7 0.5pt; border-width: 0.5pt; overflow-wrap: break-word; overflow: hidden; padding: 5pt; vertical-align: top;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">C2B37D</span></p></td></tr></tbody></table></div><p><br /></p>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-86575995236330093282022-11-30T22:08:00.004-05:002022-11-30T23:55:12.825-05:00CTV News denied even open-source levels of information by DND<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUcRmZ-1pW1Hc0yQ4mUL-ImYNHycLqc5lLeP_7V3BPclmdqqfb6OQFbYdYD548gNw3lgeDDzq-mWonqpcYxXDTObAnhgZPRWVIm5nVLybpBgESuF8vyuped6GEfhWKx_r5T8KGLfjc09-rqiqEKMNSO4IcFT4tSYk1mPchu8_n0nNbGJyqwgtaeTv-xw/s5930/52001846291_d13c503fb8_o.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="A CP-140 Aurora aircraft, call sign Demon 02, patrols the Mediterranean Sea to help build maritime situational awareness in associated support of NATO’s Operation SEA GUARDIAN on April 11, 2022. Please credit: Corporal Braden Trudeau, Canadian Armed Forces photo" border="0" data-original-height="3953" data-original-width="5930" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUcRmZ-1pW1Hc0yQ4mUL-ImYNHycLqc5lLeP_7V3BPclmdqqfb6OQFbYdYD548gNw3lgeDDzq-mWonqpcYxXDTObAnhgZPRWVIm5nVLybpBgESuF8vyuped6GEfhWKx_r5T8KGLfjc09-rqiqEKMNSO4IcFT4tSYk1mPchu8_n0nNbGJyqwgtaeTv-xw/w400-h266/52001846291_d13c503fb8_o.jpg" title="RCAF CP-140 (Block III) 140103" width="400" /></a></div><div>From the statements made on behalf of DND about releasing even the most basic levels of detail about Op NEON, a 35 day operation that flew out of Kadena Air Base in Japan, I think we need to question the "national security" need to avoid publicising details about overt (not covert) operations. Aircraft flying as part of Op NEON can be categorized as overt from their transponder posture, identifying themselves as RCAF CP-140 Aurora 140103 to any receiver in line of sight of the aircraft, including space. Denying basic information for reasons of "national security" doesn't hold water for overt operations in 2022.</div><br />You should read this first: <br /><br /><div style="text-align: left;"><b>Canadian military plane intercepted by Chinese jets 'numerous' times in recent weeks</b></div>by Todd Coyne 2022-11-29 for CTV News<br /><a href="https://vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/chinese-jets-intercepted-canadian-military-plane-on-numerous-occasions-during-recent-deployment-1.6173803">https://vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/chinese-jets-intercepted-canadian-military-plane-on-numerous-occasions-during-recent-deployment-1.6173803</a><br /><br />In a statement credited to DND spokesperson Jessica Lamirande, CTV News was told for reasons of national security DND would be unable to answer questions about how often RCAF CP-140 Aurora 140103 was intercepted by the PLAAF during their Operation NEON sorties. DND also refused to give any details about when the CP-140 arrived to Kadena Air Base, when they left, how many flights they flew, how long the flights were, which of those flights were intercepted, on which day, or identify what kind of plane had done the interceptions, beyond saying the intercepts were “numerous”. Why? National security; operational security. To paraphrase, the public can’t know these details, or it would compromise the national security of Canada. I’m here to tell you that’s just not true, we have many of the details already. I think DND PA is misrepresenting the operation, taking an overt presence off the coast of China, and making it seem like a covert reconnaissance operation they couldn't possibly tell us about. There was nothing covert about the operation, so we can all talk about it; I documented the vast majority of the operation from my home office using publicly available information.<div><br />First, RCAF CP-140 Aurora 140103 landed at Kadena Air Base on 2022-10-04, and departed Kadena Air Base on 2022-11-07; they operated from Okinawa for 35 days. The DND spokesperson did not give that level of detail to Todd Coyne of CTV News for reasons of national security.<div><br />The Mode-S transmissions from the transponder of RCAF CP-140 140103 were picked up by the @ADSBexchange network of transponder receivers performing fifteen sorties from Kadena Air Base on the following days and approximate times:<br /></div><div><ol style="text-align: left;"><li>2022-10-08 between 01:06 - 04:17 UTC</li><li>2022-10-09 between 00:58 - 07:46 UTC</li><li>2022-10-14 between 05:33 - 10:34 UTC</li><li>2022-10-15 between 04:15 - 08:15 UTC</li><li>2022-10-17 between 23:50 and 06:00 UTC on 2022-10-18</li><li>2022-10-19 between 01:40 - 09:15 UTC</li><li>2022-10-21 between 00:54 - 08:30 UTC</li><li>2022-10-22 between 00:54 - 08:41 UTC</li><li>2022-10-24 between 02:27 - 09:36 UTC</li><li>2022-10-25 between 02:08 - 09:59 UTC</li><li>2022-10-27 between 00:50 - 07:12 UTC</li><li>2022-10-28 between 00:52 - 07:46 UTC</li><li>2022-10-30 between 01:07 - 07:39 UTC</li><li>2022-10-31 between 00:51 - 07:21 UTC</li><li>2022-11-02 between 01:01 - 10:06 UTC</li></ol>Provided I didn't miss any, that makes ~15 flights, totaling ~100 hrs of flight time. The DND spokesperson did not give that detail to Todd Coyne of CTV News for reasons of national security.</div><div><br />It is not reasonable to claim disclosing which of the above listed flights were intercepted is a threat to national security. The party who were doing the intercepting already knew the Canadians were there, that’s why they were being intercepted. The Canadian aircraft itself was broadcasting its own altitude and identity with their transponder. The crew were, at times, broadcasting their identity, location, and why they were there, over the radio in plain English. This was not a covert operation that the government isn't being forthright about; Op NEON is an overt operation done in plain view of China. There is no reason to limit what the Canadian public know about overt operations, up to the same level as would be reasonable for the adversary to know. How many times the RCAF flew sorties, and how many times they were intercepted, are very reasonable things for the Chinese gov't to know by now. They can draw from the same open sources as I do, as well as their national technical means.<br /><br />In contrast, here is what was publicly and voluntarily disclosed in 2021 at the end of their fall Operation NEON deployment; not all, but many more details. (<a href="https://twitter.com/CFOperations/status/1466432046407036938">https://twitter.com/CFOperations/status/1466432046407036938</a>)<br /><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqd8JkICn8nMQxi-jBnu0oiobaSgW3pxF5di06dYm6_ago6g15x6SGTwdDrpGTEn4uUMRhuSJqsQmzHTaGMr7OYiziFOYDJsiEWU6lKa8pfmvVUMS17Xo-iXXKGS4TU-1ThGm3XBlKxYTWTE11ruVzVXokh00mGNrvEeI2V5aH5DPZmzmdhpF3gOC1-Q/w313-h400/Screenshot%20from%202022-11-30%2009-44-50.png" /><br /><br />While everyone can appreciate that Public Affairs is busy and doesn't have the time to research every little thing, Op NEON is a month+ long operation to monitor and identify ships smuggling goods to or from DPRK. <b>It's a big deal.</b> The public should be told how that went, at least to a level of detail comparable to what's available by way of public sources. Dismissing requests for the official version of events, up to the same level of detail available from public sources, claiming "national security", doesn't seem reasonable or well considered.</div></div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b>Outstanding questions for parity:</b></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>How many sorties were performed for Op NEON?</li><li>How many hours were flown during those sorties?</li><li>How many vessels of interest were identified?</li><li>How many possible illicit ship-to-ship transfers were observed?</li></ul><div style="text-align: left;"><b>Additional questions:</b></div></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>How many intercepts were performed by the PLAAF?</li><li>Were any of the intercepts considered unprofessional?</li><li>During which days were the CP-140 Aurora sorties intercepted?</li></ul></div>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-30700136516688157842021-02-12T09:00:00.014-05:002021-02-12T17:57:06.146-05:00An RCAF CC-177 took part in Operation Boxtop in early February, open sources confirm<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg33OaHsKcrax7t7IUVkDG1lnWNiYx_BjkwDrihQPqAZRrlRv2KEbzzDMYWMLHOxHIt3vdo21wj9LzUQQb2af_bGq5CJAVESGxIBdHBm0AITi1UJS1h9S6cZLGd45xOaTITrgnoi2QRntab/s720/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+07-12-36.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="606" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg33OaHsKcrax7t7IUVkDG1lnWNiYx_BjkwDrihQPqAZRrlRv2KEbzzDMYWMLHOxHIt3vdo21wj9LzUQQb2af_bGq5CJAVESGxIBdHBm0AITi1UJS1h9S6cZLGd45xOaTITrgnoi2QRntab/w270-h320/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+07-12-36.png" width="270" /></a></div><br />One of the Canadian Forces' yearly operations is #OpBOXTOP, which refuels Canadian Forces Station Alert, and it takes place ~twice a year, using transport aircraft from 8 Wing / Trenton. Since the Government of Canada bought 5 CC-177 Globemaster III heavy transport aircraft (from 2007-2014), they have supplemented the CC-130 Hercules fleet which make frequent flights to CFS Alert. In order to fly in and land the extremely heavy plane, laden with fuel, they have to wait for the ground to be sufficiently frozen to accomodate the extra weight.<div><br /></div><div>On February 11th 2021, Canadian Forces Operations (@CFOperations) published the following message on Twitter.<br /><blockquote></blockquote><blockquote><blockquote><i><b>"From Jan 31 to Feb 5, a @RCAF_ARC CC-177 Globemaster III delivered ~78 000L of DF-8 fuel to Canadian Forces Station Alert to sustain station operations at the northernmost permanently inhabited place on earth! #OpBOXTOP"</b></i></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote><blockquote><i><b>-@CFOperations</b></i></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote><p></p></blockquote><p>This caught my eye because the number on the plane pictured is clearly visible, and all the aircraft's timelines should be well defined using open sources. Let's verify the flight history of the CC-177 fleet and figure out which of the five RCAF CC-177 Globemaster IIIs was used in early February to ferry fuel to CFS Alert.</p><p>We know Joint Task Force North (JTFN), with a presence in Whitehorse and Yellowknife, will be involved as part of the CFS Alert resupply mission, as would be 440 Transport Squadron, attached to 17 Wing / Winnipeg, but I hadn't noticed previous #OpBOXTOP missions going West, I usually see them fly North from Trenton. <br /></p></div>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p dir="ltr" lang="en">🇨🇦 Where have the transponders of the <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/RCAF?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#RCAF</a> CC-177 Globemaster III fleet been heard or triangulated, in the past day, by the global <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/ADSBexchange?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#ADSBexchange</a> network of aircraft transponder receivers?<br /><br />📡<a href="https://t.co/27PYR6QgLq">https://t.co/27PYR6QgLq</a><br /><br />📸 2018-04-12 by <a href="https://twitter.com/tattuinee?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@tattuinee</a><a href="https://t.co/g6YO3dkN8H">https://t.co/g6YO3dkN8H</a></p>— Steffan Watkins 🎙️ (@steffanwatkins) <a href="https://twitter.com/steffanwatkins/status/1358824160970104841?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 8, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
<p>The tweet above contains a link which shows you, using the ADSBexchange web page, where all the Canadian Forces CC-177s have been today. Using those same identifiers you can use any aircraft tracking site you like to research their history. Below I provide links to Radarbox, which provides a history of the aircraft which is easily readable, then use ADSBexchange to confirm the data. That's two sources using different networks of physical receivers, ensuring redundancy and accuracy.</p><p><b>Radarbox</b><br /><a href="https://www.radarbox.com/data/registration/177701" target="_blank">177701</a> (C2B3D7)<br /><a href="https://www.radarbox.com/data/registration/177702" target="_blank">177702</a> (C2AFC7)<br /><a href="https://www.radarbox.com/data/registration/177703" target="_blank">177703</a> (C2B3EB)<br /><a href="https://www.radarbox.com/data/registration/177704" target="_blank">177704</a> (C2B3F5)<br /><a href="https://www.radarbox.com/data/registration/177705" target="_blank">177705</a> (C2B3FF)</p><p><b>ADSBexchange</b><br />177701 (<a href="https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=c2b3d7" target="_blank">C2B3D7</a>)<br />177702 (<a href="https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=c2afc7" target="_blank">C2AFC7</a>)<br />177703 (<a href="https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=c2b3eb" target="_blank">C2B3EB</a>)<br />177704 (<a href="https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=c2b3f5" target="_blank">C2B3F5</a>)<br />177705 (<a href="https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=c2b3ff" target="_blank">C2B3FF</a>)</p><p>If you spend the time compiling that data into something usable, you map out the schedule like this; the yellow dates are when #OpBOXTOP's shipments were said to be taking place.</p><p><google-sheets-html-origin></google-sheets-html-origin></p><table border="1" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" dir="ltr" style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none; font-family: arial, sans, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; table-layout: fixed; width: 0px;" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><colgroup><col width="84"></col><col width="73"></col><col width="73"></col><col width="73"></col><col width="73"></col><col width="73"></col><col width="73"></col><col width="73"></col><col width="73"></col><col width="73"></col><col width="73"></col><col width="73"></col><col width="73"></col><col width="73"></col></colgroup><tbody><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"#OpBOXTOP"}" style="border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); font-size: 9pt; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">#OpBOXTOP</td><td data-sheets-numberformat="[null,5,"yyyy-mm-dd",1]" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":44224}" style="border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">2021-01-28</td><td data-sheets-numberformat="[null,5,"yyyy-mm-dd",1]" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":44225}" style="border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">2021-01-29</td><td data-sheets-numberformat="[null,5,"yyyy-mm-dd",1]" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":44226}" style="border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">2021-01-30</td><td data-sheets-numberformat="[null,5,"yyyy-mm-dd",1]" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":44227}" style="background-color: yellow; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">2021-01-31</td><td data-sheets-numberformat="[null,5,"yyyy-mm-dd",1]" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":44228}" style="background-color: yellow; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">2021-02-01</td><td data-sheets-numberformat="[null,5,"yyyy-mm-dd",1]" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":44229}" style="background-color: yellow; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">2021-02-02</td><td data-sheets-numberformat="[null,5,"yyyy-mm-dd",1]" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":44230}" style="background-color: yellow; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">2021-02-03</td><td data-sheets-numberformat="[null,5,"yyyy-mm-dd",1]" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":44231}" style="background-color: yellow; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">2021-02-04</td><td data-sheets-numberformat="[null,5,"yyyy-mm-dd",1]" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":44232}" style="background-color: yellow; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">2021-02-05</td><td data-sheets-numberformat="[null,5,"yyyy-mm-dd",1]" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":44233}" style="border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">2021-02-06</td><td data-sheets-numberformat="[null,5,"yyyy-mm-dd",1]" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":44234}" style="border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">2021-02-07</td><td data-sheets-numberformat="[null,5,"yyyy-mm-dd",1]" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":44235}" style="border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">2021-02-08</td><td data-sheets-numberformat="[null,5,"yyyy-mm-dd",1]" data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":44236}" style="border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">2021-02-09</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":177701}" style="border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">177701</td><td colspan="8" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"CFC3638"}" rowspan="1" style="background-color: cyan; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom;">CFC3638</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Trenton"}" style="background-color: blue; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; color: yellow; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Trenton</td><td colspan="4" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"CFC4044"}" rowspan="1" style="background-color: cyan; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom;">CFC4044</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":177702}" style="border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">177702</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"CFC4001"}" style="background-color: cyan; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom;">CFC4001</td><td colspan="11" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Trenton"}" rowspan="1" style="background-color: blue; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; color: yellow; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom;">Trenton</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"CFC4041"}" style="background-color: cyan; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom;">CFC4041</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":177703}" style="border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">177703</td><td colspan="13" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Trenton"}" rowspan="1" style="background-color: blue; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; color: yellow; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom;">Trenton</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":177704}" style="border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">177704</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"CFC4002"}" style="background-color: cyan; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom;">CFC4002</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Trenton"}" style="background-color: blue; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; color: yellow; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom;">Trenton</td><td colspan="10" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"CFC3646"}" rowspan="1" style="background-color: yellow; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom;">CFC3646</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Trenton"}" style="background-color: blue; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; color: yellow; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom;">Trenton</td></tr><tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":177705}" style="border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;">177705</td><td colspan="8" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Trenton"}" rowspan="1" style="background-color: blue; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; color: yellow; font-size: 9pt; font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom;">Trenton</td><td colspan="5" data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"CFC4052"}" rowspan="1" style="background-color: cyan; border-color: rgb(204, 204, 204) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(0, 0, 0) rgb(204, 204, 204); border-image: initial; border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; font-size: 9pt; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom;">CFC4052</td></tr></tbody></table><p>From this analysis the only flight that could possibly have been used is CFC3646, but that seemed unusual for #OpBOXTOP because it headed in the wrong direction for CFS Alert, at least for the part of the flight we could track using open-source tools.</p><p>On 2021-01-30 ~15:30 Z RCAF CC-177 177704, call sign CFC3646, took off from CFB Trenton</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3KZ7bqkN23hAHMDdseGszg4tpmPvvMzBVB_9N0f5ehVahhnih2QitEfzhNHWnMge1L2EjF25Ut2td3o5Qy1h3wxSOsBKNbL68L6K-gtEZIA6YZ6vYGDB3YoS9pHjC93_QfQZPxxUW4jPm/s1567/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+12-47-42.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="937" data-original-width="1567" height="382" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3KZ7bqkN23hAHMDdseGszg4tpmPvvMzBVB_9N0f5ehVahhnih2QitEfzhNHWnMge1L2EjF25Ut2td3o5Qy1h3wxSOsBKNbL68L6K-gtEZIA6YZ6vYGDB3YoS9pHjC93_QfQZPxxUW4jPm/w640-h382/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+12-47-42.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p>177704 landed at Eielson Air Force Base ~22:45 Z, 2021-01-30</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnlZ-2VxCZAQBRDmzAsDwnDQLDiWTuQ1xHg8ZFEpbLK2CT06urXF6oBtLjmePQOfcw_SIeChH0-KYxUK0i3P-KK-yzgQOh-eJiJpINwwtrYIQpz1uf-sd6dbyrKd2GXIsfuyvdk_HoCrhi/s1571/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+12-51-28.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="938" data-original-width="1571" height="382" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnlZ-2VxCZAQBRDmzAsDwnDQLDiWTuQ1xHg8ZFEpbLK2CT06urXF6oBtLjmePQOfcw_SIeChH0-KYxUK0i3P-KK-yzgQOh-eJiJpINwwtrYIQpz1uf-sd6dbyrKd2GXIsfuyvdk_HoCrhi/w640-h382/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+12-51-28.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p>Radarbox independently confirms the data</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG5IdGfRmja9c_zkGmQfgWRAA0lDEvMW0WAWclz5x9tiXxyDVEc5Qfng5v9BU8VwaeO7EUiw3ITh-us5QI6Cz0cS3Ndv1CUEVwW1dSUJvuS5czeeqZI1hJYOnziQzoY8SsnewlHHul_oxH/s938/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+12-55-19.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="631" data-original-width="938" height="430" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG5IdGfRmja9c_zkGmQfgWRAA0lDEvMW0WAWclz5x9tiXxyDVEc5Qfng5v9BU8VwaeO7EUiw3ITh-us5QI6Cz0cS3Ndv1CUEVwW1dSUJvuS5czeeqZI1hJYOnziQzoY8SsnewlHHul_oxH/w640-h430/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+12-55-19.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p>They departed 2021-01-31 ~02:00Z, and headed in the direction of Whitehorse, YT, not overtly towards Alert, but could have been picking up personnel for the trip.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1bvYhvBGdmEkd_OeRFYzMMH9PqcvQScwdQ_al6O9Jo2yBpJhyO3xCqdy_Dii__0qAlc2hVVS7mGV-Y3zmEFmr4nFX-Rf1zttyhlVTHA2ZHoG113tvRAnU36LxS-kL3AqwP9M8cdXv54i_/s1573/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+12-59-00.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="939" data-original-width="1573" height="382" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1bvYhvBGdmEkd_OeRFYzMMH9PqcvQScwdQ_al6O9Jo2yBpJhyO3xCqdy_Dii__0qAlc2hVVS7mGV-Y3zmEFmr4nFX-Rf1zttyhlVTHA2ZHoG113tvRAnU36LxS-kL3AqwP9M8cdXv54i_/w640-h382/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+12-59-00.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p>No additional data was available from RadarBox<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLNitfX_VAz-LJfbWyvj9B6MXiR_UkI7bPyKAGU_RGW2kWUMN8F4mY_lwU0-fUF21GzzsDpjW-BTxQpsydYrBB2sS2ssv-4RHwGo0MAOyLnpCPlkGPKiJO3G3iNnaCTUIZ0_k9l9ja2BRL/s953/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+13-03-49.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="647" data-original-width="953" height="434" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLNitfX_VAz-LJfbWyvj9B6MXiR_UkI7bPyKAGU_RGW2kWUMN8F4mY_lwU0-fUF21GzzsDpjW-BTxQpsydYrBB2sS2ssv-4RHwGo0MAOyLnpCPlkGPKiJO3G3iNnaCTUIZ0_k9l9ja2BRL/w640-h434/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+13-03-49.png" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">177704 doesn't reappear until 2021-02-08, in a direction that looks like they're coming from Yellowknife or Whitehorse, both locations of Forward Operating Locations.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsn5i8Qevx_rHsY5gENVyT56TKPZ7UUq-4-4gruCaTjXwKZb-8JYAFX3mJuQdWLHS_Ks0PuDnB0GHbwd6wIvsl4SnqFbLd9ZSlF2MrX2E3C75v4Z1nRuR3H60XWcBydLu6KvkpIAHcNTr2/s947/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+13-08-31.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="652" data-original-width="947" height="440" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsn5i8Qevx_rHsY5gENVyT56TKPZ7UUq-4-4gruCaTjXwKZb-8JYAFX3mJuQdWLHS_Ks0PuDnB0GHbwd6wIvsl4SnqFbLd9ZSlF2MrX2E3C75v4Z1nRuR3H60XWcBydLu6KvkpIAHcNTr2/w640-h440/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+13-08-31.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">ADSBexchange confirms the findings.<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9qG999JvZbqbBcVjDB0fsmqxW649Ec-uIlqiZMJSg10N6gPzzP1F0_UWV8IFSKEL_sVPWWyP067zFlm4a6JGXKeZ8E7L6g3QaAkZdVspPy8Rk-JcxA1ytp3mYmhnZrijxKPlX8R3aVXrF/s1569/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+13-10-18.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="937" data-original-width="1569" height="382" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9qG999JvZbqbBcVjDB0fsmqxW649Ec-uIlqiZMJSg10N6gPzzP1F0_UWV8IFSKEL_sVPWWyP067zFlm4a6JGXKeZ8E7L6g3QaAkZdVspPy8Rk-JcxA1ytp3mYmhnZrijxKPlX8R3aVXrF/w640-h382/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+13-10-18.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Flights to Alert are common, flights to Alert with the CC-177 are less common, only taking place ~twice a year. Callsigns used are usually CFC85 and CFC86. That information can be found in aircraft incident databases, like <a href="https://avrodex.com/view/2014C4745" target="_blank">this one</a>. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiF86M2LM0d4XgM9QkFds0saff5TiAs9mcYp_U4nDEmzy_X3J-T0QLBDypwpPU6HiK8JMGO_c8n3Dsu99dG9eoi9Hj8Fbjj-9UVvw6LdlDEX-vkuXB3JlW0I18mdyncKH2_h1qDxVVpxSuR/s1007/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+13-20-37.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="219" data-original-width="1007" height="140" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiF86M2LM0d4XgM9QkFds0saff5TiAs9mcYp_U4nDEmzy_X3J-T0QLBDypwpPU6HiK8JMGO_c8n3Dsu99dG9eoi9Hj8Fbjj-9UVvw6LdlDEX-vkuXB3JlW0I18mdyncKH2_h1qDxVVpxSuR/w640-h140/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+13-20-37.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">If we feed those callsigns back into the Radarbox database, we have a list of all the Boxtop missions (and others to Alert, not just Boxtop missions) <a href="https://www.radarbox.com/data/flights/CFC85/" target="_blank">CFC85</a> and <a href="https://www.radarbox.com/data/flights/CFC86/" target="_blank">CFC86</a> (even <a href="https://www.radarbox.com/data/flights/CFC87" target="_blank">CFC87</a> once)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Here is a flight by 177705 which I believe was an #OpBOXTOP mission flown on 2021-01-04; it's heading in the right direction for Thule or Alert.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0R_b085H4JD-WCdwoRQ2P2bDY7UCpMc3KnktvWnaTxms_U_v5MwZd1S79WGdNb6LyeEDdpst34WgIR29ztSzIu13w2Ty5M7PHiEQxyVbjhD_Ghb3u8yE2RNajQhCdGBHG8oX5hDvAj8hY/s1920/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+13-30-14.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0R_b085H4JD-WCdwoRQ2P2bDY7UCpMc3KnktvWnaTxms_U_v5MwZd1S79WGdNb6LyeEDdpst34WgIR29ztSzIu13w2Ty5M7PHiEQxyVbjhD_Ghb3u8yE2RNajQhCdGBHG8oX5hDvAj8hY/w640-h360/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+13-30-14.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Again confirmed by ADSBexchange, CFC85 returned 2021-02-06 as CFC86 (which seems to be routine)</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDUf68Y9qBH_KNf0E8ktFttjgBMAyZW3D6ZOjryEJ8sKg71JzDGMUPJ6pg5Fu_fpkLGHrkrNtNfsZNxErHJ_hg-kD1EyEHiOVTKuqplDBX7Eag9aD8-LD8F8eSr9yl9xiee3FtsLqrKFdY/s1562/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+13-37-26.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="934" data-original-width="1562" height="382" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDUf68Y9qBH_KNf0E8ktFttjgBMAyZW3D6ZOjryEJ8sKg71JzDGMUPJ6pg5Fu_fpkLGHrkrNtNfsZNxErHJ_hg-kD1EyEHiOVTKuqplDBX7Eag9aD8-LD8F8eSr9yl9xiee3FtsLqrKFdY/w640-h382/Screenshot+from+2021-02-11+13-37-26.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Based on all that flight data I was unconvinced that the flights mentioned went to Alert, not just Yellowknife or Whitehorse; I needed something else to correlate with. What about previous years?</div>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p dir="ltr" lang="en">On May 1, 2020, the spring iteration of <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/OpBOXTOP?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#OpBOXTOP</a> officially came to a close. Over the past 2 months, CC-177 Globemasters successfully airlifted over 1500 kl of fuel from Yellowknife to Nunavut as part of our biannual mission to bring supplies to CFS Alert. <a href="https://t.co/xB6Yw0LLtA">pic.twitter.com/xB6Yw0LLtA</a></p>— Canadian Armed Forces Operations (@CFOperations) <a href="https://twitter.com/CFOperations/status/1257374132624396292?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 4, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
<br />
I learned that indeed part of #OpBOXTOP is being flown from Yellowknife to Alert, but I am sure part of the mission has previously been flown in from Thule, Greenland. I'm not sure what principally decides if they're going to fly supplies in from Thule vs Yellowknife, or both. At least I know for next time, and will keep an eye out for an authoritative answer regarding the difference between #OpBOXTOP via Yellowknife, vs via Thule. I still don't know why they went to Alaska along the way, that also seemed unusual to me.<div><br /></div><div>My apologies to <a href="https://twitter.com/CFOperations" target="_blank">@CFOperations</a> for not understanding where the mission was taking place, I had expected them to fly direct from Trenton as they had before. Public affairs do a great job and are frequently under appreciated by the public and the press.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2XGgcI5R3twVLM_-rMZ9LeiPGenXHmdU-JnENEyQIJ48ZcJiQs92H7RZrQdGeO7FLvgJvidl93YLpDe6nc0u491CRo3v_5E7dHbLyA8zTKW8FveUiIAKGy07QzCDxq9jRRoWMK8JmRe8A/s2598/8533413641_b15f2ffa2a_o.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt=""A Hercules C-130J is being off loaded as a C-177 Globemaster III lands at Canadian Forces Station (CFS) Alert. Both aircraft carry supplies for the station in support of Operation BOXTOP" Photo: MCpl Shilo Adamson (April 25, 2012) IS2012-4006-7" border="0" data-original-height="1518" data-original-width="2598" height="374" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2XGgcI5R3twVLM_-rMZ9LeiPGenXHmdU-JnENEyQIJ48ZcJiQs92H7RZrQdGeO7FLvgJvidl93YLpDe6nc0u491CRo3v_5E7dHbLyA8zTKW8FveUiIAKGy07QzCDxq9jRRoWMK8JmRe8A/w640-h374/8533413641_b15f2ffa2a_o.jpg" title=""A Hercules C-130J is being off loaded as a C-177 Globemaster III lands at Canadian Forces Station (CFS) Alert. Both aircraft carry supplies for the station in support of Operation BOXTOP" Photo: MCpl Shilo Adamson (April 25, 2012) IS2012-4006-7" width="640" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">"A Hercules C-130J is being off loaded as a C-177 Globemaster III lands at Canadian Forces Station (CFS) Alert. Both aircraft carry supplies for the station in support of Operation BOXTOP"</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Photo: MCpl Shilo Adamson (April 25, 2012)</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">IS2012-4006-7</span></div><div><br /></div>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com72Alert, NU, Canada82.5017771 -62.348091754.191543263821153 -97.5043417 90 -27.191841699999998tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-25832918719929705452020-12-30T00:00:00.001-05:002021-01-24T15:01:02.779-05:00Live in the Middle East? Have an internet connection? Want to identify the planes above your head?As published to Medium on December 30, 2020<br /><br /><b>Live in the Middle East? Have an internet connection? Want to identify the planes above your head?</b><div><br />Let’s talk about tracking planes.</div><div><br /></div><div><a href="https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/live-in-the-middle-east-have-an-internet-connection-want-to-identify-the-planes-above-your-head-89d2164221d0">https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/live-in-the-middle-east-have-an-internet-connection-want-to-identify-the-planes-above-your-head-89d2164221d0</a></div>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-33215067525851417972020-10-26T00:00:00.001-04:002021-01-24T14:58:26.856-05:00Correcting “Storm Clouds Gather Over Open Skies Treaty”<p> As published to Medium October 6, 2020</p><p><b>Correcting “Storm Clouds Gather Over Open Skies Treaty”</b></p><p>Trump admin officials pollute the media ecosystem, others spread their disinformation. Let’s learn from this.</p><p><a href="https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/correcting-storm-clouds-gather-over-open-skies-treaty-4bd2c74f1561">https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/correcting-storm-clouds-gather-over-open-skies-treaty-4bd2c74f1561</a></p><p><br /></p>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-10602496239521806682020-08-04T00:00:00.001-04:002021-01-23T14:51:10.697-05:00No, the Russians did not fly over Trump’s golf course in 2017, no matter who said so.<p>As published to MEdium August 4, 2020</p><p>No, the Russians did not fly over Trump’s golf course in 2017, no matter who said so.</p><p><a href="https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/no-the-russians-did-not-fly-over-trumps-golf-course-in-2017-no-matter-who-said-so-98394b8ebd36">https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/no-the-russians-did-not-fly-over-trumps-golf-course-in-2017-no-matter-who-said-so-98394b8ebd36</a></p><p><br /></p>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-37174931299358750132020-07-14T14:48:00.001-04:002021-01-23T14:49:35.465-05:00Declassified Open Skies Treaty mission reports show over a decade of diplomacy and cooperation.<p>As published to Medium July 14, 2020<br /><br />Declassified Open Skies Treaty mission reports show over a decade of diplomacy and cooperation.</p><p><a href="https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/declassified-open-skies-treaty-mission-reports-show-over-a-decade-of-diplomacy-and-cooperation-655da50227d6">https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/declassified-open-skies-treaty-mission-reports-show-over-a-decade-of-diplomacy-and-cooperation-655da50227d6</a></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-69633665956807476232020-04-30T00:00:00.002-04:002021-01-23T14:47:32.712-05:0024 Canadian fighter jets participated in exercise Tipic Sauvage and Haboob Havoc, at Nellis AFB and MCAS Miramar.<p> </p><p>As posted to Medium April 30, 2020</p><p><b>24 Canadian fighter jets participated in exercise Tipic Sauvage and Haboob Havoc, at Nellis AFB and MCAS Miramar.</b></p><p><a href="https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/the-rcaf-sent-twenty-four-cf-188s-south-earlier-this-year-for-training-534089131da">https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/the-rcaf-sent-twenty-four-cf-188s-south-earlier-this-year-for-training-534089131da</a></p>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-77497064985312442342020-03-14T00:00:00.009-04:002021-01-23T10:31:50.826-05:00U.S. officials target U.S. ambassador with smear campaign, retaliation for positive Open Skies Treaty testimony.<p>As posted to Medium March 14, 2020</p><p><b>U.S. officials target U.S. ambassador with smear campaign, retaliation for positive Open Skies Treaty testimony.</b></p><p><a href="https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/u-s-officials-target-u-s-762436ae876f">https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/u-s-officials-target-u-s-762436ae876f</a></p><p><b><br /></b></p>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-33105731457443845802020-03-04T00:00:00.003-05:002021-01-23T10:29:07.577-05:00Do efforts to kill the Open Skies Treaty, and the al-Baghdadi raid, cross paths?<p>As posted to Medium March 4, 2020<br /><br /><b>Do efforts to kill the Open Skies Treaty, and the al-Baghdadi raid, cross paths?</b></p><p><a href="https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/do-efforts-to-kill-the-open-skies-treaty-and-the-al-baghdadi-raid-cross-paths-e33d991e580f">https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/do-efforts-to-kill-the-open-skies-treaty-and-the-al-baghdadi-raid-cross-paths-e33d991e580f</a></p><p><br /></p>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-8579512165378166792020-03-03T00:00:00.001-05:002021-01-23T10:22:03.527-05:00Inside the U.S. Senate resolution to withdraw from the Open Skies Treaty.<p>As published on Medium on March 3, 2020</p><p><b>Inside the U.S. Senate resolution to withdraw from the Open Skies Treaty.</b></p><p>It’s a Gong Show.</p><p><a href="https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/inside-the-u-s-senate-resolution-to-withdraw-from-the-open-skies-treaty-4cbad67f3981">https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/inside-the-u-s-senate-resolution-to-withdraw-from-the-open-skies-treaty-4cbad67f3981</a></p>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-41721197824646304292020-02-19T00:00:00.024-05:002021-01-23T10:19:51.580-05:00Open Skies Treaty Update, February 2020Published on Medium, February 19, 2020:<br /><b><br />Open Skies Treaty Update, February 2020</b><br /><br />An independent attempt to explain Vayl Oxford’s update to the House Armed Services Committee regarding the Open Skies Treaty.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.blogger.com/#">https://steffanwatkins.medium.com/open-skies-treaty-update-february-2020-132141965188</a>Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-23783231628522934862019-12-21T19:12:00.000-05:002019-12-22T08:33:18.955-05:00An open letter to NORAD and USNORTHCOM - Let's talk about Russian Navy operations <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBYHO5xxZYnOugoLrJaH_PGk71aJ0uCaArmpJxCulbaPNiVthclUAVeKvdzu6MmIBir_S3F9P7ElYAWoHOqzz4FK7s5VLSQ2Bb6wBjvMOJc8vz3-7n5pheQwWbgLEGtZgZWgRP25WrPOC5/s1600/D-LPvvXWkAMhu93.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="901" data-original-width="1600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBYHO5xxZYnOugoLrJaH_PGk71aJ0uCaArmpJxCulbaPNiVthclUAVeKvdzu6MmIBir_S3F9P7ElYAWoHOqzz4FK7s5VLSQ2Bb6wBjvMOJc8vz3-7n5pheQwWbgLEGtZgZWgRP25WrPOC5/s400/D-LPvvXWkAMhu93.jpeg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Russian Navy Frigate Admiral Gorshkov (credit:USNORTHCOM)</td></tr>
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Dear North American Aerospace Defense Command & U.S. Northern Command<br />
<br />
Do you have a few minutes? I hope so.<br />
<br />
I'm a long time fan of your work, defending North America and all, but it looks like information operations from unknown parties are taking place in NORAD's area of responsibility, and seem for the most part unchallenged. I don't want you to take that the wrong way, and maybe tell the public less, in an effort to reduce the attack surface, and reduce any public discussion about Russian Navy operations; I'd like you to lean into it, and I think you're already half way there.<br />
<br />
Let me try to explain what I mean with context.<br />
<br />
Back in the summer a few of Russian Navy ships stopped in Cuba, including the new Russian frigate Admiral Gorshkov, on their way around the world, and U.S. Northern Command told the public of that event; I was thrilled. No really, I was! Being so open and transparent with the public is not something I see militaries do frequently. Russian ships do still stop in Cuba occasionally, and it reminds me (and others) of old Soviet times when they had a significant military force there. While the Russians still do have a presence, somewhat, it's a shadow of those times. Their submarine base, as well as others, lie mostly as reinforced-concrete ruins.<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
<div dir="ltr" lang="en">
We are aware of the deployment of the Russian ship Gorshkov and are taking steps to actively track it. We won't discuss all measures being taken, but NORAD is conducting air operations in defense of the US & Canada and USNORTHCOM has deployed maritime assets to track Gorshkov.</div>
— U.S. Northern Command (@USNorthernCmd) <a href="https://twitter.com/USNorthernCmd/status/1143841560037081088?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 26, 2019</a></blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
<br />
Unfortunately, there was no follow-up saying the Russian ship left, which left an opportunity that was exploited by detractors who published rumours to social media that they were still there, days / months after they left. Being aware of a Russian warship stopping in for supplies in Havana is in the public interest, it is news, and it should be mentioned; thank you for that. However, the follow-up that they left, especially because they left within a couple of days, is equally important. I believe it is important to give the correct impression that they were passing through, not repositioning there. Not mentioning the departure gives the public the impression Russia forward deployed a frigate to be stationed in Havana, which isn't true. The Russian Navy was just passing through. In the future, I hope NORAD will be more clear about that. The initial transparency, telling the public, was fantastic, but it needed follow-through. I did notice the US Navy was tailing them as they departed the Americas; NORAD was aware of exactly where they were every moment of the day.<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
<div dir="ltr" lang="en">
My bad, they ARE reporting in on AIS again!<br />
<br />
🇺🇸 <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/USNavy?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#USNavy</a> Arleigh Burke-class destroyer USS Jason Dunham (MMSI:366997034|CS:NJDM) is heading for Florida, I guess Admiral Gorshkov has departed the <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NORAD?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#NORAD</a> area of interest.<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/USSJasonDunham?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#USSJasonDunham</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/DDG109?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#DDG109</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/AIS?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#AIS</a> ⚓ <a href="https://t.co/MhDb4teslm">https://t.co/MhDb4teslm</a> <a href="https://t.co/xkRfGyBsa6">pic.twitter.com/xkRfGyBsa6</a></div>
— Steffan Watkins (@steffanwatkins) <a href="https://twitter.com/steffanwatkins/status/1144968977682239488?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 29, 2019</a></blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
Just last week someone leaked to The Washington Times and CNN that the Russians were visiting in international waters off the US East Coast for their almost-yearly visit to conduct signals intelligence; NORAD could have broke that news publicly when they arrived to the region, without the leak and without help from the press. The Russian Navy AGI Viktor Leonov is well known to sail over from Murmansk every year or two. Their mission mostly out of public view because they do not use an AIS transponder, which would show where they are to ship tracking enthusiasts like myself. Without a transponder, I rely on other more creative means, including watching for others who might stumble across their location - but that's hard to come by, since they're over 12 NM away from shore, and likely only noticed by a few planes or other ships.<br />
<br />
The earliest reference I've ever found for the Viktor Leonov coming near the US East Coast was 1998, but of course I can't find that reference anymore; I thought it was off one of the wire services published years ago. I can still find a very slim reference to their visit in 2012 (https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/02/27/russia-cuba-warship/5876249/), as well as more detail in 2014 (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/russian-spy-ship-docks-havana-n40041), 2015 (https://abcnews.go.com/International/russian-spy-ships-arrival-cuba-raises-eyebrows/story?id=28377558), 2017 (https://abcnews.go.com/International/russian-spy-ship-now-off-virginia-coast/story?id=45547194), and 2018 (https://freebeacon.com/national-security/pentagon-shadowing-russian-spy-ship/). These are facts, matters of history, that are being written by the press, that future generations will refer to. Telling the public what's going on is probably listed somewhere lower on the list of NORAD's daily activities than protecting the public. In today's age of information warfare, telling the public the truth, up front, denies NORAD's adversaries the capability of exploiting a lack of information to propagate disinformation. Publishing information from an official source has the effect of acting as an area of denial weapon in an information war; it denies the adversary the capability of waging a whisper campaign, spreading disinformation, since public information allows anyone to fact-check, and refute their statements, if the information is from a trusted source. I can't think of a more trustworthy source for Canadians and Americans than a NORAD press release. NORAD has the power to suffocate any information operations trying to misinform the public about Russian Navy operations in international waters, if they take the initiative to do so. Information is an area of denial weapon, and while NORAD knows that at some level, it is not taking advantage of the high ground it holds. By not being forthright with information, NORAD is ceding the information battlespace to adversaries who are exploiting the lack of information for agitprop.<br />
<br />
I've seen (false!) reports alleging that Russian Navy ships (plural!) have been off the coast since Trump was elected, that they dock at Mar-a-Lago, that they drop anchor outside Mar-a-Lago, that they were snooping on Wifi (of course) at Mar-a-Lago, that they were planting nuclear mines along the seaboard, that they communicate with President Trump on his phone, that they tap his phone from offshore, and of course that they're there to pick up President Trump as he flees from his life of crime. Does anyone take these rumours seriously? Well, the problem is, there's so much disinformation it's hard for the American and Canadian public to keep it all straight. Snopes articles about each of these varieties of lies are not what we need; the public needs authoritative information from one of their most trusted guardian, NORAD.<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
<div dir="ltr" lang="en">
While we won't discuss specific measures being taken, NORAD and USNORTHCOM routinely conduct air and maritime operations to ensure the defense of the United States and Canada. 2/2</div>
— North American Aerospace Defense Command (@NORADCommand) <a href="https://twitter.com/NORADCommand/status/1207071415238680576?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 17, 2019</a></blockquote>
<br />
<br />
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>I have three humble requests.<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>Please continue to tell the public when Russian Navy operations are taking place in NORAD's area of interest.</li>
<li>Please break the news yourself, so the public can recognize the excellent work NORAD is doing, and know it's from a trusted source.</li>
<li>Please ask the US Navy to consider leaving their transponders on, as USS Jason Dunham did in the summer, but USS Mahan did not while tailing Viktor Leonov after December 14th. If they can look out their window and see their escort, turning off AIS isn't going to improve OPSEC.</li>
</ul>
I simply don't believe there's any reason for the public to rely on rumours spread by leaks and malicious actors with their own agendas; you know where "they" are, and "they" know you know where they are. Leaving the news of their arrival and departure up to the rumour mill only enables disinformation. Please continue to tell the public about their comings, but also their goings, so the public doesn't get the impression there is a traffic jam off the coast off Mar-a-Lago. 😉<br />
<br />
Thank you, and Happy Holidays.<br />
<br />
Steffan Watkins<br />
Ottawa, Canada<br />
<br />
<br /></div>
Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-33594338469097944442019-12-04T06:44:00.000-05:002020-03-03T17:35:47.869-05:00Taking apart the Cotton/Cruz anti-Open Skies Treaty resolution in the United States Senate<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrS9o6blCnxy2DJyY9rmW9XsP0Q_JPmOxkiU5jPpGOU2zFKNCiclNPX3iSdMlvdHO2ECciKrzXptcBdOCnNUkA7z2AqN95dnP1bpwzO9h5Q_jr95XC-B4PgQucPp3rbeugKW0zrrHL6nFE/s1600/gettyimages-466715424.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="520" data-original-width="780" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrS9o6blCnxy2DJyY9rmW9XsP0Q_JPmOxkiU5jPpGOU2zFKNCiclNPX3iSdMlvdHO2ECciKrzXptcBdOCnNUkA7z2AqN95dnP1bpwzO9h5Q_jr95XC-B4PgQucPp3rbeugKW0zrrHL6nFE/s320/gettyimages-466715424.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Tom Cotton participates in a conversation<br />
about American foreign strategy<br />
and statesmanship at the Hudson Institute<br />
March 18, 2015 in Washington, DC. (Getty)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<h2 style="text-align: left;">
<span style="color: red;">UPDATED AND REPUBLISHED ON MEDIUM (2020-03-03)</span></h2>
<a href="https://medium.com/@steffanwatkins/inside-the-u-s-senate-resolution-to-withdraw-from-the-open-skies-treaty-4cbad67f3981">https://medium.com/@steffanwatkins/inside-the-u-s-senate-resolution-to-withdraw-from-the-open-skies-treaty-4cbad67f3981</a><br />
<br />
<br />
<strike>I find it difficult to explain how frustrating it is to watch the same stories about the Open Skies Treaty get circulated for over four years, with little understanding in the media, and almost no fact-checking of official sources, while I scream into the void, write long-form explainers, micro-blog, talk about it in podcasts, assist journalists in their research, and do interviews to inform the public about what's going on; all the while the news media is duped by officials trying to kill the treaty with deliberately misleading quotes, omissions, and half-truths. After documenting and publicising information, refuting claims made by politicians, and their favourite think tanks, I have received some good feedback from a variety of people. Some say wow, I didn't know about this treaty - even journalists covering the defence sector, members of the military (domestic + foreign), and government officials appreciate that someone is trying, however futilly, to educate the public about the Open Skies Treaty. I know that to be true, because they've told me so. That gives me hope. I'd like to think I've educated a few people along the way, but here we are, many years later; the same disinformation is making headlines, the Open Skies Treaty is on the brink of being destroyed by the Americans, and the same politicians from over four years ago are still duping the people of the world with their half-truths and flat out lies.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>I'm crestfallen, but I'm not beaten.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>By following the majority of published news items about the Open Skies Treaty, and asking the right questions on and off the record to people in the know, I am very familiar with the majority of the alleged violations of the Open Skies Treaty, and some of the violations which haven't been alleged too. Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) have tabled a resolution in the United States Senate (<a href="https://www.cruz.senate.gov/files/documents/2019.10.30_DAV19I06.pdf">https://www.cruz.senate.gov/files/documents/2019.10.30_DAV19I06.pdf</a>) which seems to exploit the disinformation Cotton and his proxies have been spreading for years.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirwVLoPTsCdWLpE3Iz8aaWw0h5fB3QWUldb0FyL4wiX9xsW14sWNGtSHVFqjUNRgEAmUi8thr3mt92uCLa9NisUzz3NgM19DkSEQbKm10N9fkmo9-dRWVwkzGXYK-SSNUReSrcEqMEFBcS/s1600/CottonCSIS_hqdefault.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><strike><img border="0" data-original-height="360" data-original-width="480" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirwVLoPTsCdWLpE3Iz8aaWw0h5fB3QWUldb0FyL4wiX9xsW14sWNGtSHVFqjUNRgEAmUi8thr3mt92uCLa9NisUzz3NgM19DkSEQbKm10N9fkmo9-dRWVwkzGXYK-SSNUReSrcEqMEFBcS/s320/CottonCSIS_hqdefault.jpg" width="320" /></strike></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><strike>Tom Cotton at CSIS Headquarters July 17, 2017</strike><br />
<strike>for a paid speaking engagement about the INF Treaty</strike></td></tr>
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<strike>I feel like this is shaping up to be a final push before their Republican POTUS is ousted. I think they're in a rush, and I think they're getting sloppy. They're recycling talking points from 2015 and 2016 that don't apply anymore. As time moves on their ammunition is running out, the allegations are being disproven or shown to be untrue. "Violations" keep getting resolved, and despite what they might tell you, diplomacy is working. Other countries, beside the Russians, have also moved to digital electro-optical sensors. I will demonstrate to you that this resolution in the Senate is the latest contrived attempt to kill the Open Skies Treaty by Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR), and now Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX). I believe these are the death throes of Cotton's quest to kill the treaty for the interests who lobby him.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>The following an excerpts of the reasons cited in the Cotton/Cruz resolution in the senate for terminating the participation of the United States in the Open Skies Treaty.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b><strike>Whereas the Department of State has repeatedly assessed<br />and documented in its annual report on Adherence to<br />and Compliance with Arms Control, Nonproliferation,<br />and Disarmament Agreements and Commitments, that<br />Russia is violating the Treaty on Open Skies, done at<br />Helsinki March 24, 1992, and entered into force January<br />1, 2002 (commonly known as the ‘‘Open Skies Treaty’’);</strike></b></blockquote>
<strike>Why not take this opportunity to explain the violations to the American people and the rest of the people of the world. The United States Department of State publishes a report every year, a report which is not sanctioned by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), or Open Skies Consultative Commission (OSCC). It is a United States Department of State account, from their view, of how the United States feels other countries are adhering, or not, to arms control agreements. While Americans likely don't want to hear this, there are 33 other signatories to the Open Skies Treaty, meaning there are 34 members of the OSCC, who have monthly meetings in Vienna, where they resolve disputes with diplomacy, and the United States does not have a special role to critique compliance. The compliance report holds no weight internationally, other than being an opinion voiced by the United States. Interestingly, the present chairperson of the OSCC is even American. Are the items that the United States Department of State calls violations, also considered violations by the entire OSCC? I don't know, they're quite tight lipped about that, so it would seem not. We do not know anything about what the 33 other members feel about the American-alleged violations, other than none of them believe the United States should leave. No country has made any statements which echo the Americans' position that they must withdraw from the Open Skies Treaty for reasons of national security. Even domestic American academics don't agree that the United States should withdraw from the treaty. You may wonder why I don't call any of the alleged-violations, just "violations". There is surely conduct that Russia has performed in the past 15+ years of flights that have been violations, but the last two outstanding "violations" are contentious, complicated, and the alleged-violations are significantly less critical than anyone who is trying to kill the treaty wants the public to understand. Amy Woolf of the Congressional Research institute goes over what they mean in her testimony before congress just a few weeks ago; let me allow her to speak for herself.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/E20-eQUKtS4?start=2823" width="560"></iframe><br /></strike>
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>A snippet of Amy Woolf's written testimony below:</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>"Concerns About Russian Compliance. The 2019 version of the State Department’s Annual Report on Adherence to and Compliance with Arms Control, Nonproliferation, and Disarmament Agreements and Commitments highlighted two areas of concern about Russian compliance with the Open Skies Treaty. The first notes that, while the Treaty establishes a maximum range of 5,500 kilometers for observation flights, Russia has imposed a sublimit of 500 kilometers for flights over its Kaliningrad region. Kaliningrad is a relatively small, but heavily militarized area that is geographically separate from Russia. According to some reports, Russia imposed this limit after an overflight by Poland in 2014 lingered over Kaliningrad and interfered with commercial aviation in the area. While this sublimit does not preclude flights over or observations of military activities in Kaliningrad, it is inconsistent with the terms of the Treaty and an OSCC decision that “precludes a State Party from decreasing the maximum flight distance from an Open Skies airfield.”</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>The 2019 Compliance Report also notes that Russia has prohibited observation flights within ten kilometers of its border with the South Ossetia and Abkhazia regions of Georgia. This dispute is less about the provisions of the Treaty than it is about Russia’s dispute with Georgia over the status of these regions. The Treaty permits parties to prohibit flights within ten kilometers of independent states that are not a party to the Treaty. While Georgia is a party to the Treaty, Russia has considered South Ossetia and Abkhazia to be independent states since its 2008 conflict with Georgia. Because these regions have not joined the Treaty, Russia has argued that flights cannot approach their borders. The United States and other parties to the Treaty have not accepted this interpretation of the status of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Russia has recently indicated that it would lift the ban on flights within ten kilometers of the borders with South Ossetia and Abkhazia if Georgia were to accept Open Skies overflights from Russia. Georgia had suspended this access in 2017 and 2018."</strike><br />
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<strike>source: <a href="https://www.csce.gov/sites/helsinkicommission.house.gov/files/III%203%20Woolf%20Testimony.pdf">https://www.csce.gov/sites/helsinkicommission.house.gov/files/III%203%20Woolf%20Testimony.pdf</a></strike><br />
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<strike>(*correction, Georgia has restricted access to its airspace, prohibiting Russian overflights since 2012 per the Georgian Government, a violation itself - reference: <a href="https://old.civil.ge/eng/article.php?id=24634">https://old.civil.ge/eng/article.php?id=24634</a>)</strike><br />
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<strike>As Amy Woolf notes in her testimony to Congress, these are not core issues, these are fringe outlying issues which do not significantly impede core Open Skies Treaty objectives. This is also a view shared by the RCAF, a representative of which <a href="https://www.vesselofinterest.com/2016/10/dnd-downplays-operational-impact-of.html" target="_blank">I interviewed in late 2016</a> about these same violations. I submit to you that framing these alleged violations as huge issues is purely a political stunt, they are not factual, and they are not acting in good faith; which shouldn't be entirely surprising from the likes of Cotton and Cruz.</strike><br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b><strike>Whereas, in 2015, Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Lieutenant General Vincent R. Stewart, testified to</strike></b><br />
<b><strike>Congress that ‘‘[t]he Open Skies construct was designed</strike></b><br />
<b><strike>for a different era,’’ and in 2016, that the treaty allows</strike></b><br />
<b><strike>Russia ‘‘to get incredible foundational intelligence on crit-</strike></b><br />
<b><strike>ical infrastructure, bases, ports, all of our facilities’’ and</strike></b><br />
<b><strike>provides Russia with ‘‘a significant advantage’’;</strike></b></blockquote>
<strike>It is quite remarkable that opponents of the Open Skies Treaty keep coming back to LtGen Stewart, but it's great for me, since his misleading testimony was what motivated me to take on interviewing the Royal Canadian Air Force, to get their view. I'd been interested for years about where the Russian Open Skies Treaty flights were taking place over Canada, because I wanted to see where their flights intersected with my interest in Cold War history, to understand what they were looking at. I had a wild and crazy question in the back of my mind; did Canada have a secret base that they were checking up on? (Spoiler: Nope) but the Russians' paths did uncover (for me) that they visit the former military bases in Northern Canada, as well as current bases, naval bases, and other locations of military interest. But why were they visiting closed bases that were nothin but concrete and rubble? I spoke with a senior officer, off the record, about choosing the location for a satellite downlink, and from what I recall part of the decision was what infrastructure was already there, and that property was already owned by the Government. There's no need to buy new land for military projects, there's lots of minimally used DND land that can handle more than one use. So, the Russians were absolutely right in visiting former military bases, some of which have been converted to prisons or other facilities. They're flying over to get a better look at them, just to make sure. If you didn't know a present-day prison was actually formerly a military base, radar base, or missile launch site, I can only imagine what interesting conspiracy theories could be made up about a Russian-assisted prison break, and flying through restricted airspace above the prison. Because of LtGen Stewart's testimony I filed Access to Information requests (The Canadian FOIA) for all the Russian flight plans over Canada, and I got over ten years of them, proving they are flying over sites of clear military interest, despite the information provided to LtGen Stewart, and in turn to the United States Senate.</strike><br />
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<strike>I don't feel entirely comfortable embarrassing LtGen Stewart for his comments, because I have reason to believe he was fed a line, several even, by people who had political motivations within or outside the DIA, who were sympathetic or directly acting on behalf of Sen. Tom Cotton. Unfortunately, despite LtGen Stewart's best intentions, he's been made to look like a fool by them. LtGen Stewart testified that the Russians switching from wet-film to digital (an American initiative that had been going on for nearly a decade at the time) was akin to going from Polaroids to 1080P. If you're of the right age, you remember what a consumer grade instant Polaroid picture looks like, and they look terrible despite your rosy memories of your childhood. You probably know what a 1080P video image looks like, which is technically 2 megapixels. LtGen Stewart was portraying that a fuzzy polaroid was equivalent to what the Russians used to see when they flew over the United States (like in 2017), and that the American government had to block ratification of the Russian digital electro-optical sensor which would give them pictures that would now look exponentially better, like 1080p. This is clearly an attempt to portray the change in the their capabilities and level of detail as superior to what it was, and it was quite absurd. If the head of the Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA), who is opposed to the treaty, and has been for the entire length of the treaty, can get away with making such ridiculous statements into the record, without anyone calling him out, I have to wonder what's going on. Fortunately, his testimony provides me with a clear example that anyone with a film camera who upgraded to a digital camera (of equivalent capability) can understand.</strike><br />
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<strike>Let me digress for a minute.</strike><br />
<strike>My dad used to shoot 35mm slide film with a 35mm camera, and I shoot digital pictures with a digital camera now. He took great pictures of fish doing underwater photography in the Bahamas. Those slides (which are still in a box) when blown up on a projector look great, lots of detail, and while my digital camera may give a better picture than his 35mm then, it's not overwhelmingly better - but it's certainly way easier to see, edit, store, etc - it's digital after all. The wet film cameras of the Open Skies Treaty are all treaty-limited in their capability. They can only take pictures of 30 cm resolution, and do so at 3 different altitudes, using different cameras and lenses. It's a high end wet-film camera. The new digital electro-optical sensors (ahem, digital cameras) are equally high-end, but made to comply with the maximum resolution requirements in the treaty. The United States didn't raise the red flag about the German Open Skies Treaty plane and their new digital electro-optical sensor, did they? The switch to digital was an American initiative, that all countries are in the middle of right now. The German Luftwaffe is flying theirs, testing it, right now - or was earlier today. The Russians first deployed theirs for their flights over Europe in 2014. LtGen Stewart's testimony in 2016 was all about trashing the move to digital on the Tu-154M that the Russians use to overfly the United States, and his testimony wasn't compelling to the Obama administration, who approved the digital electro-optical camera in 2016, and it flew over the United States in 2017 - over the White House even (foreshadowing). It then shouldn't be surprising that the Defence Intelligence Agency has an axe to grind, and is still against having a Russian observation plane with 30 cm resolution cameras fly over the United States. The thing is, there's more to the treaty than the DIA. The State Department and STRATCOM are both in favour of the treaty, so are other departments, academics, former and current officials, as well as dozens of other allied nations. The OSCE PA has even said they would like the United States to table their issues with the Open Skies Treaty at the OSCC, and not unilaterally pull out of the treaty. There is no country in the world that believes that it is necessary for the Americans to withdraw from the Open Skies Treaty, and there is no reason to believe anything Rep. Tom Cotton (R-AR) has said based on the years of disinformation he's been spreading.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>Here is LtGen Stewart's testimony for you to review and come to your own conclusions. LtGen Stewart is a highly decorated accomplished senior military officer, now retired, with an exemplary career. I think it's unfortunate he was mislead and used in this way by whoever briefed him, as he clearly is not a technical guy, by his own admission and testimony. Because of this, I do not think his testimony can be taken seriously, unfortunately. His testimony was in context of the digital electro-optical sensor upgrade, not just the Open Skies Treaty, and we know now all the FUD being spread about the sensor was just propaganda. The specifications of the camera were fully disclosed by the Russians to the public, and all treaty signatories, including the United States, and all confirmed that the sensor is limited to 30 cm resolution, as Amy Woolf stated in her testimony just a few weeks ago. Any quotes from LtGen Stewart's testimony being used by Cruz or Cotton are being taken out of context, and his cannot be used as an authority on the treaty.</strike><br />
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<strike><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/5lE9lZq9bIA?start=2881" width="560"></iframe><br /></strike>
<i><strike>(U) March 2nd 2016 House Armed Services Committee hearing on World Wide Threats</strike></i><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b><strike>Whereas, in 2016, the Commander of the United States Strategic Command, Admiral Cecil Haney, testified to Congress that the Open Skies Treaty gives Russia ‘‘a capability to be able to reconnoiter parts of our country and<br />other nations’’;</strike></b></blockquote>
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>I'm not sure how Adm Haney didn't notice, but "reconnoitering" parts of the United States, and 32 other countries, is exactly what the Open Skies Treaty is meant to do. We - the American allies who are signatory to the treaty - reconnoiter Russia too, many dozens of times a year. In fact, we can do it much more often if we like; the quotas are renegotiated yearly. Doing so is not objectionable, and raises questions as to what anyone thought the treaty was for if not exactly that. Is his statement true? Yes, Russia does reconnoiter, but it's certainly not a reason to kill the treaty; it's the reason 34 countries are signatory to the treaty. What an incredibly weird justification for withdrawing from a treaty; doing what it says it's supposed to do. His testimony is not a justification to leave the treaty, it's just describing a working Open Skies Treaty mission. We do exactly the same thing over Russia as the Russians do over he United States, and all other signatory countries.</strike><br />
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<strike><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/3q58h0kUP9w?start=1321" width="560"></iframe><br /></strike>
<strike><br /></strike>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<strike><b>Whereas, in 2017, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,</b><b>General Joseph Dunford, testified to Congress that ‘‘we</b><b>don’t believe the treaty should be in place if the Russians</b><b>aren’t complying’’;</b></strike></blockquote>
<strike>Shockingly this is out of context, this quote is cherry picked and cropped, let me correct it.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>Dunford's whole quote, in context of Tom Cotton leading questions, was to say at 58:25 "let me (..) make sure we make it clear, we believe on balance that it would be best that the treaty continue to be in place, but we do not believe the treaty should be in place if the Russians are not compliant, but there is a decidedly aggressive diplomatic effort to bring the Russians back into compliance, which we think would be the best outcome"</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>Tom Cotton cites four (alleged) violations in this September 2017 testimony</strike><br />
<strike>(remember this date)</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><strike>Limiting flights over Kaliningrad (that's the 500km sub-limit)</strike></li>
<li><strike>Abkhazia and South Ossetia (Georgian breakaway republics; the 10km issue)</strike></li>
<li><strike><b>Chechnya</b>, which in September 2017 was no longer an issue, per the April 2017 State Department compliance report.<br />"One compliance concern cited in previous editions of the Compliance Report — a minimum altitude restriction over Chechnya — has been resolved. In early 2016, U.S. implementers observed that Russia stopped including altitude restrictions over Chechnya during pre-mission briefs. On April 18, during the OSCC plenary, the Russian representative confirmed that Russia no longer published altitude restrictions over Chechnya."<br />source: <a href="https://www.state.gov/2017-report-on-adherence-to-and-compliance-with-arms-control-nonproliferation-and-disarmament-agreements-and-commitments/">https://www.state.gov/2017-report-on-adherence-to-and-compliance-with-arms-control-nonproliferation-and-disarmament-agreements-and-commitments/</a></strike></li>
<li><strike><b>An altitude limit over (a part of) Moscow</b>, which was also dropped as an issue in April 2017, after it was discovered by the American delegation to the OSCC that other countries have also imposed similar altitude restrictions for air traffic control / flight safety reasons. The issue did not reappear in 2018 or 2019, it's gone for good.<br />"Russia’s imposition of a minimum altitude for all air traffic over Moscow, in the region designated as UUP-53, continued and impacted one observation flight in 2016. The United States discussed this concern with States Party in 2016, including Russia’s assertion that the altitude restriction is linked to safety of flight, and it became clear that a number of States Party impose altitude restrictions for reasons of flight safety. The United States, Russia, and other interested States Party intend to explore altitude restrictions as part of a broader discussion of air traffic control procedures and Open Skies Treaty implementation. The United States will continue to monitor this issue closely."<br />source: <a href="https://www.state.gov/2017-report-on-adherence-to-and-compliance-with-arms-control-nonproliferation-and-disarmament-agreements-and-commitments/">https://www.state.gov/2017-report-on-adherence-to-and-compliance-with-arms-control-nonproliferation-and-disarmament-agreements-and-commitments/</a></strike></li>
</ul>
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>It serves Tom Cotton's interest to overstate the alleged Russian violations, and rounding up by a factor of 2x, reporting alleged violations which had already been resolved and reported as such, publicly, almost 6 months earlier, was not caught by the media.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>Tom Cotton continued with his misleading line of questioning asking Gen Dunford if the Russians get more out of the imagery than the Americans do since the Americans have superior satellite constellations for imagery; but this is a truism and has always been accepted as such. There is nobody on the planet with a better satellite constellation for imagery than the United States. That's not a reason to kill the treaty, since it was that way when the Americans proposed and signed the treaty.</strike><br />
<strike>It's that way by design, and it's always been that way.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>Starting at (57:32)</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike><iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="330" src="https://www.c-span.org/video/standalone/?434409-1/joint-chiefs-staff-general-dunford-testifies-reappointment" width="512"></iframe><br /></strike>
<strike><br /></strike>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<strike><b>Whereas the Government of the Russian Federation has recently used the Open Skies Treaty for surveillance of major American cities and infrastructure, including</b><b>Washington D.C. and New York City;</b></strike></blockquote>
<strike>...and Area51, China Lake, the Nevada Test Site, RCS sites, ICBM fields, missile testing sites, Cheyenne Mountain... Tom Cotton didn't think an enterprising OSINT afficianado with a knack for tracking planes would examine the flight paths of many past flights, at great detail, and debunk this; they're not flying over anything that doesn't have a military use. I've done this for American flights, and Canadian flights, alleging that the Russians are using their flights to survey anything that we wouldn't survey ourselves is completely untrue. I also interviewed the RCAF about this, and the RCAF on the record confirm there is nothing the Russians are flying over that we don't fly over ourselves. Suggesting they are flying over "critical infrastructure" in some sort of improper manner is not any sort of violation of the treaty even if it were true, which it is not. The flight paths of the flights, and where they take pictures, can be determined with OSINT, or if the FOIA system was working correctly, could be asked for directly, since the Russians provide all signatories to the treaty a list of where they took pictures at the end of their flight over the United States. All treaty signatories know what the Russians took pictures of, so it's completely disingenuous of Cotton to claim they are spying on critical infrastructure in two ways. Factually, they are not. Per the treaty, they're allowed to. We are also allowed to, and we do take pictures of their infrastructure if there is a need. "Infrastructure", for example rail, is of military as well as civilian use, and knowing what's on the rail cars is in the interest of the Russians, as well as being completely legal under the treaty.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<strike><b>Whereas the Government of the Russian Federation has installed advanced digital technology for use in Open Skies flights, enhancing its surveillance and espionage capabilities; Whereas Government of the Russian Federation has limited</b><b>and at times outright denied access for surveillance flights by the United States and other countries;</b></strike></blockquote>
<strike>This is a two part-er;</strike><br />
<strike>a) The switch to digital was an American initiative from a decade ago, everyone in the treaty is moving to digital. I suspect Cotton realized this, and sped up efforts to kill the treaty, but this item is already out of date and proves their initiative to kill the treaty is disingenuous.</strike><br />
<strike>a1) Tom Cotton may not want the public to be aware that the Germans have already installed their digital electro-optical sensor, and are in the middle of testing it - hopefully it will be flying next year.</strike><br />
<strike>a2) The United States (you may have heard of them) has already installed their digital electro-optical sensor and is testing it too; maybe ready for next year, only 7 years behind the Russians.</strike><br />
<strike>b) Outright denied access to what? When? There isn't enough information here to make an argument, let alone expose it for the propaganda that it is. When planes arrive n country they table a flight plan, that flight plan outlines what they want to overfly, if there are flight safety issues or weather, the flight plan is changed - it's a negotiation. It's extremely rare for a flight to be denied completely, but it did happen between Russian and Turkey, when Turkey wouldn't give access to the areas Russia wanted several years ago. No Open Skies Treaty flights have been denied over Russia, that's disinformation.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b><strike>Whereas Congress has repeatedly sought to limit implementation of the Open Skies Treaty in response to Russian treaty violations, including in the John S. McCain National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2019 (Public Law 115–232);</strike></b></blockquote>
<strike>He's got me there, he's flooded Congress with disinformation for years, and have made several very poor misinformed decisions. In the last NDAA it even brought up the risks of SAR, and no plane has SAR certified, or installed. Sure the treaty allows for it, but nobody is doing it, or even has any plans to do it - it looked like it was added to the NDAA to promote fear.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b><strike>Whereas the United States Government has developed and deployed technology so that it does not gain significant additional intelligence from participating in the Open Skies Treaty; </strike></b></blockquote>
<strike>Welcome to 1992! The United States has had superior spy satellites which render part of the Open Skies Treaty flights redundant in terms of *new* information, but it isn't just about *new* imagery for most countries either; Open Skies Treaty flights serve as a manner to gather unclassified imagery of things they may already be privy to through national technical means. Resulting Open Skies Treaty imagery can be presented at the UN, NATO, or NORAD in an unclassified setting. American TOP SECRET//SI//TK//NOFORN 6 cm resolution imagery needs to be handled more carefully, but 30cm res can be carried in a binder, or even emailed to someone in a slide deck. It provides imagery that can be shared with any partner nation, even if they do not have an intelligence sharing agreement in place.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b><strike>Whereas participating in the Open Skies Treaty costs the<br />United States hundreds of millions of dollars in unnecessary spending</strike></b></blockquote>
<strike>Again, this is just disinformation by the Cotton cadre. All nations, even the United States, benefit from the Open Skies treaty to different degrees, filling in gaps as well as enabling unclassified intelligence sharing; and considering the American OC-135s are ~60 years old, I think they've been paid off a while. It's time to buy new planes, but you don't need anything bigger than the new German plane, which is a recycled Airbus A319. A repurposed KC-10 would do just fine as well, and be a heck of a lot more efficient; I hear they're having some growing pains anyway and might have a spare or two.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<strike>Please watch the following testimony by three expert witnesses on the hill and dispel some of the rumours that have been getting spread by Cotton and his cadre for over 4 years.</strike><br />
<strike><br /></strike>
<div>
<strike><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/E20-eQUKtS4" width="560"></iframe></strike>
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Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-36406991435701495392019-10-31T09:59:00.000-04:002020-03-04T05:58:52.104-05:00Do efforts to kill the Open Skies Treaty, and the al-Baghdadi raid, cross paths?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3WFna_jiw2K7Xbh6JiQ66ULU3npmwqyMrlWpJdchMRfxBlP2amIps1t2iUnb9QAlu4M_IahF5tRwQ5WE4n1LvJATCezK1Bk-XDjFHPMeAtTSA-NRIHIbJ5rZbRXJaD-kRoY2pU_JQL11-/s1600/190814-F-ZT243-0251.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1280" data-original-width="1600" height="512" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3WFna_jiw2K7Xbh6JiQ66ULU3npmwqyMrlWpJdchMRfxBlP2amIps1t2iUnb9QAlu4M_IahF5tRwQ5WE4n1LvJATCezK1Bk-XDjFHPMeAtTSA-NRIHIbJ5rZbRXJaD-kRoY2pU_JQL11-/s640/190814-F-ZT243-0251.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px; text-align: center;">Aircrew members assigned to Russian air force Open Skies<br />
and Airmen assigned to the 15th Wing, pose for a group photo<br />
at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii, Aug. 14, 2019<br />
Photo Credit: Tech. Sgt. Heather Redman, 15th Wing Public Affairs, USAF</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
There have been a series of startling things in the media which have compelled me to document and draw attention to the timing of events.<br />
Are they related, or a coincidence?<br />
<br />
Based on information from multiple leaks, during the <b>1st week of October</b>, Tim Morrison, the National Security Council’s Russia and Europe director, put some sort of letter of intent to withdraw from the Open Skies Treaty under Donald Trump’s fingers while a pen was in them, finishing off the paperwork that John Bolton had drafted before leaving, and progressing a personal quest of Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) has been on for years, to kill the Open Skies Treaty. Did I mention Tim, Tom, and John are all on the same page about the Open Skies Treaty? Well, they’re three peas in a pod.<br />
<div>
On Friday <b>October 4th</b>, 2019 a meeting invite went out to several departments of the United States Government for an NSC meeting on October 7th, Monday, without a set agenda.</div>
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On Saturday <b>October 5th</b>, Turkish President Erdogan announced an operation involving Turkish forces in Northern Syria would commence, also on Monday October 7th.</div>
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<a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-syria-security-turkey-usa/erdogan-says-turkey-to-launch-military-operation-in-northeast-syria-idUSKCN1WK053">https://www.reuters.com/article/us-syria-security-turkey-usa/erdogan-says-turkey-to-launch-military-operation-in-northeast-syria-idUSKCN1WK053</a></div>
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<div>
By Sunday <b>October 6th</b> the public was aware that the US Military would be withdrawing, leaving the Kurds to fight the Turks, and it was all defence correspondents were reporting on.</div>
<div>
<a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/u-s-says-it-will-stand-aside-turkey-moves-syria-n1063106">https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/u-s-says-it-will-stand-aside-turkey-moves-syria-n1063106</a></div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
On Monday <b>October 7th</b> there was the aforementioned meeting between members of the NSC, and other government departments. From my understanding, all departments were told that they would have to be prepared for October 26th when they would exit the Open Skies Treaty, because Trump already signed a letter of intent to exit the treaty; which didn’t make any sense to me, since withdrawing from a treaty takes months of negotiations. I asked around if this was something about an NDAA deadline, or some other event that I was unaware of - nobody I asked knew.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
On Wednesday <b>October 9th</b> Slate published an article giving a significant amount of detail about the story, </div>
<div>
<a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/10/open-skies-trump-bolton-morrison.html">https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/10/open-skies-trump-bolton-morrison.html</a></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Several articles were written by many <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/open-skies-help-keep-the-peace-with-russia-11571599202">experts</a> (WSJ published one from George P. Shultz, William J. Perry and Sam Nunn), even the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/10/opinion/open-skies-treaty-trump.html">NYT </a>editorial board, all in support of the treaty, and no interviews were granted to anyone at the White House or National Security Council. The leak was real, and the article by <a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/10/open-skies-trump-bolton-morrison.html">Slate </a>was true - nobody at the NSC was ready to talk about any of it, yet.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Over the next two weeks I spent a lot of time tutoring journalists on the Open Skies Treaty, laying trails of breadcrumbs on Twitter so people could find their own information, hooking them up with experts in the field, publicising new developments about the Open Skies Treaty crisis, and tweeting background for the media and the public. All the while I was being mindful that one of the principal enemies of the treaty was at the helm, in the NSC, destroying the treaty; Tim Morrison. But what would be happening October 26th?</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>October 23</b>rd, CSIS published an article on the Open Skies Treaty, and when I contacted the author for edits to the piece to make a significant detail unambiguous, he refused to make any changes - not one word - saying he stood behind every word and gave three references to other articles (including The Economist, which he may not have noticed I contributed to). Upon reviewing the articles, none supported his position.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I had contacted the author of the paper, and rethought my many objections, condensing them down to changing just one word toward the top of the article that could be changed to make it clear to the public that flights over Kaliningrad are *not* being blocked; Open Skies Treaty flights are being *frustrated*, by a 500 km limit, and the RCAF has characterised that limit as not significant to their missions over Kaliningrad. That’s unusual, I thought, but CSIS is a think tank; there is no reason to think they would have any desire to change the piece at all. Why did they publish the piece on October 23rd, two weeks after Slate broke the story on Oct 9th? I still don’t know. That’s unusual, I thought, but CSIS is a think tank, not a newspaper; there is no reason to think they would have any desire to change the piece at all. But why did they publish the piece on October 23rd, two weeks after Slate broke the story on Oct 9th?<br />
<br />
This is the 2nd time I’ve run into an Open Skies Treaty article related to someone at CSIS which I’ve found ambiguously worded and riddled with issues, and the author refused to make any changes then too. The last was written by Kath Hicks (and/or her research assistant), for <a href="https://www.thecipherbrief.com/column_article/the-russian-threat-youre-not-hearing-about">The Cipher Brief</a>. Not one change made out of 8 pages of feedback; I find that fascinating. Perhaps people at CSIS have been, or are being, targeted with disinformation from sources close to Cotton and Morrison; maybe John Bolton is going to appear shortly as one of their senior fellows, time will tell.<br />
<br />
(after months of nothing in response to my email, I published the corrections publicly)<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-partner="tweetdeck">
<div dir="ltr" lang="en">
While I'm pretty sure I remember <a href="https://twitter.com/kath_hicks?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@kath_hicks</a> welcoming feedback, I can't find those tweets anymore, and I have heard nothing back from my email on August 16th 2018 requesting the record be corrected. <a href="https://t.co/KLH3oAYFzN">https://t.co/KLH3oAYFzN</a></div>
— 𝔰𝔱𝔢𝔣𝔣𝔞𝔫 𝔴𝔞𝔱𝔨𝔦𝔫𝔰 🎃 (@steffanwatkins) <a href="https://twitter.com/steffanwatkins/status/1072183994970710016?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 10, 2018</a></blockquote>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>October 26</b>th, the strike on Al-Baghdadi happened, and all leads were about the raid on Sunday, October 27th.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>October 27</b>th, the Wall Street Journal published what I would call<a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-moves-closer-to-ending-another-post-cold-war-treaty-11572177600"> an unusual article</a>, it didn’t “flow” like any previous reporting about the potential Open Skies Treaty pull-out by the Americans. The article had some treaty-positive information, and also spread propaganda from the opponents of the Open Skies Treaty. I felt it missed some obvious counter-arguments about why the treaty should be kept, and it had the first quote that I’ve seen on the topic from Tim Morrison, the aforementioned NSC official who is spearheading the murder of this 34-country treaty. This was October 27th, one day after October 26th, the date given by NSC officials October 7th to be prepared for, or as we now know it, the day of the Al-Baghdadi raid. The published timeline of events so far suggests Tim Morrison would have been aware of the upcoming Al-Baghdadi raid, and I believe the leak to the WSJ was already part of the plan on October 7th. I believe it is reasonable to think Tim delayed the “leak” by “officials” to the WSJ, about their intent to kill the Open Skies Treaty until October 26th. He would be in a position to know it would take that long to get all their domestic allies on the same page, arrange information operations, get their favourite think tanks on board, “experts” lined up for interviews with the major news networks, the Al-Baghdadi raid would provide cover for the bombshell news, and would get the Open Skies Treaty announcement pushed back to a less prominent position in the daily news cycle.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>Where does that leave CSIS and the WSJ?</li>
<li>Are they clandestinely operated by the White House?</li>
<li>Do they only publish what the National Security Council ask them to?</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">No</span></b>, I’m not that paranoid.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I believe the answer is more human, less conspiracy. Every journalist is under deadlines, and with a limited amount of research, they need to send to press something at the end of the day, even when nobody calls them back, or maybe previous references are less than clear. Also, every journalist and researcher have their trusted sources on the topics that they’re focused on - myself included. Some of those journalists have Tim Morrison in their Rolodex (look it up kids), the guy who is actively trying to kill the treaty (and provided an exclusive quote to the WSJ), and some have John Bolton, or Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) as their sources; three different people, that will give them the same story, more or less. That’s all the due diligence a journalist might need, to prove they’ve researched a story, if their editor didn’t understand that those three people were the greatest threat to the treaty, and were actually the people trying to kill it. Isn’t it presumptive of me to assume they spoke to one of those three? What if they spoke to none of them? Well, those three people are very influential, themselves having contacts at right-wing think tanks, and other people around Washington, who will also parrot their talking points; they don’t live in a bubble. There is no shortage of former White House and DoD officials who have heard their anti-Open Skies Treaty talking points, and most wouldn’t know that they’re mostly trumped up (no pun intended). Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) and his allies have been slandering the treaty with disinformation for years, feeding half-truths to the media, committees, and the public; since Obama, at least. This faction of American government does not represent the will of the people. They represent their own interests, and should be treated as a radical, well funded, fringe group, out to endanger the world for their own reasons.<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0p7kdMCKvmE9DBIcpRd-UtllUoV4BF7OlxQZ2yoeUJzbCNyDJxaUWWUEDmcg9n7vPnxU_U78aSUlmJblxhxmgiLf9j3p66pnyhjYbU10vcd5wv-LcsEefR4pYlp2a4UUQprmZOuoYEeCE/s1600/190814-F-ZT243-0240.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="223" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0p7kdMCKvmE9DBIcpRd-UtllUoV4BF7OlxQZ2yoeUJzbCNyDJxaUWWUEDmcg9n7vPnxU_U78aSUlmJblxhxmgiLf9j3p66pnyhjYbU10vcd5wv-LcsEefR4pYlp2a4UUQprmZOuoYEeCE/s400/190814-F-ZT243-0240.jpg" style="cursor: move;" width="400" /></a></div>
</td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;"><div style="margin: 0px;">
The Russian air force Open Skies Tupolev Tu-154M RF-85655,</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">
lands at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii, Aug. 14, 2019</div>
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Photo Credit: Tech. Sgt. Heather Redman, 15th Wing Public Affairs, USAF</div>
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</div>
<div>
<br />
The NYT, Slate, Vox, and many others are already on record about what’s been going on with the Open Skies Treaty. Journalists have been contacting sources and writing articles since October ~8th. I can’t understand how the Wall Street Journal was able to delay by over two weeks covering the story, but I’m now watching for others who haven’t, or won’t, write about it as well because they can’t figure out what’s going on.<br />
<br />
I hope my efforts in publicising what’s really going on disrupt any disinformation that’s being spread about the Open Skies Treaty. Any journalist with questions about the treaty or what’s been going on is free to email me questions or catch me on Twitter. I’m more than happy to brief them on the history of the treaty, give references to official documents, and referrals to more arms control academics and experts than you can shake a stick at.<br />
<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
Previous Important Open Skies Posts:</h4>
<div>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><a href="https://www.vesselofinterest.com/2017/08/a-journalists-primer-on-open-skies.html" style="background-color: white; color: #4d469c; font-family: inherit; text-decoration-line: none;">A Journalist's Primer on the<span class="Highlight" style="background-color: #ffff66; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: rgb(229 , 229 , 229) 1px 1px; color: black; font-style: inherit; padding: 1px;"> Open Skies </span>Treaty</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.vesselofinterest.com/2018/09/debunking-anti-open-skies-treaty.html">Debunking Anti-Open Skies Treaty Propaganda, Digital Electro-Optical Sensor Edition</a></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://www.vesselofinterest.com/2016/06/cutting-through-misinformation-about.html" style="background-color: white;"><span style="background-color: white;">Cutting through misinformation about the</span><span class="Highlight" style="background-color: #ffff66; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: rgb(229 , 229 , 229) 1px 1px; color: black; font-style: inherit; padding: 1px;"> Open Skies </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #3778cd;">Treaty</span></a></span></li>
<li><a href="https://www.vesselofinterest.com/2016/10/dnd-downplays-operational-impact-of.html">DND downplays operational impact of Open Skies restrictions by Russia, contrasting the DoD</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
(also posted on <a href="https://medium.com/@steffanwatkins/do-efforts-to-kill-the-open-skies-treaty-and-the-al-baghdadi-raid-cross-paths-e33d991e580f" target="_blank">Medium</a> 2020-03-04)</div>
</div>
Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-81381735869625352552019-04-20T10:47:00.002-04:002019-04-20T14:10:53.917-04:00The HMCS Toronto had an identity crisis while deployed with NATO SNMG2 in the Black Sea<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPiSs3f60Yw7ah2i-z1JyDr9THnoB7_G_opSz2kyzh54brD08SuEEqBAbfHAupcfE3yba-Jw-uP8gW69yonpYrO_e5A49kHFWUfvJVlapCUexvEPDtNDeGhUbwmf42VALUXQ9pVpI9LKAm/s1600/toronto-is2013-4003-06.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="817" data-original-width="1200" height="434" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPiSs3f60Yw7ah2i-z1JyDr9THnoB7_G_opSz2kyzh54brD08SuEEqBAbfHAupcfE3yba-Jw-uP8gW69yonpYrO_e5A49kHFWUfvJVlapCUexvEPDtNDeGhUbwmf42VALUXQ9pVpI9LKAm/s640/toronto-is2013-4003-06.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
There are some things that happen in world military affairs that only I get upset about, and this is probably one of those things.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidhyphenhyphenBZ8nH2a2s4AE8ZedDnFMCpbqNfMGNZicL1cZicjAF4aJt2ov4o348KNd2Dn4RBZ4GnpZuhyLMMjb-DvI93aucHoXYMvKaC6MwNPm57AjqhuEqrFucjAoCC7_DqvKIZZn4DwTRu6wrE/s1600/Capture2019-04-15.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="641" data-original-width="1551" height="82" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidhyphenhyphenBZ8nH2a2s4AE8ZedDnFMCpbqNfMGNZicL1cZicjAF4aJt2ov4o348KNd2Dn4RBZ4GnpZuhyLMMjb-DvI93aucHoXYMvKaC6MwNPm57AjqhuEqrFucjAoCC7_DqvKIZZn4DwTRu6wrE/s200/Capture2019-04-15.PNG" width="200" /></a><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitgdoydJE45fInPpChtVixU1_-pRCuCCY_VReqKXLeJ9bPWGQ0l7fTG0eoSz83fyWbilbhSvjKa6tAHTBW2IjYA_49H0UcKB4NFDmsYsfisSRaJvqdAmvP5xhBSNAtF5eNC-FwcyEeLQgl/s1600/Capture2019-04-17.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="678" data-original-width="1524" height="88" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitgdoydJE45fInPpChtVixU1_-pRCuCCY_VReqKXLeJ9bPWGQ0l7fTG0eoSz83fyWbilbhSvjKa6tAHTBW2IjYA_49H0UcKB4NFDmsYsfisSRaJvqdAmvP5xhBSNAtF5eNC-FwcyEeLQgl/s200/Capture2019-04-17.PNG" width="200" /></a>According to their AIS transponder, HMCS Toronto <a href="https://ottawacitizen.com/news/national/defence-watch/hmcs-toronto-to-head-out-on-nato-operation" target="_blank">departed</a> 2019-01-21 ~11:45Z from CFB Halifax for a six month tour with NATO Standing NATO Maritime Group Two (#SNMG2), and unlike previous Royal Canadian Navy-NATO deployments (like HMCS St Johns), HMCS Toronto has been operating with their AIS transponder off the whole time, for months.. until they entered the Black Sea and seem to have started broadcasting the MMSI of the HMCS Charlottetown. In some form or fashion, whatever had been entered manually into the transponder was not as it should be - but I don't know how it happened. From my seat here in Ottawa, one of my windows to the deployed maritime world is MarineTraffic.com, which has a worldwide network of AIS receivers. Along the way, in the Black Sea (and now in the Med), HMCS Toronto has been near many of those receivers, and I was able to put them on a map to illustrate where they were. Each place where they were broadcasting their location using AIS was being heard by not just the MarineTraffic.com receivers when they were close to shore, by design they were being "heard" by any ship, including Russian Navy SIGINT vessels in the area, without going through MarineTraffic.com. I mention this to make sure you have at the forefront of your mind that the HMCS Toronto itself is broadcasting their precise location, over marine VHF, and through the miracle of technology, are transmitting that location to everyone around the world; it isn't just Russian AGIs that know where the HMCS Toronto is - and that's not a problem or cause for concern!<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQssyxzzsWIKT3vjkBc465nzBWFjOB9YUcByC8c2AXV89ddkl9yGN4rX6zHLUp2CyUgEUYTjvKyopKYJfPcbc3YIB3d4T7mOnGTqtep2pu84eJjoEV9V81opIyVW8fpi9c340cHRFbEzhq/s1600/Capture2019-04-17b.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="672" data-original-width="1532" height="87" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQssyxzzsWIKT3vjkBc465nzBWFjOB9YUcByC8c2AXV89ddkl9yGN4rX6zHLUp2CyUgEUYTjvKyopKYJfPcbc3YIB3d4T7mOnGTqtep2pu84eJjoEV9V81opIyVW8fpi9c340cHRFbEzhq/s200/Capture2019-04-17b.PNG" width="200" /></a><br />
The commander of SNMG2, Commodore Boudewijn Boots of the Royal Netherlands Navy, engages with the public over social media, bringing pictures from the bridge to Twitter, letting you know where they are regularly; so I have absolutely no doubt the location of the ships is in no way a "secret", and revealing the location of HMCS Toronto is in no way compromising their security - they are broadcasting their location themselves, but are showing up on MarineTraffic.com as using the identification number (MMSI) of the HMCS Charottetown.<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-conversation="none" data-lang="en-gb">
<div dir="ltr" lang="en">
<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/SNMG2?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#SNMG2</a> 🇳🇱🇨🇦🇹🇷🇧🇬🇷🇴 completes her <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NATO?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#NATO</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/BlackSea?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#BlackSea</a> deployment. 🇧🇬Exercise <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/SeaShield?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#SeaShield</a> proved our Allied maritime capabilities once again. Working with our 🇺🇦 and 🇬🇪partners showed NATO's commitment and enhanced our cooperation at sea. Thank you all. <a href="https://t.co/WnKuSjDkqE">pic.twitter.com/WnKuSjDkqE</a></div>
— Boudewijn Boots (@BoudewijnBoots) <a href="https://twitter.com/BoudewijnBoots/status/1118396647866871808?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">17 April 2019</a></blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
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<br />
<h4>
Are they trying to impersonate HMCS Charlottetown? What happened?</h4>
<br />
There are many Twitter accounts that are not operated by individuals, and are actually detractors put there to hijack the conversation and mislead the public; that said, I haven't given up on the platform yet, even though its extremely difficult to tell the difference between outraged soccer moms and paid disinformation operatives conducting their affairs in bad faith.<br />
<br />
One inventive answer is that it was a prank or otherwise inside joke among the comms operators on the HMCS Toronto referencing when HMCS Charlottetown was performing exercises near Florida and labelled itself a "Pleasure Craft" (rather than a warship) over it's AIS transponder.<br />
I'm not convinced that's the case.<br />
<br />
I always appreciate messages from people who may know something but can't tell me anything because I don't have a need to know; "There are things at play here that are beyond the letter of the book." Okay, that's almost Yoda-worthy.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We also have at least two organisations' standard operating procedures in competition with each other, along with the personal views of the commanding officier (Cdr Martin Fluet), the commander of SNMG2, NATO itself, and the Royal Canadian Navy. Something changed, and I don't know who gave what orders to whom.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I was not paying any attention to HMCS Toronto's movements, because after they left Halifax and turned off their transponder, I didn't expect to see them for six months. When they departed the Black Sea, and I noticed they were using the MMSI assigned to the HMCS Charlottetown, I was quite surprised. You'll remember they were the ones who lost power / caught fire / broke down off the coast of Scotland and we were able to track them as they were limping around. Maybe they decided that was too transparent, and have gone in the other direction? The problem with that mentality is the underlying reason to turn off their transponder; to avoid public scrutiny, not t avoid the Russian Navy - who I'll guess are the primary adversary when conducting European war games. The Russians have their own national technical means to monitor and track NATO ships; and AIS, used by commercial ships the world over to avoid collisions, is not their primary method to detect or monitor #NATO ships. Does it help? Sure, everything helps, I'll give you that. If the Russians think the USS Ross is at a specific location, and they can "hear" USS Ross broadcasting its information from that same location, it does act as a confirmation, but if there's ever a shooting war, the first thing all the NATO ships would do is turn off their transponder - not just change their name, or pick a different MMSI.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
Changing the ship's MMSI doesn't hide the location of the ship from anyone; why do it?</h4>
<div>
<br />
That is what I was losing my mind over.<br />
<br />
It is ultimately the commander of the HMCS Toronto who is responsible for the safety of his crew and his ship. The commander's choices are guided by directives from his superiors.<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>What advice was provided to him from NATO? or the Royal Canadian Navy? I don't know. </li>
<li>Was there a new directive or was the SOP changed? I have no way of telling, </li>
<li>Did Commodore Boudewijn Boots and <a href="https://twitter.com/martinfluet" target="_blank">Cdr Martin Fluet,</a> actually change nothing, but someone made a typo when entering the transponder number in the system? Maybe. The MMSI for HMCS Toronto and HMCS Charlottetown are only one number off.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
<br />
My frustration is fundamentally that it is unrealistic to think the Russian Navy, who were following SNMG2 the whole time, mistook HMCS Toronto for HMCS Charlottetown. Nobody in the world was fooled. There was absolutely no improvement made to the security of the ship, or the mission, as far as I can tell.<br />
<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>If it was an act of obfuscation or deception it was completely useless and didn't warrant doing.</li>
<li>If this was done on purpose, in order to deceive, what does that say about the Royal Canadian Navy's level of maritime domain awareness? Did they think it would change something?<br />That's what greatly concerns me.</li>
<li>If this was a typo, a major system on the ship shouldn't have typos, and at the time they left Halifax they were using the right transponder number, meaning they changed it along the way. That's disturbing.</li>
</ul>
<br />
I would love to discover that this was all a ruse by the Royal Canadian Navy, and this was a repainted HMCS Charlottetown that actually transited to the Black Sea because the HMCS Toronto had much more extensive damage than had been previously reported; but I have no evidence to support that, I just made it up.<br />
<br />
Derrick cracked me up with this, and it's at least partially true. The Royal Canadian Navy, and by extension NATO, and the American DoD, I believe, need a lot of help in understanding what is or isn't effective in hiding their movements. I follow the ships I do to remind the public and journalists that we (the people) can and should track our military with the transponders they broadcast their location to their adversaries with, and are aware they are using, so we can know as much as they do. Why should the Russian Navy know where Canadian ships are, when the Canadian public doesn't? If "they" know, *you* should know.</div>
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One day when the RCN makes disclosure of Operation Watkins the public will learn that their Counter OSINT Training Program was solely based around one man playing along while command officers learned that someone was paying attention</div>
— Derrick Snowdy (@jdsnowdy) <a href="https://twitter.com/jdsnowdy/status/1118568832237559808?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 17, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-31386349318753300952019-04-17T06:35:00.001-04:002019-04-17T06:35:49.031-04:00Did you hear the one about a Russian Yacht circling Puerto Rico, like a shark with lasers?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dateline November 17, 2017: The Bermuda-flagged super-yacht "<a href="https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/home/shipid:371584/" target="_blank">Eclipse</a>" sailed into Th</span>e Port of Palm Beach Florida. Eclipse is <a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/roman-abramovich" target="_blank">Roman Abramovich</a>'s yacht; and he's a very rich Russian with ties to Vladimir Putin, so naturally rumours started to circulate among a faction of people, who were still in shock over Donald Trump's election win. One of the stories was about clandestine meetings at Mar-a-Lago; Russian yachts moored off the coast, and their "oligarch" owners slipped in to shore, maybe under the cover of darkness. It was a great story to lift the spirits of those who felt they'd lost the election, and helped smooth over any criticism of Hillary Clinton's election loss. The Russian yacht-clandestine meeting narrative would fan the flames of the story it was the Russians, not the American voters, who were to blame. The yacht story would also prove to be quite absurd.</span><br />
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<style type="text/css"><!--td {border: 1px solid #ccc;}br {mso-data-placement:same-cell;}--></style><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg98PlgbSq5O4EsPe1XCkhVcjQPQVeVqmunkNxur1CK383iPyS2iXMFXE1gFXPQWmPtG9UCFOX1STU_rVEwbAZaKP0CMNjTOTSXNh-MCcFlXzxfFxDOvhb9mz07TNmQlI-QgBm7MqsJVzby/s1600/DP2iSTKUMAAmoi2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" data-original-height="827" data-original-width="1520" height="216" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg98PlgbSq5O4EsPe1XCkhVcjQPQVeVqmunkNxur1CK383iPyS2iXMFXE1gFXPQWmPtG9UCFOX1STU_rVEwbAZaKP0CMNjTOTSXNh-MCcFlXzxfFxDOvhb9mz07TNmQlI-QgBm7MqsJVzby/s400/DP2iSTKUMAAmoi2.jpg" width="400" /></span></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: x-large;"><b>"<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">don’t get all collusion-delusional</span>"</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">-Tony Doris, Journalist with the Palm Beach Post covering the last yacht story</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">As reputable media organisations <a href="https://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/new-russian-yacht-docks-port-will-putin-friend-pay-trump-visit/jHOu5zlKUqMa0lMLsqzz6L/" target="_blank">reported</a>, <b>Roman Abramovich wasn't on his yacht in Florida in 2017.</b></span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">That's what his publicist said.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">That's what the press said.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">That's what I said.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Why? How can I be so sure? Because there were no helicopters, no fast cars, no entourage, no limo... and no Roman. Where Roman Abramovich goes, so does the Paparazzi. There were no Paparazzi staking out the ship, because Roman Abramovich wasn't there. Some people wanted to believe the yacht, owned by a rich Russian, was a sign of Russian influence. The yacht was parked for weeks at the end of 11th Avenue in Palm Beach, having preparations done for its usual winter season spent in the Caribbean. Unfortunately, the yacht's presence was all the evidence some people needed. Believing the yacht's owner is nearby may be a good guess for someone's weekend cabin cruiser, it doesn't scale to the mega-rich, with yachts that are the size of cruise ships.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Despite the rumour not being even remotely plausible, let alone true, the story plays to a crowd who would very much like to believe Russian yachts are following the President of the United States up and down the United States East Coast, and somehow meeting with him, despite closed airspace overhead, and secret service agents hiding in the bushes. Mega-yachts of the rich and famous are not following Donald J Trump around</span><span style="font-family: inherit;">. The story is quite ridiculous, and easily shown to be false; all multi-million dollar yachts have AIS transponders, all are tracked, but the rumour has staying power, because people </span><u style="font-family: inherit;">want</u><span style="font-family: inherit;"> to believe it. It is quite impossible to smuggle a Russian billionaire into the USA using a yacht that's worth hundreds of millions of dollars unnoticed.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Skip ahead to April 2019, and another (in)famous Russian's yacht sailed into a US harbour, this time, into the Port of San Juan; <a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/andrey-melnichenko/" target="_blank">Andrey Melnichenko</a>'s super-yacht "<a href="https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/home/shipid:3598603/" target="_blank">A</a>" - to a crowd of impressed onlookers.</span></div>
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<a data-flickr-embed="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/sjuap74/47576468851/in/photolist-2fuaQDH-2egGkXb-2emgYnA-RGcFg8-24Q3hs2-2fnbdAm-T9pJFN-2dLdjW4-2dJqmzx-QZz6D1-2c2nFvs-PnbbzT-2d8mYtF-2amFNVu-2amGuCA-2bJAgJM-QZreGw-2d3L3uw-2d3KMXL-PkZ88a-PkZCh2-QYmzdS-2d6Yobx-PkSvMc-2bHx3HD-2d7bpFn-2bHDwoX-QYpVVY-2d79Vq6-2d7aKFK-QYnqbw-2c16SD7-2akx32o-2d2HKcf-2c16LP1-QYnTvm-QYgoUL-2d2HV2A-2d2B7qG-2c17cqq-PkQzrF-PkQkda-PkP18D-2akxKX7-2d2CWJJ-QYhCfm-2c11Ewm-2d6UEq4-2bHnRHR-2bGL5LB" title=""A""><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img alt=""A"" height="534" src="https://live.staticflickr.com/7905/47576468851_86045bc661_c.jpg" width="800" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Since Donald J Trump isn't in Puerto Rico (I hear he's not popular with the locals for some reason), how can this non-event be spun to be something nefarious and Russian-y? The rumour is the yacht stopped near a dozen different American military bases in Puerto Rico, the insinuation is they are conducting SIGINT/ELINT/COMINT/(etc); someone even made a list of the bases... but it's not entirely as it seems; it's a truism. Truisms make great springboards for propaganda, especially when people don't understand they're truisms to begin with.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Picture a rectangular dining table, standing on four legs. In your imagination, walk around the table. Now picture the headline as; "Suspicious person seen circling 4 table legs; citizens monitoring situation for signs of vandalism." It misses the obvious, an uses exaggeration for effect; but it's still the same story, phrased differently; spin, propaganda, disinformation - whatever you want to call it.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">I want you to think about this. I invite you to look at a map of Puerto Rico. Answer me this; in what direction can you sail around the island, approaching from the East, and loop around the island (ending up heading East again, like a horse shoe) without passing "near" a dozen military bases? Do you sail around the island clockwise, or counterclockwise, to avoid the bases? What do other yachts do? What's is the baseline from which you determine that this trip is at all unusual or out of the </span>ordinary<span style="font-family: inherit;">.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuKBgZ5wsXJZoaQKrVuCHZ1Qr6odLts201Rp2dw59pI6dMZlfLyGezI15-QjkHuEd9hHBEHiE6yB1BYu-0Yb3CRNxZg_pFFuCKONjKfOaS9GMFa9-aW5l7y-Y_sopitx-LXj3ezrit-tAU/s1600/Map-of-US-Military-Installations-in-Puerto-Rico-and-Vieques-60.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" data-original-height="383" data-original-width="640" height="191" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuKBgZ5wsXJZoaQKrVuCHZ1Qr6odLts201Rp2dw59pI6dMZlfLyGezI15-QjkHuEd9hHBEHiE6yB1BYu-0Yb3CRNxZg_pFFuCKONjKfOaS9GMFa9-aW5l7y-Y_sopitx-LXj3ezrit-tAU/s320/Map-of-US-Military-Installations-in-Puerto-Rico-and-Vieques-60.png" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">unknown source, picture making the rounds with the rumour</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">I hear Puerto Rico is lovely, but it isn't very big. All of the military bases are close to shore if not on the shore. No matter where you are in Puerto Rico, you're already near a US military base. Even using terms like nearby and close are subjective, and could be an attempt to make the claim impervious to criticism. These are the usual wiggle-words that we, the consumers of propaganda, need to be on-the-lookout for. Additionally, the claim doesn't elaborate regarding the speed or where the ship stopped; it is only referred to as circling the island, and stopping near bases, which is true, they did sail around the island counter clockwise. If they had sailed around the island clockwise would that have avoided scrutiny? My point in pointing out the absurdity of these allegations is they're totally baseless. As a truism those that make the claims can say they're factually correct; and they are. There was a big yacht, owned by a Russian (not a Russian yacht - there's a difference), that sailed around the island of Puerto Rico, as it had previously done around many other Caribbean islands. There's nothing weird or nefarious about it. It's the same route taken by millions of other ships before them, and completely unrelated to Venezuela; which is a new red herring that could have been thrown in by the Venezuela regime change propaganda campaign for all I know.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsP_eHA2cHLdGviBc1hTITV4kh8aDxz56eUukmBkogLXDkdXEp4rwHjKStvZE2gu7hmTmkq1ULFfXLK86FHJl3zTQ8k0-pX7LkrSxigLxcfjQkhjRR26c0nLO7HJFCVEqYkYdhaXjIU1FE/s1600/Capturefsdsfdfsd.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" data-original-height="678" data-original-width="1290" height="336" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsP_eHA2cHLdGviBc1hTITV4kh8aDxz56eUukmBkogLXDkdXEp4rwHjKStvZE2gu7hmTmkq1ULFfXLK86FHJl3zTQ8k0-pX7LkrSxigLxcfjQkhjRR26c0nLO7HJFCVEqYkYdhaXjIU1FE/s640/Capturefsdsfdfsd.PNG" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGsw5o9ONt8aTBR6Zz8HMZ1M6XOJzl3aIEc7mvuB9oEqoDHB7UfshVaz8zHuIaH1JOzHdwLLEIF-aRrCCs_qTOw-T7qVh6VIJtYibS-ucsr272Y79ozLdMxa06hRg1eRysuw2jaysBeGxb/s1600/Capturegukgkk.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" data-original-height="551" data-original-width="1330" height="264" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGsw5o9ONt8aTBR6Zz8HMZ1M6XOJzl3aIEc7mvuB9oEqoDHB7UfshVaz8zHuIaH1JOzHdwLLEIF-aRrCCs_qTOw-T7qVh6VIJtYibS-ucsr272Y79ozLdMxa06hRg1eRysuw2jaysBeGxb/s640/Capturegukgkk.PNG" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh82dLMq8w6qqegMDyVjSjOfhg_J5gYdapBJlAsf_pPt_qhSfuZjU9SLtIRHSniDFUeSQihbThW8vyrtGpt1bjATAXxTAWrfCpp-q3kyMUDaWgU6VXVR2-ltKeCCOmcta9XqEHyLB-gWwY4/s1600/Capturedgfdfgd.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="763" data-original-width="1403" height="348" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh82dLMq8w6qqegMDyVjSjOfhg_J5gYdapBJlAsf_pPt_qhSfuZjU9SLtIRHSniDFUeSQihbThW8vyrtGpt1bjATAXxTAWrfCpp-q3kyMUDaWgU6VXVR2-ltKeCCOmcta9XqEHyLB-gWwY4/s640/Capturedgfdfgd.PNG" width="640" /></a></div>
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MarineTraffic.com AIS-T and AIS-S Tracking Data</h4>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXZrDkjwujuiDmJ1247hOsCLoo7wKDgvBmx5bz9x17UI9BsJf1qRKE1HfR4kvZtzniN4UWhDcQatg1ZUxrtfLfFZKj429juKTfVfeeBtLLeYdLnAOyIlRIHuc-mYNoI_C4mQWOrwwo5FdA/s1600/A_Route+2019-03-18+to+2019-04-17+PuertoRico.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="729" data-original-width="1600" height="290" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXZrDkjwujuiDmJ1247hOsCLoo7wKDgvBmx5bz9x17UI9BsJf1qRKE1HfR4kvZtzniN4UWhDcQatg1ZUxrtfLfFZKj429juKTfVfeeBtLLeYdLnAOyIlRIHuc-mYNoI_C4mQWOrwwo5FdA/s640/A_Route+2019-03-18+to+2019-04-17+PuertoRico.PNG" width="640" /></a></div>
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Using MarineTraffic.com data of the ship's movements shows their pattern of movement matches what you'd expect the route would be for any incredibly expensive yacht; they're sailing from beach to beach, Caribbean vista to Caribbean vista. Overlaying that they're stopping near American military bases is true, but only because Puerto Rico has so many military bases; it's a truism. Every ship that circles the island or stops anywhere near Puerto Rico is "near" a military base.</div>
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Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com8Puerto Rico18.220833 -66.59014916.2904625 -69.171936 20.151203499999998 -64.008361999999991tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-29198332734061466732019-02-06T15:25:00.000-05:002019-02-08T10:06:08.734-05:002019-01-26: NORAD intercepted two RuAF long range aviation Tu-160 bombers over the Arctic.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8d1ou0VwTQ9KvJPRIU5MkoSSn_jQF7ht2OmgC48S96727uG4CkLo6EurQ0vDT8dA0k2c1QAOJs9UTXo0B4tWFtWCB-Mcu1f5dLmmqKMtFBOt9rVKjEVudyhVY8Bmhgc20flcDX_faO5ZF/s1600/tu-160_02.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="767" data-original-width="1152" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8d1ou0VwTQ9KvJPRIU5MkoSSn_jQF7ht2OmgC48S96727uG4CkLo6EurQ0vDT8dA0k2c1QAOJs9UTXo0B4tWFtWCB-Mcu1f5dLmmqKMtFBOt9rVKjEVudyhVY8Bmhgc20flcDX_faO5ZF/s640/tu-160_02.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Two Tu-160 "Blackjacks" Photo Credit: Unknown</td></tr>
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(2019-02-08 edit added at the bottom)<br />On January 26th 2019 Russian Air Force Tu-160 bombers took a spin around the Arctic and drew out a welcoming party of two F-22s and two CF-188s; NORAD announced the incursion into their self-assigned "Air Defence Identification Zone" or ADIZ for short. The ADIZ is international airspace, but serves as a buffer where unidentified or suspect planes are intercepted, to make sure they don't get too close to Canada or the United States in case they have hostile intentions. While too close is subjective and the ADIZ arbitrary, potential hostile aircraft should be intercepted before they are within sovereign airspace, which only extends 12 nautical miles out to sea.<br />
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These intercepts happen routinely, anywhere from none, to fifteen times in a year<br />
(per official NORAD numbers between 2007 and 2016 (incl.))<br />
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Here is NORAD's initial tweet from Saturday January 26th, 2019:<br />
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An E-3 AWACS, 2x F-22, 2x CF-18 fighter jets from NORAD positively identified 2x Russian Tu-160 Blackjack strategic bombers entering the Canadian Air Defense Identification Zone on January 26, 2019. Bombers remained in international airspace and did not enter sovereign territory <a href="https://t.co/utKe26SRBB">pic.twitter.com/utKe26SRBB</a></div>
— NORAD & USNORTHCOM (@Norad_Northcom) <a href="https://twitter.com/Norad_Northcom/status/1089216512596922368?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">26 January 2019</a></blockquote>
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Subsequently, on Monday, January 28th 2019, NORAD issued this longer statement:<br />
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<i><b>An E-3 Airborne Early Warning and Control System, two F-22 and two CF-18 fighter jets from the North American Aerospace Defense Command positively identified two Russian Tu-160 Blackjack strategic bombers entering the Canadian Air Defense Identification Zone on January 26, 2019.</b></i></blockquote>
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<i><b>NORAD employs a layered defense network of radars, satellites, and fighter aircraft to identify aircraft and determine the appropriate response. The identification and monitoring of aircraft entering a US or Canadian ADIZ demonstrates how NORAD executes its aerospace warning and aerospace control missions for the United States and Canada.</b></i></blockquote>
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<i><b>“NORAD’s top priority is defending Canada and the United States. Our ability to protect our nations starts with successfully detecting, tracking, and positively identifying aircraft of interest approaching U.S. and Canadian airspace,” said General Terrence J. O’Shaughnessy, the NORAD Commander. “NORAD is on alert 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.”</b></i></blockquote>
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<i><b>Operation NOBLE EAGLE is the name given to the military response to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and applies to all air sovereignty and air defense missions in North America. NORAD is a binational command focused on the defense of both the U.S. and Canada, the response to potential aerospace threats does not distinguish between the two nations, and draws on forces from both countries. -NORAD Public Affairs</b> (<a href="http://www.norad.mil/Newsroom/Press-Releases/Article/1741730/norad-identified-russian-aircraft-entering-canadian-air-defense-identification/" target="_blank">source</a>)</i></blockquote>
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FACTS</h4>
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Here is a summary of the facts, derived from the original text displayed above, which you won't see on Fox, VOA, or Axios. These are the facts conveyed by NORAD themselves. Anything beyond the above details you just read came from somewhere other than two public official NORAD statements; one Saturday (Twitter), and one Monday posted to the NORAD web site. Did the journalists speak with NORAD? Did they say so? Did they cite their source? If not, they may have made it up, or maybe their editor made it up. Call them out for it.<br />
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<li><span style="background-color: #fff2cc;">The Russian planes were in the ADIZ</span>, </li>
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<li>(at least) <span style="background-color: #fff2cc;">5 NORAD planes were involved</span></li>
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<li>2x USAF F-22 Raptors </li>
<li>2x RCAF CF-188 Hornets, and </li>
<li>1x E-3 Sentry (aka AWACS)</li>
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<li><span style="background-color: #fff2cc;">2 RuAF planes were "Positively identified" by NORAD</span>; which suggests they intercepted, then flew alongside the RuAF Tu-160s, which were always in international airspace, for a period of time, until they were satisfied they were not a threat. However, I'm extrapolating my understanding from what little they said.</li>
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<br />
To Recap:<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="background-color: #fff2cc;"><b>2 RuAF Tu-160s were "positively identified" in the ADIZ by 4 NORAD fighters.</b></span></li>
</ul>
That is the whole story.<br />
<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
SPECULATION</h4>
<div>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>Additional USAF refuelling aircraft were likely providing gas to NORAD thirsty travellers, but that is unconfirmed. </li>
<li>It is unlikely all four planes were escorting the Tu-160s the entire time. There would likely have been a "hand off" from one pair to the other at some point.</li>
</ul>
<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
FALSEHOODS</h4>
<div>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>"Russian bombers buzz North American coastline" was coined by Lucas Tomlinson (@LucasFoxNews) and Fox News producers. I can't say that a NORAD person never said those words to Lucas and his editor/producer, nor does Lucas claim they did, or quote them - someone editorialized what NORAD said. However, the statement is unlike anything I've ever heard from anyone at NORAD I've ever spoken to. "Buzzed" would imply proximity to the shore or "coast". NORAD's statement specifically said they had not entered sovereign airspace, which extends 12 Nautical Miles from shore; so factually, citing NORAD, I can tell you they were not "Buzzing" the coast, and that Fox has deliberately mis-characterized the flight for the sake of sensationalist reporting; for propaganda even.<br /><a href="https://www.foxnews.com/world/russian-bombers-buzz-north-american-coastline">https://www.foxnews.com/world/russian-bombers-buzz-north-american-coastline</a></li>
<li>Unfortunately, other media outlets and bloggers jumped on this "coast" narrative and made it the news of the day, regardless of the facts. I hope journalists and editors realize they were used by partisan politics in propagandizing the routine flight in international airspace and will be more wary next time, but have little hope that will be the case.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
RUSSIAN VS NORAD STRATEGIC COMMUNICATION:</h4>
<br />
~4 hours before NORAD tweeted about the intercept, the Russian Military TV Channel "Star" broadcast the Tu-160 story, from their point of view.<br />
<br />
<b>Saturday</b><br />
<b>(2019-01-26 16:48 Moscow (13:48Z)</b><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Два стратегических ракетоносца Ту-160 выполнили плановый полет в воздушном пространстве над нейтральными водами акваторий Северного Ледовитого океана, Баренцева, Лаптевых и Карского морей.<br />
Продолжительность полета составила более 15 часов. В ходе полета экипажи Ту-160 отработали дозаправку топливом в воздухе."</blockquote>
or, Google Translated...<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Two strategic missile carriers Tu-160 performed a planned flight in airspace over the neutral waters of the Arctic Ocean, the Barents, Laptev and Kara seas.<br />
The flight duration was more than 15 hours. During the flight, the crews of the Tu-160 worked refueling in the air."<br />
<a href="https://tvzvezda.ru/news/forces/content/201901261648-gd93.htm">https://tvzvezda.ru/news/forces/content/201901261648-gd93.htm</a></blockquote>
<br />
<b>2019-01-26 19:40 Moscow (16:40Z)</b><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Плановый полет прошел над нейтральными водами акваторий Северного Ледовитого океана, моря Лаптевых, а также Баренцева и Карского морей."</blockquote>
or<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"The scheduled flight took place over the neutral waters of the Arctic Ocean, Laptev Sea, and the Barents and Kara Seas."<br />
<a href="https://tvzvezda.ru/news/forces/content/201901261936-by3o.htm">https://tvzvezda.ru/news/forces/content/201901261936-by3o.htm</a></blockquote>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>2019-01-26 12:40 EST (17:40Z) NORAD releases statement via Twitter</b></div>
<div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"An E-3 AWACS, 2x F-22, 2x CF-18 fighter jets from NORAD positively identified 2x Russian Tu-160 Blackjack strategic bombers entering the Canadian Air Defense Identification Zone on January 26, 2019. Bombers remained in international airspace and did not enter sovereign territory"</blockquote>
</div>
<div>
<br />
<b>2019-01-26 23:59 Moscow (20:59Z)</b><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
«Полет был для нас более обычным и привычным. 16 часов – это не максимум, который мы летали»</blockquote>
or<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
“The flight was more ordinary and familiar to us. 16 hours is not the maximum that (we've flown)” -Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Zheludkov, RuAF<br />
<a href="https://tvzvezda.ru/news/forces/content/201901270001-dnlk.htm">https://tvzvezda.ru/news/forces/content/201901270001-dnlk.htm</a></blockquote>
<br />
<b>Sunday</b><br />
<b>2019-01-27 03:59 Moscow (00:59Z)</b></div>
<div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Опубликованы кадры ночной дозаправки Ту-160 над водами Арктики"</blockquote>
or<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"(Zvezda) Published footage (of) night refueling of the Tu-160 over the waters of the Arctic"<br />
<a href="https://tvzvezda.ru/news/forces/content/201901270401-u447.htm">https://tvzvezda.ru/news/forces/content/201901270401-u447.htm</a></blockquote>
<br />
<b>2019-01-27 04:44 Moscow (01:44Z)</b></div>
<div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Пять военных самолетов США и Канады подняли по тревоге из-за Ту-160"</blockquote>
or<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Five military aircraft of the United States and Canada raised the alarm because of the Tu-160"<br />
<a href="https://tvzvezda.ru/news/vstrane_i_mire/content/201901270444-ly6v.htm">https://tvzvezda.ru/news/vstrane_i_mire/content/201901270444-ly6v.htm</a></blockquote>
<br />
Whereas TV Zvezda is the Russian military TV network, and usually provides original Russian-sourced information, Sputnik usually mirrors what is being broadcast in the United States with an alternative view from a Russian angle (mileage may vary); take this post which could have referred to Russian sources, but instead reported on American sources in English, and added what sort of weapons loadout they could have (not what weapons they *did* have, because all indicators point to the plane being empty).<br />
<br />
<b>2019-01-27 11:07 Moscow (08:07Z)</b><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
US, Canadian Jets ‘Identified’ Russian Bombers in Airspace Near Canada - NORAD<br />
<a href="https://sputniknews.com/world/201901271071857898-us-canada-tu-160/">https://sputniknews.com/world/201901271071857898-us-canada-tu-160/</a></blockquote>
<br />
<b>Monday</b><br />
<b>2019-01-28 Zulu</b><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"An E-3 Airborne Early Warning and Control System, two F-22 and two CF-18 fighter jets from the North American Aerospace Defense Command positively identified two Russian Tu-160 Blackjack strategic bombers entering the Canadian Air Defense Identification Zone on January 26, 2019."<br />
<a href="http://www.norad.mil/Newsroom/Press-Releases/Article/1741730/norad-identified-russian-aircraft-entering-canadian-air-defense-identification/">http://www.norad.mil/Newsroom/Press-Releases/Article/1741730/norad-identified-russian-aircraft-entering-canadian-air-defense-identification/</a></blockquote>
<a href="http://www.norad.mil/Newsroom/Press-Releases/Article/1741730/norad-identified-russian-aircraft-entering-canadian-air-defense-identification/"></a><br />
<br />
I think it's quite possible they intentionally schedule the flight when they expected the least response from NORAD Public Affairs and he public; my impression is these get more coverage on weekdays rather than weekends. I could be wrong.</div>
<div>
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
WHAT? NO MAP?</h4>
Unfortunately, unlike the Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Forces who post a summary of Russian air movements in their air-defence zone, NORAD does not give us any context where the flights took place. This obfuscation is said to be for "Operational Security" reasons, but I don't quite understand that, since we're referring to Russian planes who know they were intercepted.<br />
<br />
Japanese Joint Chiefs of Staff Press Release (via Twitter) including map of Russian operations near Japan; you've never seen anything like this issued by NORAD because they've never done so.<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en-gb">
<div dir="ltr" lang="ja">
【HP更新情報】<br />
ロシア機の日本海における飛行について<a href="https://t.co/LG8A5DbXS0">https://t.co/LG8A5DbXS0</a> <a href="https://t.co/AoMUzXupBG">pic.twitter.com/AoMUzXupBG</a></div>
— 防衛省統合幕僚監部 (@jointstaffpa) <a href="https://twitter.com/jointstaffpa/status/1085848238496702465?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">17 January 2019</a></blockquote>
<br />
<br />
I can't see why NORAD would seem to feel releasing the above Japanese-style map would compromise national security, but it would greatly improve the understanding of NORAD operations for the public at large, and neuter any attempts at disinformation efforts that would portray the event as something more than it was.<br />
<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
FINE, HERE'S AN UGLY MAP</h4>
This is a screenshot of OpenStreetMaps which shows you the 12 nautical mile limit as a thin purple line. Please note that between the coast of Russia, and the line; that's Russian airspace. Between the Alaskan coast and the purple line; that's American airspace. That's all of it; 12 Nautical Miles. It's not very far at all, especially by plane.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU96FZM0QrR5AxUjXvHFxaRVwTcmT5AU-Su4dwUxCFbciwwNEGDTr64ZPs-5LXKtx5gfR7DFlPpjSfLXV_d7TP5vGekJNJTYlMgy-kQAKiI4W5UFB-7LEkmd2ohGRdqmum8NFBXPKHTMNA/s1600/Captureq3423423.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="881" data-original-width="1600" height="352" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU96FZM0QrR5AxUjXvHFxaRVwTcmT5AU-Su4dwUxCFbciwwNEGDTr64ZPs-5LXKtx5gfR7DFlPpjSfLXV_d7TP5vGekJNJTYlMgy-kQAKiI4W5UFB-7LEkmd2ohGRdqmum8NFBXPKHTMNA/s640/Captureq3423423.PNG" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
Here we have an FAA-data driven Google Earth image showing the ADIZ. If a Russian Air Force plane flies through the green zone shown below, NORAD may send an interceptor to say Hi. They might not. The idea is to keep the Russians guessing regarding when and where they are detected by coastal radar or other national technical means. Did they, or didn't they see them flying by? You'll notice that the ADIZ is mostly over international waters, which is where you'd need to be to intercept a Russian bomber, before it unloads ALCMs at CONUS; that's the idea anyway.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirlRNdClh6HOoljqCvh4Ds_CRmhrhoKWyYwPOQftO_JdtxrqteYRBGUpMT1Oda0Xje5dVJx-j_Hgk_JLvV2YBYn0sYSMrHcFVlcVNHY5EBh66hmMnuRLYkt3p2Kg4WJyTqWpHxHctwRzgA/s1600/ADIZ_NorthAmerica.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="968" data-original-width="1600" height="386" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirlRNdClh6HOoljqCvh4Ds_CRmhrhoKWyYwPOQftO_JdtxrqteYRBGUpMT1Oda0Xje5dVJx-j_Hgk_JLvV2YBYn0sYSMrHcFVlcVNHY5EBh66hmMnuRLYkt3p2Kg4WJyTqWpHxHctwRzgA/s640/ADIZ_NorthAmerica.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
Most of the time people do not see the earth from the top, and do not appreciate that Russia is just on the other side of the pole. I believe people know they are there, on the other side, but just never see what that means, like this, over the top - withe the ADIZ in green:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjV8KZltLMxrlMIFZtiaHP0pUyfSbYDftRTgMPm0bqaufOeDwum5g-lTz1SeZhuE6akRZYmD4UDqJxdLnrSG_6JFIRK9PeMCQf42xadlSe5FPqyqXvXhXDvlWnLbYnfSzxFyXO9xfm6foO-/s1600/MurmanskArctic.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="924" data-original-width="1600" height="369" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjV8KZltLMxrlMIFZtiaHP0pUyfSbYDftRTgMPm0bqaufOeDwum5g-lTz1SeZhuE6akRZYmD4UDqJxdLnrSG_6JFIRK9PeMCQf42xadlSe5FPqyqXvXhXDvlWnLbYnfSzxFyXO9xfm6foO-/s640/MurmanskArctic.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
Exactly where the Tu-160 took off from and landed was not published, but they did say they travelled over the Arctic, Laptev, Barents, and Kara Sea - and always in international airspace; which is easy to do, since it's all international airspace past 12 nautical miles from shore.<br />
<br />
I can hope that someone at NORAD sees my butchery of Google Earth maps / the ADIZ and demands they publish better maps so they never have to be subjected to my graphics "prowess" again.<br />
<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
THERE'S VIDEO?</h4>
<br />
Unfortunately Lieutenant-General Sergey Kobylash, the commander of long-range aviation of the RuAF isn't a Twitter guy, so I don't think I'll be able to ask him any specifics on the mission, but here are the videos they published of the flight (the same flight) as NORAD announced. You may not be aware, but NORAD has no obligation to Canadians or Americans to tell us every time they perform one of these interceptions; they only release the information if the Russians publish something about it, or if someone at the Pentagon leaks it to the press, forcing their hand.<br />
<br />
As an aside; <b>it sure would be nice to get 1080p or 4k NORAD footage, wouldn't it?</b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div style="padding-top: 57%; position: relative;">
<iframe allow="autoplay; fullscreen" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="379" src="https://tvzvezda.ru/news/forces/content/201901270001-dnlk.htm/player/" style="height: 100%; left: 0; position: absolute; top: 0; width: 100%;" width="673"></iframe></div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div style="padding-top: 57%; position: relative;">
<iframe allow="autoplay; fullscreen" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="378" src="https://tvzvezda.ru/news/forces/content/201901270401-u447.htm/player/" style="height: 100%; left: 0; position: absolute; top: 0; width: 100%;" width="673"></iframe></div>
<br />
<br />
<div style="padding-top: 57%; position: relative;">
<iframe allow="autoplay; fullscreen" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="378" src="https://tvzvezda.ru/news/forces/content/201901270458-ljj1.htm/player/" style="height: 100%; left: 0; position: absolute; top: 0; width: 100%;" width="673"></iframe></div>
<br />
The news media routinely make the same mistakes, with clickbait headlines about intrusions into North American airspace, every single time one of these flights takes place, but NORAD every single time diligently tells the public<b> no national airspace was crossed</b>, and the bombers were never in sovereign airspace. Why editors and producers of the news ignore this can only be because of clicks, because it certainly isn't from being accurate. Kudos to you journalists who didn't fall for the "buzz the coast" narrative, and a finger wag to those of who who spread the story in that "Fake News" light.<br />
<br />
<h4>
2019-02-08 Update</h4>
<br />
Thank you to the mystery person (and people!) who are monitoring the Russian HF radio networks the bombers talk to each other (unencrypted, old school, voice comms) while performing operations, live tweeting it for the world to read as it happens. I completely missed this thread on Twitter, and several side-bar threads of people I follow, and who follow me on Twitter; so I profusely apologize to them for not noticing and not including the information they had put out there while the action was going on.<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en-gb">
<div dir="ltr" lang="en">
2 Tu-160 58401 and 58402, the third Tu-160 58403 as a radio communication plane + 4 IL-78 90722,90723,90724 and 90725.I heard them on the air for 14 hours</div>
— Записки охотника (@galandecZP) <a href="https://twitter.com/galandecZP/status/1089260239050952705?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">26 January 2019</a></blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
<br />
<br />
We knew the Russians said they were doing refuelling up over the Arctic on their 15 hour training flight, but now we know the composition of that effort. <br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>2x Tupolev Tu-160 strategic bombers (58401, 58402)</li>
<li>1x Tu-160 strategic bombers acting as a communication relay (58403)</li>
<li>4x Ilyushin Il-78 refuelling planes (90722, 90723, 90724, 90725)</li>
</ul>
That's a pretty impressive sortie, I'd say.</div>
</div>
Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-71026804966457920662019-01-25T15:23:00.000-05:002019-01-25T16:56:46.281-05:00The public's ability to use OSINT to track planes should not be underestimated by the RCMP.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggVipmJOoTDeIu1G7xtp-cofNFfhRSd9sC23OfjJWroxpZszRxs4Qzr1Z9uE3o1KB4ecabTGXxLNw88caQJulCy3SNd8p9dbwD5HWiNbApcOMzLoY-QMDoPsZj_v3kdF78zhaXzOES0oRk/s1600/Screenshot+from+2019-01-25+12-35-55.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="431" data-original-width="826" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggVipmJOoTDeIu1G7xtp-cofNFfhRSd9sC23OfjJWroxpZszRxs4Qzr1Z9uE3o1KB4ecabTGXxLNw88caQJulCy3SNd8p9dbwD5HWiNbApcOMzLoY-QMDoPsZj_v3kdF78zhaXzOES0oRk/s1600/Screenshot+from+2019-01-25+12-35-55.png" title="" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">( Cropped Pilatus PR Photo - underbelly of the PC-12 NG "Spectre" showing its electro-optical sensor)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
At least one RCMP surveillance plane, believed to be outfitted with electo-optical night vision and thermal sensors, circled ~6000-7000ft over Kingston for almost two weeks in January, keeping residents awake, annoyed, and curious, all night long, while they were investigating a National Security case in Kingston.<br />
<br />
It turns out the noise was from at least one nondescript, primarily white in colour, Royal Canadian Mounted Police Pilatus PC-12, registration number C-GMPB, ICAO Hex C065E0, and a serial number of 1304. C-GMPB departed London Ontario on January 4th headed toward Ottawa. On January 4th a local Kingstonian PlaneSpotter, Neil Aird, heard the plane, and checked his own ADS-B/Mode-S transponder receiver to catch the tail number as it flew overhead and around Kingston.<br />
<br />
The same plane seemed to head home on January 7th, then back towards Ottawa January 8th, operating in the area until January 15th when the plane was flown back to Southern Ontario, to the Division "O" headquarters, but not before getting photographed by Neil on January 14th. I speculate the jaunt to London Ontario could have been a crew change, or something similarly practical and mundane.<br />
<br />
Let's check in on the capabilities of the plane, which are naturally not mentioned by the RCMP. For cost savings, I suspect the plane is COTS, so we can refer to the marketing material around the two or three PC-12 "Spectre" variants the RCMP purchased. The last official number I could find was two, but I think more have been upgraded/converted or delivered since. The plane would have been outfitted with the top of the line IR/Electro-Optical and Thermal sensors. Here is their brochure; in short, they'll kit it out with whatever sensors you want, or leave you the hook ups exposed so you can customize it yourself. Glossy: <a href="https://www.pilatus-aircraft.com/data/document/Pilatus-Aircraft-Ltd-PC-12NG-Spectre.pdf" target="_blank">here</a>.<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/-7UuMJD6ulo" width="560"></iframe>
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<br />
Below we have a sister-plane to C-GMPB taking off from Ottawa International YOW/CYOW in 2018. Notice the paint scheme is different from older RCMP planes with rainbow racing stripes.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Tt4xqikENnk" width="560"></iframe>
</div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
C-FGMQ|ICAO:C01121|SN:1107</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Here is another sister-plane to the aircraft that had been circling Kingston, on and off, from January 4th to January 14th, 2018. Notice the paint scheme; not the usual RCMP colours.</div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/LkHV1tEpl_E" width="560"></iframe></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Reg:C-FMPA|ICAO:C02137|SN:1216</div>
<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
What did we learn from this?</h4>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>The RCMP have sixteen Pilatus PC-12 planes, and the same type of plane has several different configurations, with potentially overlapping duties. There is a surveillance variant called the "Spectre" and the RCMP has 2 of those on the books. I believe it's one of those that caused the din above Kingston. I have not been able to conclusively pick out the registration numbers of the two "Spectre" variants out of the 16 plane fleet, yet. (<a href="https://www.homelandsecurity-technology.com/projects/pc-12-ng-multimission-aircraft/" target="_blank">specs</a>)</li>
<li>Singled out as being the only single engine plane circling for over a week over a city makes you "overt", not "covert". Kingston has ~125,000 people, and more than a few noticed the RCMP was circling overhead and kept them awake all night for days; that's overt, not covert surveillance. I was contacted by a couple of people in Kingston who'd seen me written up previously (<a href="https://nationalpost.com/news/how-an-ottawa-man-tracks-the-worlds-military-and-spy-ships-from-his-home-office" target="_blank">here</a>, <a href="https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/tracking-air-force-one-flights-and-other-secret-trips-from-your-living-room" target="_blank">here</a>, or <a href="https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/mystery-plane-that-keeps-flying-over-kingston-ont-in-dead-of-night-baffles-citizens" target="_blank">here</a>), but I really didn't think there would be such a paper trail for an RCMP surveillance aircraft, I thought they would have been super-stealthy. I guess not!</li>
<li>Even before we knew the tail number from Neil's work, the plane operated all night long, that's a very specific behaviour. I ask you rhetorically, who else would possibly be flying, at 3 am, over Kingston in the cold. I live near the Carp Airport (CYRP) and twice a year helicopter pilots get re-certified for night operation or some other paperwork. They fly helicopters over the neighbourhood until ~10pm, and then go home - because they're human and have families to go home to. There is no activity, other than LEO, that would keep employees circling that long at that time in that pattern. I speculated it could be something corporate, doing some sort of survey,... but realistically, no. It's really likely any circling plane at 3am over any town of 125k people is some variety of LEO; local, provincial, national, or border services.</li>
<li>The plane was circling for hours. Again, this is a behavioural tell.<br />Take an example.. Sightseeing biplanes take off from CYRP; depending how much you want to spend, you can get a short tour, or a long tour of Ottawa. Either way, you're taking off from CYRP, flying around, and returning during the daytime, within a short-ish period. Minutes, not hours. There isn't anything that would justify circling for hours and days on end. The pattern of the plane's movement, the time, the altitude, this all paints a picture, but I still don't know why a white van parked across the street (yeah I know it's a movie trope) wouldn't be sufficient? SURE the plane is nice, but was it necessary? I don't know. That's past what I can realistically criticize, since they won't say why they needed the plane to begin with (even after today's 1pm press conference).</li>
<li>Initially many wondered if it could have been military? With CFB Trenton so close, it seemed like it could have been, but Trenton has a transport squadron, and while there are other people who I'd rather not mention in the area, none that would do reconnaissance from a small plane that fits that description, that I'm aware of. I liked the idea they were testing a drone's optics or something, but that didn't pan out either. Early distant photos of the plane showed it was a small plane, that looked like a PC-12, but was not confirmed at the time.</li>
<li>On January 4th the public (Neil in this case) knew that an RCMP operation was going on from the noise coming from their not-so-covert platform circling at < 7000ft for hours at night, by checking for the closest transponders that were beaconing in the area. The operational security implications of this are huge, as organised crime could easily look for all RCMP planes' presence in the future. I'm sure there are reasons why Mode-S has to be used, rather than being turned off entirely, which gives away the location of the plane, but shouldn't there be something they can do? Use a different mode? Neil is one of the good guys, and expecting the bad guys to not notice an RCMP plane circling overhead when they can precisely triangulate their position with < $1000 of computer gear bought off Amazon.</li>
</ul>
<div>
Why am I bringing all this up? Because nothing changes if you leave it alone. The RCMP is performing surveillance with a plane that's (figuratively) screaming "<i>HEY! I'm with the RCMP and you're within line-of-sight of this transponder that's on a plane overhead, else your laptop wouldn't be able to hear me!</i>", over 1090 MHz, over and over, as it circles all night long, if you're listening. I believe this was a good use case for why the RCMP needs a Predator-sized drone, which could fly higher, see farther, and loiter longer - drones don't eat or sleep. If the plane hadn't been noticed from its sound, nobody would have looked it up and tried to piece it together with relatively easily available present hobbyist technology.<br />
<br />
Here's Global News talking with Neil, who's really the Plane-Spotter hero of this story, in my opinion.<br />
Also, the title of the report should be "MYSTERY SOLVED!". Neil nailed it, and Steph Crosier first reported it in The Whig January 22nd 2018.<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="372" scrolling="no" src="https://globalnews.ca/video/embed/4881340/" width="670"></iframe>
<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
</h4>
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
Appendix:</h4>
Snapshot of all Pilatus PC-12 planes in the RCMP inventory, per the Canadian Government. (<a href="http://wwwapps.tc.gc.ca/Saf-Sec-Sur/2/CCARCS-RIACC/RchSimpRes.aspx?cn=%7C%7C&mn=%7C%7C&sn=%7C%7C&on=GOVERNMENT+OF+CANADA%2c+ROYAL+CANADIAN+MOUNTED+POLICE%7C&m=%7C%7C&print=y" target="_blank">source</a>, <a href="http://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/en/rcmp-flight-operations-program-evaluation" target="_blank">source</a>)</div>
<table border="1" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" dir="ltr" style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none; font-family: arial, sans, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; table-layout: fixed; text-align: center; width: 0px;" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><colgroup><col width="132"></col><col width="132"></col><col width="132"></col><col width="132"></col><col width="132"></col></colgroup><tbody>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Brand"}" style="background-color: #d9ead3; border-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Brand</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Model"}" style="background-color: #d9ead3; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-top-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Model</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Registration"}" style="background-color: #d9ead3; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-top-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Registration</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"ICAO"}" style="background-color: #d9ead3; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-top-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">ICAO</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Serial"}" style="background-color: #d9ead3; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-top-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-weight: bold; overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Serial</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/45"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/45</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-FMPB"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-FMPB</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C02138"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C02138</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":283}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">283</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/45"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/45</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-GMPY"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-GMPY</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C065F7"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C065F7</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":311}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">311</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/45"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/45</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-GMPP"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-GMPP</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C065EE"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C065EE</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":374}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">374</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/47"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/47</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-FMPF"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-FMPF</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C0213C"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C0213C</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":768}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">768</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/47E"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/47E</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-GMPM"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-GMPM</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C065EB"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C065EB</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":1011}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">1011</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/47E"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/47E</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-GMPX"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-GMPX</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C065F6"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C065F6</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":1017}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">1017</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/47E"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/47E</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-GMPE"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-GMPE</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C065E3"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C065E3</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":1073}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">1073</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/47E"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/47E</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-FMPK"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-FMPK</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C02141"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C02141</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":1092}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">1092</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/47E"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/47E</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-FGMQ"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-FGMQ</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C01121"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C01121</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":1107}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">1107</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/47E"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/47E</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-GMPV"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-GMPV</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C065F4"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C065F4</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":1181}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">1181</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/47E"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/47E</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-GMPO"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-GMPO</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C065ED"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C065ED</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":1197}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">1197</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/47E"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/47E</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-FMPA"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-FMPA</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C02137"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C02137</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":1216}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">1216</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/47E"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/47E</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-GMPA"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-GMPA</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C065DF"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C065DF</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":1262}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">1262</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/47E"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/47E</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-GMPQ"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-GMPQ</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C065EF"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C065EF</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":1268}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">1268</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="background-color: #d9ead3; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/47E"}" style="background-color: #d9ead3; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/47E</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-GMPB"}" style="background-color: #d9ead3; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-GMPB</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C065E0"}" style="background-color: #d9ead3; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C065E0</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":1304}" style="background-color: #d9ead3; border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">1304</td></tr>
<tr style="height: 21px;"><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"Pilatus"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">Pilatus</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"PC-12/47E"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">PC-12/47E</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C-GMPW"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C-GMPW</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":2,"2":"C065F5"}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">C065F5</td><td data-sheets-value="{"1":3,"3":1336}" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-right-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); overflow: hidden; padding: 2px 3px; vertical-align: bottom;">1336</td></tr>
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News:</h4>
<b>2019-01-22 "Kingston's mystery plane captured on camera" (</b><b>Kingston Whig Standard)</b><br />
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<a href="https://www.thewhig.com/news/local-news/kingstons-mystery-plane-captured-on-camera">https://www.thewhig.com/news/local-news/kingstons-mystery-plane-captured-on-camera</a><br />
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<b>2019-01-22 "Mystery plane that keeps flying over Kingston in the dead of night baffles citizens" (National Post)</b><br />
<a href="https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/mystery-plane-that-keeps-flying-over-kingston-ont-in-dead-of-night-baffles-citizens">https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/mystery-plane-that-keeps-flying-over-kingston-ont-in-dead-of-night-baffles-citizens</a><br />
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<b>2019-01-23 "Kingston mystery plane solved?" (Global News)</b><br />
<a href="https://globalnews.ca/video/4881340/kingston-mystery-plane-solved">https://globalnews.ca/video/4881340/kingston-mystery-plane-solved</a><br />
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Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com2Kingston, ON, Canada44.2311717 -76.48595439999996943.8677627 -77.131401399999973 44.594580699999995 -75.840507399999964tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-2831348183336047052018-11-15T17:51:00.000-05:002018-11-16T14:03:42.668-05:00The Canadian Forces may be ignoring a nuclear waste problem they may have in Goose Bay.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2-wS7CZS9hZo2lobBkJcMJGmILXvdDPoPGleCpi_X94TUvpbudZKztQ0298UmMfPKxvkn7rA2mzMhBu0iXIsTcl290Qlq4Zt7e61VGgIauXdnY6AjM7jkoU-L1VskTi40ss98pP5QV4ED/s1600/Screenshot+%2528120%2529.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="346" data-original-width="962" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2-wS7CZS9hZo2lobBkJcMJGmILXvdDPoPGleCpi_X94TUvpbudZKztQ0298UmMfPKxvkn7rA2mzMhBu0iXIsTcl290Qlq4Zt7e61VGgIauXdnY6AjM7jkoU-L1VskTi40ss98pP5QV4ED/s1600/Screenshot+%2528120%2529.png" /></a></div>
The United States Strategic Air Command stored multiple offensive nuclear weapon assemblies in the woods near Goose Air Base from 1950 to at least 1954, per John Clearwater, who wrote the book on nuclear weapons in Canada. Several even, including <a href="https://www.amazon.ca/gp/search?index=books&linkCode=qs&keywords=9781550023299" target="_blank">U.S. Nuclear Weapons in Canada</a>, and <a href="https://play.google.com/store/books/details/John_Clearwater_Canadian_Nuclear_Weapons?id=ArMKT4TbF9YC" target="_blank">Canadian Nuclear Weapons</a>. In 1954 the United States military completed construction on the proper double-barbed wire fenced Weapons Storage Area in the Southeast part of the base, giving any "Special Weapons" a concrete hardened new home. They used the same design you can still see at multiple bases in Span and Morocco; same earth covered magazines, separate storage for the fissile "pits" (the part that sits as the core of the nuclear weapon), same administration buildings, same warehouses for parts, etc - the design was repeated worldwide. (I've written about this before <a href="https://campingcdn.blogspot.com/2014/11/goose-bay-air-base-nuclear-weapons.html" target="_blank">here</a>, and compiled a lot of information with the help of people local to the base - thank you all!)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFIYPLlxqvd5bbMal9TE8mOwhyphenhyphenlwwU_J1exRpq-mdM71ZcwWbiF8Van7kwYitmB457VzrhMxlh4atoUjHaSsUjfDVa_SIaHlTRZBjSK9x2wO1kC-N6pGqKH9xpBDxkk9-vZiTxRpjGZaxa/s1600/Screenshot+%2528121%2529.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="849" data-original-width="779" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFIYPLlxqvd5bbMal9TE8mOwhyphenhyphenlwwU_J1exRpq-mdM71ZcwWbiF8Van7kwYitmB457VzrhMxlh4atoUjHaSsUjfDVa_SIaHlTRZBjSK9x2wO1kC-N6pGqKH9xpBDxkk9-vZiTxRpjGZaxa/s400/Screenshot+%2528121%2529.png" width="365" /></a>Fissile pit storage buildings were unique in US military architecture. US Strategic Air Command "Special Weapon" design (until the early 1960s) had removable fissile pits, and once sealed pit weapons were fielded, the maintenance intensive "open pit" weapons were withdrawn, stockpiled, and decommissioned. A sealed pit is maintenance-free and allows the weapon to sit idle, without routine maintenance (polishing) while deployed at an Operational Storage Site.<br />
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Vintage site plans of Goose Air Base show the <b>pre-1954</b> weapons storage site in the woods at the Northwest end of the base, and it is labelled "USAF Special Storage Area". You may recall nuclear weapons of the time were referred to as "Special Weapons". There are the ruins of a dog kennel, guard buildings, and laboratories for the maintenance of the bomb by technicians on loan from Sandia National Labs, and double barbed wire fences.The fences have been kept up, since the base still uses the area, and are lately using it for a firing range.<br />
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If no maintenance was ever going to be done at the 1950-1954 labs in the woods, there would be no reason to build a "lab" right beside the Operational Storage Site. It's also possible that they built the lab in case they had to perform maintenance, but never did.<br />
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In the process of doing maintenance on a fissile pit, which is like a shiny heavy metal grapefruit, small amounts of low yield waste are produced - dust. Fissile pit maintenance has to do with polishing any oxidation off. After the procedure, Kimwipes, smocks, paper masks, gloves, etc. would all be put into metal canisters, and buried down a bore hole in the back yard. Literally. Any dust that rubbed off the pit onto the floor would be painted into the floor with a heavy paint that would keep the dust trapped. Painting radioactive dust into the floor instead of sweeping it up isn't a bad idea, it's just short lived - if the paint starts to chip, you have a problem, which was exactly what happened in Fort Bliss. An old timer pointed out to the officials at Fort Bliss that before re-purposing the old Snake Pit buildings, maybe they should check for radiation in the floor. (!)</div>
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<a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/army-investigates-radiation-exposure-at-fort-bliss/">https://www.cbsnews.com/news/army-investigates-radiation-exposure-at-fort-bliss/</a></div>
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This slide deck should show you how seriously the US Military takes this threat; they went all out trying to find the contamination at Fort Bliss (Deck dated 2016)</div>
<a href="https://www.bliss.army.mil/dpw/Environmental/documents/2016%20RAB%20-%20Presentations.pdf" target="_blank">https://www.bliss.army.mil/dpw/Environmental/documents/2016%20RAB%20-%20Presentations.pdf</a><br />
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All activities involving nuclear weapons were, and are still, highly classified matters of national security. Unlike common knowledge about where the local drive-in theater was in the 1950s, very few people knew anything about nuclear weapons maintenance / operations who lived nearby, unless they had a need to know. From reviewing hundreds of pages of documentation from 5 Wing Goose Bay, and Parks Canada, regarding the former Strategic Air Command Weapons Storage Area at CFB Goose Bay, nobody has any institutional knowledge about the 1954 and 1958 Weapons Storage Areas built specifically to store nuclear weapons, or what came before them.<br />
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What will satisfy me that the Canadian Forces have taken this seriously and done all they can do to prove there is absolutely no nuclear waste buried near where the United States stored "The Bomb" between 1950 and 1954?<br />
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I'd like a survey for Alpha ( α ), Beta ( β ) and Gamma ( γ <b style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">) </b>radiation to be performed with the aid of the United States Corps of Engineers, who have dealt with these sites many times before, and considering it's their mess, I think its appropriate to drag them back to Goose Bay to take a closer look at what they left behind -<b> IF they left anything behind</b>. The low-yield waste that would have been left behind would emit Alpha and Beta radiation; the risk to the local community would be slight. All the same, I would like the Government of Canada to be 100% confident that when the Americans pulled out of Goose Bay they only left a nightmare of hydrocarbon contamination, and not radiological contamination too.<br />
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The United States keeps quite good account of where their nuclear weapons are, and where they have been. All nuclear weapons and weapons assemblies have serial numbers and can be traced through their life cycle. Canadians do not know when and how many nuclear weapons were in Canada, and for how long. Ultimately I would like a complete account of every single nuclear (and non-nuclear) weapon that has been transported in Canada, including US-leased bases, with their serial numbers. <b style="background-color: #fff2cc;">If there were no fissile pits from 1950-1971 (with a focus on 1950-1954) in Goose Bay, then there is no way there could have been low yield nuclear waste there, and it would save everyone a lot of time knowing that up-front.</b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-wl3QZs4imJqKEfEHdStNlm0G4yNw-7zxF90w7TkKgxSmqnjdeE36Ie_DMhXy74wXxMghsiSyh1oCULDAYFXQvx5KCOpg7XB6ywlqOpYiFKJxG5Izq7kFxP1ZOWnnN6W80SRU4jMLhPnH/s1600/12592312_10156520610925445_5437019285326517027_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="272" data-original-width="699" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-wl3QZs4imJqKEfEHdStNlm0G4yNw-7zxF90w7TkKgxSmqnjdeE36Ie_DMhXy74wXxMghsiSyh1oCULDAYFXQvx5KCOpg7XB6ywlqOpYiFKJxG5Izq7kFxP1ZOWnnN6W80SRU4jMLhPnH/s1600/12592312_10156520610925445_5437019285326517027_n.jpg" /></a></div>
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Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-31158424007907539612018-11-13T12:00:00.000-05:002019-01-08T08:33:45.259-05:00Tracking US Navy nuclear submarines using publicly available information<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPs9OYVmkpDtCWKa1uvo0kWXx58gN9ccUETY361JhYXFT4RwbN_pRQtgj8-BUshznh4CA7jYNFovN0Uuz1iTxGcQD2quQUDRKNeQc1T6U9TAnpOva8GUGqD8WG1OIP3neQ4OfxZClR8jqZ/s1600/USNavy_SSN_random.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="317" data-original-width="960" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPs9OYVmkpDtCWKa1uvo0kWXx58gN9ccUETY361JhYXFT4RwbN_pRQtgj8-BUshznh4CA7jYNFovN0Uuz1iTxGcQD2quQUDRKNeQc1T6U9TAnpOva8GUGqD8WG1OIP3neQ4OfxZClR8jqZ/s1600/USNavy_SSN_random.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">US Navy official photo (exact credit unknown)</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcoC6GyHkKy7uBnHT9RXY0Sd7t6BsRSug7FIRt2gcZlMCoh3Q2KbMqbdJ4jsi_E196O2RBSC4AWnNYj4pbkW8y0edek2555Ajdg5Yg7d2OT1jF-TkYCNBv7TLTPq5iZkhcvNpjBBNf4nc6/s1600/2017-06-09_Navy_Web_Page.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="828" data-original-width="988" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcoC6GyHkKy7uBnHT9RXY0Sd7t6BsRSug7FIRt2gcZlMCoh3Q2KbMqbdJ4jsi_E196O2RBSC4AWnNYj4pbkW8y0edek2555Ajdg5Yg7d2OT1jF-TkYCNBv7TLTPq5iZkhcvNpjBBNf4nc6/s320/2017-06-09_Navy_Web_Page.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">US Navy official web page (Screenshot 2017-06-09)</td></tr>
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(2018-12-16 Edit) The purpose of the secrecy around the locations of US Navy SSNs, SSGNs, and SSBNs is <u>op</u>erational <u>sec</u>urity; OPSEC. You don't want to tell an adversary where the submarines are, so you don't jeopardize their mission. The safety of those submarines, and their submariners, is of paramount importance to everyone. My objective in highlighting the following is to raise awareness that the supposed secrecy surrounding those deployments does not to hide their area of deployment from the Chinese Navy, North Korean Navy, or the Russian Navy; it hides or obfuscates their deployments from the collective knowledge of the American people, who happen to pay for the US Navy though their taxes. The technique I'm going to show you suggests that they are not hiding, and know it. I speculate they are not spoken openly about for political, rather than OPSEC, reasons.<br />
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The US Navy themselves post to official US Navy web pages and social media about US Navy submarine deployments; the screenshots embedded are proof of that, in case you hadn't noticed these posts before, or are not following the US Navy on social media. Unlike the leaks to Fox News from Pentagon sources and other news organisations around the positions of the Russian Navy AGI Viktor Leonov, which were derived from US Navy intelligence sources and clearly Secret, if not Top Secret, these are public displays of the US Navy's ability to project power to the other side of the globe. The transponders being on, and the press releases, are all shows of force.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9aZ54gCanGcGbypKad_0LIHSSNroxpX_ZdxAnvOcYsLgrDC71NpVdJ2iFS6I3l1H2fyL3_nPQRwsi6smgjHDt6O-8ccJZDIZHUz1bRPGUItYR7XFGdQwFFhb4Jmnb2c3DPtxlbsFzKRDr/s1600/2017-06-07_Busan_Twitter_USNavy.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="371" data-original-width="584" height="253" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9aZ54gCanGcGbypKad_0LIHSSNroxpX_ZdxAnvOcYsLgrDC71NpVdJ2iFS6I3l1H2fyL3_nPQRwsi6smgjHDt6O-8ccJZDIZHUz1bRPGUItYR7XFGdQwFFhb4Jmnb2c3DPtxlbsFzKRDr/s400/2017-06-07_Busan_Twitter_USNavy.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">US Navy official Twitter account (posted 2017-06-07)</td></tr>
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I do not want anyone to think the transponders on these subs are being used naively or in any incompetent fashion by the US Navy, or they're "forgetting" that they turn them on and off; all of this is extremely well known by the commanding officer of the submarine and the rest of the crew. The decisions related to who to tell or not tell in the public sphere are solely made at the Pentagon. Submarines are stealthy by nature, and have the capability to remain hidden for an extended trip into hostile waters; that these submarines are turning up on AIS indicates the US Navy feels it doesn't have to hide these particular submarines at these specific times. You'll notice very few SSBN "Boomers" on the list, since they do not show up very often at all; their areas of operation are more secret than the attack submarines. I presume this difference is directly related to their vital role in the nuclear triad; they must stay hidden. This difference again demonstrates it isn't that the US Navy can't keep a secret, SSN deployments just aren't universally as secret as they may seem to be. <br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_JGBTxLAafu6WLfCMDq_elQUBjBDJj-7ufQT9DOHXFIesODCq9-qtl_ifdphu_i0zTmiSv2JvrVxUwvehYO1w3HO4bl2hvGQxpeiLfIKSI_mKKPTlIuBO8egiW9_DTzg0WbC4miopzJZb/s1600/2017-06-09_map_of_sub_transponders.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="695" data-original-width="1028" height="216" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_JGBTxLAafu6WLfCMDq_elQUBjBDJj-7ufQT9DOHXFIesODCq9-qtl_ifdphu_i0zTmiSv2JvrVxUwvehYO1w3HO4bl2hvGQxpeiLfIKSI_mKKPTlIuBO8egiW9_DTzg0WbC4miopzJZb/s320/2017-06-09_map_of_sub_transponders.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">locations where US Navy submarines have last beaconed using AIS-T<br />
(screenshot 2017-06-09 MarineTraffic.com)</td></tr>
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Much like the NORAD interceptions of Russian Long Range Aviation flights, or Russian Open Skies Treaty overflights of the United States, the military is under no obligation to share information about these operations with the public, and by policy doesn't. NORAD does not announce when they intercept Russian Long Range Aviation flights; the only time you hear them on the news is when information is leaked by someone (read: officials at the Pentagon). The USAF doesn't announce when Russian Open Skies Treaty overflights are going on. Those flights are not secret, as evidenced by their transponders being on, and as they are announced in advance in the Russian news media. Again, the silence is political.<br />
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The following spreadsheet should help you match the Maritime Mobile Service Identity (MMSI), which the submarine transponder identifies itself as, with the true name of the submarine. They usually identify themselves with a generic name like "submarine" or "us submarine"; with a little data aggregation we can fix that. Special thanks to @lala_zet (どうもありがとうございました) who posted their MMSI / name correlations as well. The MMSI-name correlations I didn't have, I copied, and the ones I had previously, I was able to confirm.<br />
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Some of the below, but not all, can be tracked on MarineTraffic.com, if this interests you. The corresponding MMSIs can only be considered "best-guess" in terms of accuracy.<br />
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<br />
USS Henry M. Jackson (SSBN-730) MMSI:<br />
USS Alabama (SSBN-731) MMSI:<br />
USS Alaska (SSBN-732) MMSI:<br />
USS Nevada (SSBN-733) MMSI:<br />
USS Tennessee (SSBN-734) MMSI:<br />
USS Pennsylvania (SSBN-735) MMSI:<br />
USS West Virginia (SSBN-736) MMSI:<br />
USS Kentucky (SSBN-737) MMSI:<br />
USS Maryland (SSBN-738) MMSI:<br />
USS Nebraska (SSBN-739) MMSI:<br />
USS Rhode Island (SSBN-740) MMSI:369970218<br />
USS Maine (SSBN-741) MMSI:<br />
USS Wyoming (SSBN-742) MMSI:369970231<br />
USS Louisiana (SSBN-743) MMSI:369970198<br />
USS Ohio (SSGN-726) MMSI:<br />
USS Michigan (SSGN-727) MMSI:369970203<br />
USS Florida (SSGN-728) MMSI:369970157<br />
USS Georgia (SSGN-729) MMSI:369970181<br />
USS Seawolf (SSN-21) MMSI:<br />
USS Connecticut (SSN-22) MMSI:369970178<br />
USS Jimmy Carter (SSN-23) MMSI:369970192<br />
USS Bremerton (SSN-698) MMSI:369970170<br />
USS Jacksonville (SSN-699) MMSI:<br />
USS Buffalo (SSN-715) MMSI:<br />
USS Olympia (SSN-717) MMSI:369970212<br />
USS Providence (SSN-719) MMSI:369970008<br />
USS Pittsburgh (SSN-720) MMSI:369970216<br />
USS Chicago (SSN-721) MMSI:<br />
USS Key West (SSN-722) MMSI:366874512<br />
USS Oklahoma City (SSN-723) MMSI:369970211<br />
USS Louisville (SSN-724) MMSI:<br />
USS Helena (SSN-725) MMSI:369970185<br />
USS Newport News (SSN-750) MMSI:369970208<br />
USS San Juan (SSN-751) MMSI:369970217<br />
USS Pasadena (SSN-752) MMSI:369970213<br />
USS Albany (SSN-753) MMSI:369970163<br />
USS Topeka (SSN-754) MMSI:369970227<br />
USS Scranton (SSN-756) MMSI:369970221<br />
USS Alexandria (SSN-757) MMSI:369970165<br />
USS Asheville (SSN-758) MMSI:<br />
USS Jefferson City (SSN-759) MMSI:<br />
USS Annapolis (SSN-760) MMSI:369970166<br />
USS Springfield (SSN-761) MMSI:369970223<br />
USS Columbus (SSN-762) MMSI:369970177<br />
USS Santa Fe (SSN-763) MMSI:369970220<br />
USS Boise (SSN-764) MMSI:369970169<br />
USS Montpelier (SSN-765) MMSI:<br />
USS Charlotte (SSN-766) MMSI:369970172<br />
USS Hampton (SSN-767) MMSI:369970183<br />
USS Hartford (SSN-768) MMSI:369970184<br />
USS Toledo (SSN-769) MMSI:369970226<br />
USS Tucson (SSN-770) MMSI:369970228<br />
USS Columbia (SSN-771) MMSI:369970176<br />
USS Greeneville (SSN-772) MMSI:369970182<br />
USS Cheyenne (SSN-773) MMSI:369970173<br />
USS Virginia (SSN-774) MMSI:369970229<br />
USS Texas (SSN-775) MMSI:369970225<br />
USS Hawaii (SSN-776) MMSI:369970158<br />
USS North Carolina (SSN-777) MMSI:369970159<br />
USS New Hampshire (SSN-778) MMSI:<br />
USS New Mexico (SSN-779) MMSI:369970012<br />
USS Missouri (SSN-780) MMSI:368926259<br />
USS California (SSN-781) MMSI:369970327<br />
USS Mississippi (SSN-782) MMSI:369970328<br />
USS Minnesota (SSN-783) MMSI:369970641<br />
USS North Dakota (SSN-784) MMSI:369970642<br />
USS John Warner (SSN-785) MMSI:369970640<br />
USS Illinois (SSN-786) MMSI:369970957<br />
USS Washington (SSN-787) MMSI:369970958<br />
USS Colorado (SSN-788) MMSI:369970201<br />
USS Indiana (SSN-789) MMSI:369970960<br />
USS South Dakota (SSN-790) MMSI:368926327<br />
<br />
(2018-12-16 Edit)<br />
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Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com28tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-2454095867033723492018-11-03T16:15:00.002-04:002019-11-11T10:06:05.401-05:00We will bury you (in data) - Russian Navy Yantar backgrounder and Summer 2016 Trip Report.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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I read the modern propaganda being parroted on social media. Twitter accounts allege to have seen or heard things on the news, with no precise source, but claim it sounded "right", and according to their bias, they believe it to be true. This cycle repeats itself almost daily. It's disappointing, and disheartening, especially when the media is routinely misled by sources who so boldly mislead them. Some (even many) journalists aren't aware at the time, and sometimes are never aware that they've been lied to. Unsuspecting people will parrot the information they get from the media, who are just reporting what they were told, from sometimes-trustworthy and believed-to-be reputable sources, with no idea they're complicit in perpetuating a lie. Thankfully, this isn't the 1950s anymore, and the power to fact-check many topics that were previously exclusive to the government with spy satellites and covert operations is now in the hands of the people. Today, anyone can find someone in Vladivostok and ask them to take a picture of a ship in front of them using their iPhone. It's a whole different world, and the public needs to aggressively fact-check the stories that are being fed to the media by both military and political factions worldwide.<br />
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I would like everyone to fact-check the Canadians, fact-check the Russians, fact-check the Americans; fact-check every side. Publish your findings for everyone to read, with facts and references that can be checked. There is nothing more patriotic than proving to the world that your government isn't lying to you. But what if they are, and you expose it..? Well, that's not your fault, now is it?<br />
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One of my least favourite pieces of propaganda is the rumour being spread that the Russian Navy AGOR Yantar is tapping and/or preparing to cut/detonate <b><u>commercial telecom cables</u></b> that stretch across the Atlantic. I didn't want to get into exactly how this came about, but "anonymous officials" have been less than truthful. I believe US Government leaked statements, through "anonymous" officials, about the ship being capable of cutting cables; the DoD was concerned about their secret military cables that run across the ocean to remote deployments and bases. Somewhere along the way, with or without help from "government officials", the media switched the narrative to direct focus toward <b>commercial telecom</b> cables. "<b>The Internet</b>", they said, was what Russia was after, all of a sudden.<br />
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David E. Sanger and Eric Schmitt of the New York Times reported <b>October 25th, 2015 </b>that the Russian Navy AGOR Yantar "<b><u>cruised slowly</u></b> <b><u>off the East Coast</u></b> of the United States on its way to Cuba — <b><u>where one major cable lands near the American naval station at Guantánamo Bay</u></b>".<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-XzacNtoVd9bdiFA_KSbQujIhFpe6Les_dCqvtiO8TQIjkwyD80zCFnawWQ73KRHlSxOMaDAUrd0xY42esh9doovJ7A7nYh44uo_WN2fg1loabGr76T1SeM3xpCvbfOSUsz2rpKnios9M/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+10-26-38.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="751" data-original-width="757" height="317" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-XzacNtoVd9bdiFA_KSbQujIhFpe6Les_dCqvtiO8TQIjkwyD80zCFnawWQ73KRHlSxOMaDAUrd0xY42esh9doovJ7A7nYh44uo_WN2fg1loabGr76T1SeM3xpCvbfOSUsz2rpKnios9M/s320/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+10-26-38.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Green = >12.5 Knots, Yantar's top speed is ~14-15<br />
Map Data from MarineTraffic.com<br />
Illustration by Steffan Watkins<br />
(using Google Fusion Tables & Google Maps API)</td></tr>
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<u>Slowly</u>? While "slowly" is subjective, there is nothing subjective about the AIS data the ship was transmitting for most of the transit from near Halifax Nova Scotia to Havana Cuba, which shows the ship was at full speed, and with the wind at their backs they even got up past 16 knots. How did Mr Sanger and Mr Schmitt arrive at the conclusion the ship sailed slowly, anywhere? Anonymous government officials? Unfortunately neither Mr Sanger or Mr Schmit fact-checked these claims with OSINT data (to be fair, I didn't check in October 2015 either)<br />
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"Off the East Coast" is a frequently used term, that is hugely subjective. Everyone has a different interpretation regarding what constitutes "off the coast". Legally, sovereign territorial waters extend only 12 nautical miles, and the EEZ extends 200 nautical miles; so where was Yantar? Until they approached Cuba at the end of their transit, their closest point was hundreds of miles away from the coast. Once again, government officials chose to mislead Mr Sanger and Mr Schmitt, rather than provide a verifiable number that could be fact-checked to give an illusion of their proximity to the US coast that simply didn't exist.<br />
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Maybe the anonymous government officials didn't want to give the New York Times "Top Secret" US Navy intelligence about the ship's location, but... I just gave you a map. How did I do that? The Russian Navy vessel Yantar is a research vessel, classified as an AGOR, a relatively ordinary, but new and advanced, Russian Navy oceanographic research ship; and while ultimately I'm sure Yantar is doing more than looking for whales, <u>their location isn't a secret to anyone outside The Pentagon</u>. They're broadcasting their location both to AIS satellite based receivers, and terrestrial receivers, for the entire world to watch. They beacon their precise location frequently, every few minutes to local marine traffic over Marine VHF.<br />
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Mr Sanger and Mr Schmitt correctly stated the vessel was headed to Havana, but they left fact-based reporting behind when they linked the Russian ship's movements to the Guantanamo Bay cable that comes ashore at the base in Guantanamo Bay. Yantar was never anywhere near Guantanamo Bay's cable demarcation point, or even the South side of Cuba, where Guantanamo Bay is, nor did they stop where the cable was expected to have been laid by USNS Zeus. I speculate this was either a misunderstanding, or deliberate misinformation being sewn by the "anonymous" government officials.</div>
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Mr Sanger and Mr Schmitt continued and quoted US Navy Admiral Mark Ferguson, commander of US Naval Forces in Europe. </div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><b>"</b>Citing public remarks by the Russian Navy chief, Adm. Viktor Chirkov, <b>Admiral Ferguson said the intensity of Russian submarine patrols had risen by almost 50 percent over the last year. Russia has increased its operating tempo to levels not seen in over a decade." </b></span><b><span style="background-color: black; color: yellow;">[MISLEADING]</span></b></span></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
-<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/26/world/europe/russian-presence-near-undersea-cables-concerns-us.html" target="_blank">Russian Ships Near Data Cables Are Too Close for U.S. Comfort, New York Times, October 25, 2015</a>.</blockquote>
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If those truisms sound familiar to you, I already went over how both the US Navy and Russian Navy have a symbiotic relationship regarding their bravado, threats, and posturing (<a href="http://www.vesselofinterest.com/2018/07/a-story-of-russian-navy-bravado-uk.html" target="_blank">here</a>). In short; the Russians promote their successes, and the US increase their already ridiculous military budget to counter their claims, regardless of how hollow, validating the Russian Navy's ego, enabling further peacocking. It's true that the Russian Navy operations are at their highest since the Cold War. That's a truism because there were no submarine patrols when the Soviet Navy fell apart, and any number of patrols now is higher than none.<br />
"Intensity" of Russian submarine patrols is up "Almost" 50% the Admiral said in 2015. That's likely a reference to days at sea, which I explain in the previous blog post <a href="http://www.vesselofinterest.com/2018/07/a-story-of-russian-navy-bravado-uk.html" target="_blank">too</a>, and we already know those numbers are, at best, 20% of Cold War levels, using declassified CIA data.</div>
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Let me paraphrase then, using OSINT to fill-in the blanks that US Navy Admiral Mark Ferguson, commander of US Naval Forces in Europe, left out of his statement:<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Russian submarine patrols spent 50% more time at sea, over the year before, raising the number of days spent at sea to almost 20% of what they were during The Cold War, according to declassified CIA assessments of Soviet Navy out of area deployments from the 1980s. </b>-Steffan Watkins, paraphrasing US Navy Adm Ferguson</span></blockquote>
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See how that statement loses a lot of air when you un-cloak the numbers behind it?</div>
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Over a month before the New York Times ran their much-quoted piece, seasoned journalist and senior editor of the Washington Free Beacon Bill Gertz published <a href="https://freebeacon.com/national-security/u-s-shadowing-russian-ship-in-atlantic-near-nuclear-submarine-areas/" target="_blank">his bombshell piece</a> September 3rd 2015, after being contacted by anonymous Pentagon officials about the same story. For unknown reasons there was no credit given to Mr Gertz in the New York Times piece, so let me review the truth (and un-truths) he was given by the Pentagon officials who were, evidently, trying to get the story out in the media.</div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>"U.S. intelligence (is) closely watching a Russian military vessel in the Atlantic that has been sailing </b><u style="font-weight: bold;">near a U.S. nuclear missile submarine base</u><b> and </b><u style="font-weight: bold;">underwater transit routes</u><b>, according to Pentagon officials." <span style="background-color: black; color: red;">[FALSE]</span><span style="background-color: white;">&</span></b><b><span style="background-color: black; color: lime;">[TRUE]</span></b></span></blockquote>
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<b>-</b><a href="https://freebeacon.com/national-security/u-s-shadowing-russian-ship-in-atlantic-near-nuclear-submarine-areas/" target="_blank">U.S. Shadowing Russian Ship in Atlantic Near Nuclear Submarine Areas, Washington Free Beacon, September 3, 2015</a></blockquote>
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See map above; they could have been watching underwater transit routes to and from King's Bay, but they were (arguably) not "near" King's Bay as Mr Gertz' source stated; that's a stretch. Notice that the New York Times didn't mention reconnaissance of paths that US nuclear ballistic submarines transit in their piece over a month later?</div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">"<b>Defense officials </b>(..) <b>say the Yantar is believed to be gathering intelligence on underwater sensors and other equipment used by U.S. nuclear submarines based at Kings Bay, Georgia.</b>" <b><span style="background-color: black; color: lime;">[TRUE]</span></b></span></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b>-</b><a href="https://freebeacon.com/national-security/u-s-shadowing-russian-ship-in-atlantic-near-nuclear-submarine-areas/" target="_blank">U.S. Shadowing Russian Ship in Atlantic Near Nuclear Submarine Areas, Washington Free Beacon, September 3, 2015</a></blockquote>
That's another very important statement the New York Times piece seemed to miss; <b>they are gathering intelligence on US sensors</b>; SOSUS's successors, IUSS, etc. That seems like the sort of thing any adversary would want to know; where are the hydrophone arrays?<br />
What new technology is being deployed to detect Russian submarines?<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: large;">"A major target of the program is the Department of Defense Information Network, known as DoDIN. Moscow is seeking to map the global information network that is vital for U.S. warfighters" </span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: lime; font-size: large;">[TRUE]</span></b></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b>-</b><a href="https://freebeacon.com/national-security/u-s-shadowing-russian-ship-in-atlantic-near-nuclear-submarine-areas/" target="_blank">U.S. Shadowing Russian Ship in Atlantic Near Nuclear Submarine Areas, Washington Free Beacon, September 3, 2015</a></blockquote>
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Again, it seems the New York Times piece, published over a month later, didn't want to re-publish that the <b>Russian Navy vessel Yantar <span style="text-decoration-line: underline;">was </span>reported<span style="text-decoration-line: underline;"> by Pentagon officials to be looking for US military cables and sensors</span></b>. Bill Gertz' original piece, over a month before the New York Times published basically the same story, doesn't mention the Russians coming over to attack the Internet at all, so I can't see where they got that idea, unless an anonymous official wasn't trying to distract them from the truth that Mr Gertz published over a month before.</div>
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I understand that journalists do not want to accidentally become part of the story, but in my view, "the story" is now why the New York Times changed and omitted so much relevant information from Bill Gertz' original piece, published over a month before, about the exact same topic. I presume the New York Times reached out to Pentagon officials, to confirm the story, but Pentagon officials refused to confirm the most important details from The Washington Free Beacon's piece, so the New York Times didn't run those parts. They obviously read the piece on the exact same topic from their competing news outlet. Isn't it the <a href="https://freebeacon.com/national-security/u-s-shadowing-russian-ship-in-atlantic-near-nuclear-submarine-areas/" target="_blank">original Washington Free Beacon piece</a> we should be paying closer attention to, since it has the superset of information? I strongly suspect Bill Gertz was given a bonafied leak that the Pentagon didn't want out in the open. The NYT piece, even unknowingly, encourages speculation about "other" types of cables that aren't DoD related, and obscures the vulnerability of DoD undersea cable infrastructure that exists. I believe that's the crux of the whole issue; there's a vulnerability, the Russians know it, and they're mapping it out.<br />
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<h4 style="text-align: left;">
Russian Navy AGOR Yantar - Summer 2016 Trip Report</h4>
All of the above came as a result of the inaugural voyage of Russian Navy AGOR Yantar during their initial shake-down in 2015, where their stated purpose was to test their equipment. Fast-forward to Summer 2016, when Yantar was operating for ~3 months in the Northern Atlantic and near the GIUK gap; which has provided several new interesting places to investigate. My analysis focuses on where the Yantar stops. Ships don't loiter in one spot in the middle of a sea or ocean for a day or two on a whim. You can realistically assume that if a ship, which was built for, and carries Russian Navy's most advanced deep sea equipment, is stationary for more than a few hours, that something of note is going on. While Yantar is equipped with lights for night-time work, when reviewing the data, time of day is important to determine if they have stopped somewhere and are waiting for first light before conducting operations. Using GPS-based AIS-data to try and guess what a ship is doing is just that; guessing. I could be wrong with my assessment of any of these locations, but these are my best guesses based on as much information I could find. If you have a better idea, lay it on me!<br />
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While writing a piece for Jane's Intelligence Review I studied the entire 2015 tour (+more), and saw scant evidence that any of their stops were over commercial telecom cables, which throws shade on reports that the Yantar's movements are related to tapping or cutting commercial telecom cables. Did I mention those cables are already charted on nautical charts? They're already mapped and known to the shipping industry, in an effort to avoid them being caught by ships' anchors. On that alone people should realize the publicized "The Ruskies are coming for your Internet" story does not hold water. While Yantar is absolutely conducting operations on behalf of the GUGI, which is the department that would do deep sea covert operations. Any covert action would be done covertly with mini-subs, deployed from a stretched-submarine, that acts as a mothership - not Yantar - which is a big steel very-not-stealthy ship. I believe it's perfectly reasonable to believe the Yantar is tasked with reconnaissance to enable future undersea operations. Also, I don't think it's that hard for our military to tell the public those details flat out, rather than trying to make up excuses for why Yantar is an interesting ship to follow.</div>
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Using historical AIS-T (terrestrial) and AIS-S (satellite) data from <b>MarineTraffic.com</b>, we can see between May and July 2016 Yantar departed their home port in Olenya Guba|Оленья Губа and stopped in several places that were... interesting.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioSyRU-1BD3EsaclVqgLjuj3vaTu1zE_K-mIqmICYGEBXxmekgoMzp9z_1opdpd9aGEOz5vlb8wOvTi1KBrh0h03KRms7S0hhjBbWOW95y_10bw6JM2EvvzeIKYCuMr58LC5vpTd0g_qbI/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-11-03+15-35-37.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="349" data-original-width="802" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioSyRU-1BD3EsaclVqgLjuj3vaTu1zE_K-mIqmICYGEBXxmekgoMzp9z_1opdpd9aGEOz5vlb8wOvTi1KBrh0h03KRms7S0hhjBbWOW95y_10bw6JM2EvvzeIKYCuMr58LC5vpTd0g_qbI/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-11-03+15-35-37.png" /></a></div>
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At each of the big red push pins the Yantar came to a stop. The more pushpins around the spot they stopped, the more times an AIS signal from that location was received by a satellite overhead. The colour of the dots indicates how fast they were going.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3zB3wZn0pM2mthOk3gJKyufPScI2A-CRdm8tJopI71WUNVqu3XPSsusrHK7moW4CCqxTMcpiMS-eYfifB082c3c_GSCsXT_kI12_bSQMcdQbN2MvJ5rtRLNRCqIXDxQkQnLP9pYGcS1Kx/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-09+10-41-16.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="777" data-original-width="1555" height="156" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3zB3wZn0pM2mthOk3gJKyufPScI2A-CRdm8tJopI71WUNVqu3XPSsusrHK7moW4CCqxTMcpiMS-eYfifB082c3c_GSCsXT_kI12_bSQMcdQbN2MvJ5rtRLNRCqIXDxQkQnLP9pYGcS1Kx/s320/Screenshot+from+2018-10-09+10-41-16.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Vicinity of the Soviet Navy Submarine K-159<br />
~69.36142, 33.93928</td></tr>
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Several stops were made in the Barents Sea immediately outside Murmansk, and one of those was at a site where a Russian Navy submarine (K-159) was lost while being towed to be scrapped, with its two nuclear reactors aboard, killing 9 of the 10 member salvage team aboard the submarine. That story was reported by The Barents Observer <a href="https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/ecology/2018/01/no-leakages-sunken-nuclear-sub-yet" target="_blank">here</a>. The environmental survey / report is <a href="https://www.nrpa.no/publikasjon/investigation-into-the-radioecological-status-of-the-site-of-the-sunken-nuclear-submarine-k-159.pdf" target="_blank">here</a>.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQOLwdWQuCED5BwiG2-W6pKOlfuo8KqhPXOysZNlfBtES_0J4SWzRyB000THwj52CdKQqbW_e1mVgGk6yJo-aZG_c6A8L5Q-YyjOiIwq9PlgbafscRe_pwuUguJ99trwJXAIVd6nNHLaFU/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-09+10-40-56.png" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="160" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQOLwdWQuCED5BwiG2-W6pKOlfuo8KqhPXOysZNlfBtES_0J4SWzRyB000THwj52CdKQqbW_e1mVgGk6yJo-aZG_c6A8L5Q-YyjOiIwq9PlgbafscRe_pwuUguJ99trwJXAIVd6nNHLaFU/s320/Screenshot+from+2018-10-09+10-40-56.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Close to the site of the Kursk disaster.</td></tr>
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They also stopped near the site of the ill-fated Kursk's destruction, despite it not being there anymore. Maybe looking for something they left behind? Were there pieces of the Kursk that were not recovered that they wanted to check in on?<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhxLSXVhAmt19B8ue4yTZ9zhzlRdJznGsuVmPVMcoe85KPVmNz4YiteYFlcimW4Atj3X6kXy0rkXWFpIK1pZ2FH_YkXtcLKl2aISIm2Lne-YgmdlZhcm12cRwwaBhUkxQ1Rwz8VJKU3EFP/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-09+12-33-57.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="777" data-original-width="1555" height="159" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhxLSXVhAmt19B8ue4yTZ9zhzlRdJznGsuVmPVMcoe85KPVmNz4YiteYFlcimW4Atj3X6kXy0rkXWFpIK1pZ2FH_YkXtcLKl2aISIm2Lne-YgmdlZhcm12cRwwaBhUkxQ1Rwz8VJKU3EFP/s320/Screenshot+from+2018-10-09+12-33-57.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Vicinity of the German Battleship Scharnhorst?<br />
71.9814, 26.96789</td></tr>
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Around 2016-06-23 Yantar slowed and may have stopped around 71.9814, 26.96789, which is closer to the wreck of the German Battleship Scharnhorst's official position than the other spot to the NW where they stopped on their way out. There are no indications the two locations are related, but the only item of note in the area that I know of is the Battleship. If it isn't related, then it could be a military undersea cable or sensor, but neither are mapped, suggesting they are not commercially owned.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNPaEuo1IFR_KGebuZQ0fgYcvYgDUOFr6AGDyGwzdT4BC_yeBSSjjUwmbi4MIp-9V11fgvqxupDnLuvdINB-HXQMiTRKPxSOlS5i1znI-6UNf4PDpS63ZmY0XrcKcdbzqeEeYtJP_uZm3m/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-06-09.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNPaEuo1IFR_KGebuZQ0fgYcvYgDUOFr6AGDyGwzdT4BC_yeBSSjjUwmbi4MIp-9V11fgvqxupDnLuvdINB-HXQMiTRKPxSOlS5i1znI-6UNf4PDpS63ZmY0XrcKcdbzqeEeYtJP_uZm3m/s320/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-06-09.png" width="320" /></a><br />
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Arrived: 2016-05-26 for ~12hrs<br />
Location: ~72.54836, 25.08537<br />
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Off the Northern coast of continental Norway, this area is composed of sand, clay, and stone, with a depth of around 800-900ft. There are no known cables or wrecks that I was able to find mentioned. The closest bathymetric survey was a German, somewhat nearby, in 1993 (M26-2).<br />
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I'm pretty confident it isn't anything pipeline, gas line, or telecom cable related.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpIr3Dr0ngjZcTv4uS1HM_kRx8Z_x21T0yNYivnF45xBruxX8JqwuOLSJ51xRv_u0c-YF88bSqPI0PbaGkkMH7LNkOAcJKmAA-371J7fIb5IeDoqRooUDv_Rf4BohIJeiIKscZb7Yowsy_/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-11-03+13-32-44.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="866" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpIr3Dr0ngjZcTv4uS1HM_kRx8Z_x21T0yNYivnF45xBruxX8JqwuOLSJ51xRv_u0c-YF88bSqPI0PbaGkkMH7LNkOAcJKmAA-371J7fIb5IeDoqRooUDv_Rf4BohIJeiIKscZb7Yowsy_/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-11-03+13-32-44.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Southern tip of Svalbard, Norway, showing the area the Russian Navy Yantar stopped and examined. Nothing charted.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGXYsjSITuoxDQyuCGmH5hFhegDtnVf6pNWfFESY6yanMjWbk54p3aghGJcecrimjZ2iCZulOgltvsKSGkcOXlaqlGofbXO52D_Ydbd1W5nU64gynznJGRH8vvUpaeJ4JjvufSrcWlk7qR/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-02+21-47-38.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="177" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGXYsjSITuoxDQyuCGmH5hFhegDtnVf6pNWfFESY6yanMjWbk54p3aghGJcecrimjZ2iCZulOgltvsKSGkcOXlaqlGofbXO52D_Ydbd1W5nU64gynznJGRH8vvUpaeJ4JjvufSrcWlk7qR/s320/Screenshot+from+2018-10-02+21-47-38.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Three distinct places where Yantar had stopped and hovered.</td></tr>
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Between 2016-05-27 and 2016-05-28 ~76.31613, 15.17415 Yantar stopped just outside Norwegian territorial waters, off the Southern tip of Svalbard, and concentrating on three distinct sites; what was it they were focused on? The depth is around 900ft/275m at those locations.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXN3NEx3XT3AnYslmZnojj5-VUinVQClgmuryadjnlioFQRUnHd-Yvj8_vgThpZqjGuNDb0L9URZd6KzVmSNB6-vLX4rhnUGMaJv8fTzmHn5PbDCvkRYFaR0m_g16b4683sFdTOY_3thBX/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-06-46.png" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="179" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXN3NEx3XT3AnYslmZnojj5-VUinVQClgmuryadjnlioFQRUnHd-Yvj8_vgThpZqjGuNDb0L9URZd6KzVmSNB6-vLX4rhnUGMaJv8fTzmHn5PbDCvkRYFaR0m_g16b4683sFdTOY_3thBX/s320/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-06-46.png" width="320" /></a>There are no wrecks, cables, pipelines, or geological features there that I could find any reference to. I can find nothing note worthy to stop and look at, but they most certainly didn't stop for a "swimex". As the nautical chart shows, no remarkable undersea features are known to be there. NATO comms cable? Cable running to an undersea sensor? Maybe undersea sensors themselves? I don't know. This is selection by elimination.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOPcq8lZywct4VocRL8anTClB1cNgEpy_iKgVYKT8wRM6KHAbXC2QV4v8s6MYmmoi7SF9ZmLYIGgPn2yixGwYe-BMxC7VrCn1VfJ4DpxVR2yw5QyRVfwVm5-VedBcEPCnbxkXaRUANKG-S/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-11-03+13-43-36.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="369" data-original-width="899" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOPcq8lZywct4VocRL8anTClB1cNgEpy_iKgVYKT8wRM6KHAbXC2QV4v8s6MYmmoi7SF9ZmLYIGgPn2yixGwYe-BMxC7VrCn1VfJ4DpxVR2yw5QyRVfwVm5-VedBcEPCnbxkXaRUANKG-S/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-11-03+13-43-36.png" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLbvgNyPr1qA-0XjA184qVOrXJNrYwdmECDX1GuI_X5GrepvJ9N8lbQ3oCi4-5D2eJfDqun9AYgfkLJHq-jnS4a0-lYJL4CPXbV1hVZsST4PhpuLRskR4A9bBfELxYceu90Ki8gqpmtsIE/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-07-27.png" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="178" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLbvgNyPr1qA-0XjA184qVOrXJNrYwdmECDX1GuI_X5GrepvJ9N8lbQ3oCi4-5D2eJfDqun9AYgfkLJHq-jnS4a0-lYJL4CPXbV1hVZsST4PhpuLRskR4A9bBfELxYceu90Ki8gqpmtsIE/s320/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-07-27.png" width="320" /></a>Yantar then moved over to the middle of the Fram Strait between Norway and Greenland(Denmark); the very middle. Same story. Granted, the three sources of nautical charts I have on hand don't have a lot of data in that area, but there is nothing that suggests a commercial telecom cable would be in that area, or gas line, or any civilian infrastructure, obstruction, or geological feature. However, that location is in the middle of a choke point, and would be a perfect place to put a sensor; hydrophone or otherwise. Can I prove there is a hydrophone array between Svalbard and Greenland? Of course not. If it isn't a sensor of some kind, what was it? Secret cables? A wreck, or three? At least 3 of their other stops were in proximity to sunken nuclear subs, so I wonder, what submarine losses could have happened covertly? Could these be older wrecks? Could they have been looking for some good crab fishing while they were in the neighbourhood?<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpaWa5JB4dKv2kcMJcbZOptVAR2tTx-euT58YjFrTjQ6JsjdH9to2vlSIiKkTrIsSp5hBmbUQ8ZYLKIjrdbR6znOXGjaiGSQ8bRUJOncdwuvRPDpoq1QZpLwa_uL4xUoPynKNpyg8_cKhN/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-08-21.png" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpaWa5JB4dKv2kcMJcbZOptVAR2tTx-euT58YjFrTjQ6JsjdH9to2vlSIiKkTrIsSp5hBmbUQ8ZYLKIjrdbR6znOXGjaiGSQ8bRUJOncdwuvRPDpoq1QZpLwa_uL4xUoPynKNpyg8_cKhN/s320/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-08-21.png" width="320" /></a>They stopped at at least three locations in the same vicinity, and travelled in slow deliberate lines. I believe the red dotted line we're seeing is a search for a cable, rather than a geographically known single point or object, like a sensor or wreck. Cables have a little play and travel, since they get pulled up to be repaired and laid down more or less in the same place again.<br />
Let me use an analogy for the search that explains why the pattern of movement is important; If you had a carpeted living room, with an extension cord hidden in the pile of the carpet, you could walk barefoot where you believe the extension cord is, and find where it is with your toes. To find the cable quickest, you'd walk perpendicular to the cable's presumed direction.<br />
At least, that's what I think that's what we're seeing from the transponder's path. Notice the line of red dots, and the crescent of red dots? It was not a full criss-cross zig-zag like a search pattern for something lost on the bottom.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMBwOqIMLIOXRbp2TRz7qys6DG6xBTJ2mHApGp-0VoGcTca7MVlfkQ8EnFQmMSOz4lA-4jPQhOsShHCD_yLAURmBePFtvAJzswMZuvafQWFXxm-Qjb-dw8OkS3Hiu6s7U9oJ5hVriblPOS/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-08-39.png" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMBwOqIMLIOXRbp2TRz7qys6DG6xBTJ2mHApGp-0VoGcTca7MVlfkQ8EnFQmMSOz4lA-4jPQhOsShHCD_yLAURmBePFtvAJzswMZuvafQWFXxm-Qjb-dw8OkS3Hiu6s7U9oJ5hVriblPOS/s320/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-08-39.png" /></a>I believe they are looking for multiple undersea cables that are not charted. I suspect they know cables go from A to B, and are therefore searching in a perpendicular line to the cable's run, in the vicinity they expect the cable. Hopefully that makes sense without a better graphic to explain it. Compared with the pushpins where the Yantar went directly to a location, and seemed to stop over something, it seems like they're doing more of a sweeping search path for something at those three pushpins in the trench on the map.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEob_tkHXZvjRC2LMjzk5jdtX7XbEjbBHOV9cjBumE9IETnb6dYdmE3SZY3u57ZQ29XgZjY_ZoptqufX3TGY0dUlwOHtd4VHbjhRGIhJjDU0f2mL22lzEcFpDq9Y0QNyNdKVGvZ7dls7Ns/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-10+16-35-15.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="258" data-original-width="954" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEob_tkHXZvjRC2LMjzk5jdtX7XbEjbBHOV9cjBumE9IETnb6dYdmE3SZY3u57ZQ29XgZjY_ZoptqufX3TGY0dUlwOHtd4VHbjhRGIhJjDU0f2mL22lzEcFpDq9Y0QNyNdKVGvZ7dls7Ns/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-10+16-35-15.png" /></a></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4ha7SK8OAju2_azPuGORnOLMMutTPaDz2ZJgyXUGFT6ACQoh9z2KQMESnsbnjxAQzxP0GMtuoPCJwNiwojPD7vPOTFGo5aOeEZxkGmA7PRtvpL5OwHx7DkCTLXx8nGlVa2jzJo1M-JFsT/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-09-04.png" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="179" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4ha7SK8OAju2_azPuGORnOLMMutTPaDz2ZJgyXUGFT6ACQoh9z2KQMESnsbnjxAQzxP0GMtuoPCJwNiwojPD7vPOTFGo5aOeEZxkGmA7PRtvpL5OwHx7DkCTLXx8nGlVa2jzJo1M-JFsT/s320/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-09-04.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">In the vicinity of ~71.1265, -10.5407</td></tr>
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Jan Mayen is a Norwegian island in the Arctic Ocean, but I do not know if it has a current military significance, like providing power for local hydrophones or sensors, but the Yantar stopped on 2016-06-04 at ~71.1265, -10.5407, which is only ~60km from land, and seems to be northeast and very close to a significant sea mount that raises the depth from thousands of feet to only hundreds. Rumour has it hydrophones were positioned in geographically favourable positions for their acoustics. Mounts, cliffs, etc. were reportedly used to position hydrophones at the correct depth to get the best acoustic "view". While it's complete conjecture, it is interesting that NE would be the direction you'd expect Russian submarines to be coming from.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGyXt6c7tlTRJHqhPIe0Z57jCiz5rrkb1j054uKaOEBywAqTpqCnyEsIxqjo0zJU64SjfoLVKoNMmPGZWywfUCPTKwX1msCm6MgrokbQJX5-RUzv7zuuOcvi1W4AEiPnRVhvcvENt2SsXM/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-09-53.png" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="176" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGyXt6c7tlTRJHqhPIe0Z57jCiz5rrkb1j054uKaOEBywAqTpqCnyEsIxqjo0zJU64SjfoLVKoNMmPGZWywfUCPTKwX1msCm6MgrokbQJX5-RUzv7zuuOcvi1W4AEiPnRVhvcvENt2SsXM/s320/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-09-53.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Stopping at a pinch point,<br />
where conventional wisdom would put a hydrophone.</td></tr>
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Iceland is one of the founding nations of NATO, and critical to the security of the North Atlantic. At least one set of SOSUS hydrophones was placed NW of the island, and at least one set was placed SE of the island, according to Soviet Navy sources.<br />
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Iceland is an island (in case you're unfamiliar with it) and Yantar slowed down and stopped on opposite sides of the island, seeming taking an interest in the NE shore, the shore that faces where Russian Navy subs might potentially be coming from, over the top of Norway. The places they stopped were locations between Iceland, Greenland, and continental Europe; almost like a fence. At the NW side of Iceland they slowed and eventually stopped over an area again ~800-900ft in depth. I'm getting the impression the depth of the water is significant to this investigation.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0Cua_i5prh2aCVuRPVEmooEPoErU50BOTqJX34ouHFXxkkGzzD9-W4Y9ArrOT4ZVVh96XZQz3scn-ugxE4EETAA_MWs29Cr-fCy8n6BvRhtpJN5V75xJnYihEwyphH_uv8JDBwufsOgI4/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-11-06.png" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0Cua_i5prh2aCVuRPVEmooEPoErU50BOTqJX34ouHFXxkkGzzD9-W4Y9ArrOT4ZVVh96XZQz3scn-ugxE4EETAA_MWs29Cr-fCy8n6BvRhtpJN5V75xJnYihEwyphH_uv8JDBwufsOgI4/s320/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-11-06.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Right in the middle of the Davis Sill,<br />
a great spot for a hydrophone or sensor?<br />
63.41641,-56.30731</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
After Iceland, the next stop was getting close to home. Yantar stopped over the Davis Sill; a rise between the Davis Strait and the Labrador Sea, that arguably forces deeply submerged submarines closer to the surface, or sail closer to the bottom, depending how you look at it. This is both a pinch-point, and a location of reduced depth; perfect for identification of submerged submarine using hydrophones, or other sensors. IMO. However, they stopped over a spot which had a depth of ~1400m, but no bathymetric surveys seem to have been done at that exact point, so I'm unsure if there could be a sea mount making the depth less than the surrounding area. Pure speculation. What's in the middle of the Davis Strait that the Russian Navy sailed all the way there to check out? They're a long way from home, and it's undeniably specific; that was no "while we're here" pit-stop. Historically they are very close to a former Cold War sub-hunting base on the West coast of Greenland. It would be an excellent place to put a sensor, I'd think.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCyJDZL6bZrwNHdmDVE-pRm2fLlDQi4vg88F1OLVvi9iufZbvFnwhOFSoKh5IeGN53WgCiucKvz8Y91E1zxvhI3CmEQUQCRPWR-5AMYFfIMYjf92FhuuDKVQkyTK8TeG9jV5p-3Hi2BPUr/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-11-03+12-14-40.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="1587" height="193" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCyJDZL6bZrwNHdmDVE-pRm2fLlDQi4vg88F1OLVvi9iufZbvFnwhOFSoKh5IeGN53WgCiucKvz8Y91E1zxvhI3CmEQUQCRPWR-5AMYFfIMYjf92FhuuDKVQkyTK8TeG9jV5p-3Hi2BPUr/s640/Screenshot+from+2018-11-03+12-14-40.png" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Unknown significance<br />
<span style="font-size: 12.8px;">~70.2537,17.2082</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcFqXy9mSjKu0L47-osg6sDatnlEN1UkAhdEcVPxpo7w71_2K2PAKHFYnfZ4CUuCxu6QpTsZucKtGS51JOTv4mr66uYUWqH95yfoQsCAo4NckLLLA3MldikcLriCcVxbMOVnDcOTyUzis2/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-11-33.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcFqXy9mSjKu0L47-osg6sDatnlEN1UkAhdEcVPxpo7w71_2K2PAKHFYnfZ4CUuCxu6QpTsZucKtGS51JOTv4mr66uYUWqH95yfoQsCAo4NckLLLA3MldikcLriCcVxbMOVnDcOTyUzis2/s400/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-11-33.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Unknown significance<br />70.25372,17.20824</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
On the way back from the Davis Strait, Yantar stopped in the Norwegian EEZ, where there is a sandy bottom and a depth of ~820ft. I can't see any significance to this location; no cables, wrecks, etc.<br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMnSryIXieOogVFFQSaORPoKl8NDmZbIFRQn-lH1pIrESLppFvJTxy22I28-mhVwEVWEKXlA_GcDf8V9oqzp18Uo2Q0P1DdtGY1EWstpEzddxcm6-mHuB7VdUs2t1ZKMY4bezhy9suL2Lp/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-12-05.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMnSryIXieOogVFFQSaORPoKl8NDmZbIFRQn-lH1pIrESLppFvJTxy22I28-mhVwEVWEKXlA_GcDf8V9oqzp18Uo2Q0P1DdtGY1EWstpEzddxcm6-mHuB7VdUs2t1ZKMY4bezhy9suL2Lp/s400/Screenshot+from+2018-10-01+14-12-05.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Location of Soviet Navy Mike-Class Submarine<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>K-278 Komsomolets</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Finally, something I can put my finger on. They stopped at the location of the Soviet Navy Mike-Class Submarine <a href="https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/ecology/2018/01/no-leakages-sunken-nuclear-sub-yet" target="_blank">K-278 Komsomolets</a>, a known wreck that still may have two nuclear torpedoes, if the Americans haven't stolen them, and a fueled reactor. From what I read, the Norwegians are quite concerned with this wreck, and regular surveys are performed by environmental agencies.<br />
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I understand that the US Navy, NORAD, and NATO are rather sensitive about publishing where they put their undersea sub-hunting sensors, so I thought... what about the Soviets? Thankfully, there's a lot of expertise out there, and a lot of old documentation from the Cold War that the "Soviets" don't really care about anymore. One such graphic has shown up via two online sources, but I'm very interested in finding the original (for a better scan) or to find more Soviet Navy intelligence files regarding NATO SOSUS/IUSS sensor locations. Why? Because things don't change. From my experience, a mountain top today is just as high and has just as good a view for a long range radar as it did 50 years ago; applying the same idea to the ocean, I would think an old fashioned SOSUS hydrophone array might be obsolete now, but they were all positioned in geographically advantageous positions; I expect those places would be re-used for new sensor systems, which is why I'd like to monitor them for surface activity going forward. Better still, I don't think I'm alone in this pursuit; I'll continue to monitor Russian Navy auxiliary movements and see if they give away the locations of cables or sensor networks, as suggested by their stops at otherwise uninteresting spots.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjobAD0J4h7HG1hSmujKwvQxBdqQZR-OCiM5XlELNvPyCsdcYlJ7d3AN4-co9gyF1FAh_CWh4lnltQLXCjvJzW7rrf0Shp64taVMcFsxUJnFd5Lb_gzXzeAi4nWYTaiHeObsYKSksu6PoCn/s1600/Screenshot+from+2018-09-24+15-29-55.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="428" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjobAD0J4h7HG1hSmujKwvQxBdqQZR-OCiM5XlELNvPyCsdcYlJ7d3AN4-co9gyF1FAh_CWh4lnltQLXCjvJzW7rrf0Shp64taVMcFsxUJnFd5Lb_gzXzeAi4nWYTaiHeObsYKSksu6PoCn/s640/Screenshot+from+2018-09-24+15-29-55.png" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Soviet diagram of SOSUS locations (original Soviet source unknown) </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Ultimately this circles back to the stories that are being told in the media about Yantar's purpose, claims that it's after telecom cables, that it's after the internet, that the Russians are going to cut the internet and destroy the financial markets. None of the places Yantar stopped in the Summer of 2016 have any connection to the internet or telecom cables. While Yantar could cut cables with the claws of its ROV, it's an overt vessel, and ill-suited for covert operations - cable cutting or tapping would both be covert operations. Yantar's pattern of movement and operations show no signs that they're tapping telecom cables. I believe strongly that they are conducting underwater reconnaissance; helping allies like Iran and Syria with their cable issues, surveying NATO sensor arrays, surveying covert secret cables that are lying around the ocean's floor, checking on lost nuclear weapons on the ocean's bottom, etc.<br />
<br />
<i><b>"Muh, NATO said.."</b></i><br />
If you still think Yantar is looking for telecom cables, The Internet, I challenge you to go back and read the quotes from the NATO/NORAD/DoD/USNavy sources to do with the Yantar specifically, and pay particular attention when they speak of Yantar and cables. No military source mentions commercial telecom cables; they all mention cables (wink wink, military cables), and they mention communications (wink wink, NATO/DoD comms), but they <u>do not</u> mention the Internet. The internet story is something the New York Times published in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/26/world/europe/russian-presence-near-undersea-cables-concerns-us.html" target="_blank">October of 2015</a>, and as far as I understand, misunderstood from the get-go, or were deliberately misled by officials who wanted to cover up what Bill Gertz' article revealed. The <a href="https://freebeacon.com/national-security/u-s-shadowing-russian-ship-in-atlantic-near-nuclear-submarine-areas/" target="_blank">September 2015</a> leak by Pentagon sources to the Washington Free Beacon said nothing about "internet" cables, but did speak of the threat to Secret DoD cables, which makes the earlier article more reputable and accurate.<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
<br /><b>Credit:</b></h4>
I could not have done this analysis without the help of MarineTraffic.com, and I am very appreciative of the help they have provided. Thank you.<br />
<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
<b>References:</b></h4>
<a href="https://infoscience.epfl.ch/record/181564/files/LABA_COVERPOSTER.pdf">https://infoscience.epfl.ch/record/181564/files/LABA_COVERPOSTER.pdf</a><br />
<a href="https://maps.ngdc.noaa.gov/viewers/bathymetry/">https://maps.ngdc.noaa.gov/viewers/bathymetry/</a><br />
<a href="https://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/gazetteer/">https://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/gazetteer/</a></div>
</div>
Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com91tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1525741920646800814.post-80819429539405105062018-10-13T09:34:00.000-04:002018-10-13T09:34:12.798-04:00A One-size-fits-all Generic "Russian Navy vessel has crossed the English Channel" blog post<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
After the last Russian Navy ship that crossed the English Channel, I realized that I was sounding a lot like a broken record, so I figured I'd write a one-size-fits-all blog post regarding Russian (sometimes Russian Navy) ships crossing the English Channel, North or South-bound.<br />
<br />
On any given day a Russian-flagged vessel, possibly Russian Navy, is about to, or has already, crossed the English Channel. It could be a research ship, tug, oiler, transport ship, cruiser, submarine, destroyer, corvette, AGI, or other. It might be armed, or unarmed. By policy, the Royal Navy will likely escort the ship through the channel, even though the Royal Navy and NATO have no indications they have any intention of launching a surprise attack on the UK. NATO ships frequently shadow Russian flotillas, but are not mentioned by the Royal Navy, and if the Royal Navy doesn't dispatch a vessel to shadow them, they will likely not mention it to the press unless asked.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAnsvlD25V3sW2NPrhsqrl8PH_osMS392tidyx9EdTrLhG5Y9OfYWEJJWsQGCrkvcx1gnA9LKiVLgUMtpHjz9kGsR8WOtnnRQ6ECapsB7gMrhIJWKJ4X6heLwQylm3I6DJx1S9gbeXL80q/s1600/Screenshot+%252860%2529.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="633" data-original-width="629" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAnsvlD25V3sW2NPrhsqrl8PH_osMS392tidyx9EdTrLhG5Y9OfYWEJJWsQGCrkvcx1gnA9LKiVLgUMtpHjz9kGsR8WOtnnRQ6ECapsB7gMrhIJWKJ4X6heLwQylm3I6DJx1S9gbeXL80q/s400/Screenshot+%252860%2529.png" width="396" /></a>This is based on my evidence-based observations; there are patterns that appear over time. I routinely see Twitter accounts portraying themselves as UK citizens saying "This isn't news! They do it all the time!" and I disagree. It's very much news, <u>because</u> they do it all the time. The UK Ministry of Defence is not compelled to share all operations with the citizens of the UK, or the world, obviously, and it is my view they classify far more than they need. If there are year-to-year metrics published about Russian ships crossing the channel or Russian ships being intercepted while crossing the Channel, I haven't found them yet. All of these numbers and statistics are being used by the UK Secretary of Defence to justify increased defence spending. Without making the data available to scrutiny. We have no evidence to support claims of increased "Russian Navy" aggression around British waters, as has been claimed, and past statements have proven the Honourable Secretary of Defence tends to spin statistics in somewhat misleading ways.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXyRQ3M0DMbEQLvK6BduJ73Z1-7tRC1sTum16y1VlaoBWNgHfma2nH0u3-QDSg9hEtZP-8nNKT1yzG6G82pLubZMuLNyuw8WYSrfsNw7IFRBm_FSgnkcSw9St8FFZGlzXulAeOQ7s6IqQd/s1600/Screenshot+%252861%2529.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="344" data-original-width="639" height="215" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXyRQ3M0DMbEQLvK6BduJ73Z1-7tRC1sTum16y1VlaoBWNgHfma2nH0u3-QDSg9hEtZP-8nNKT1yzG6G82pLubZMuLNyuw8WYSrfsNw7IFRBm_FSgnkcSw9St8FFZGlzXulAeOQ7s6IqQd/s400/Screenshot+%252861%2529.png" width="400" /></a><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4pek0LEvRVAhOUb2wOQ24JwRkW5tzcdbHSeR1w32iaTQ2m9qqOuu6oJFAMzW4FGR_R9FLWlvZ6T_TmwiTkx0izmoRY7rVJbUlqlB3Z6IbjWt9orIX_UZttK1Ewt3BA7hghdi0GG0w_td4/s1600/Screenshot+%252862%2529.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="410" data-original-width="620" height="263" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4pek0LEvRVAhOUb2wOQ24JwRkW5tzcdbHSeR1w32iaTQ2m9qqOuu6oJFAMzW4FGR_R9FLWlvZ6T_TmwiTkx0izmoRY7rVJbUlqlB3Z6IbjWt9orIX_UZttK1Ewt3BA7hghdi0GG0w_td4/s400/Screenshot+%252862%2529.png" width="400" /></a>The military's communication team is Public Affairs (PA), the PA's office is at least partially responsible for portraying the military in a favourable light. Their job is not primarily to keep the UK public informed of everything that is occurring in the British Armed Forces on a day-to-day basis. That doesn't mean they don't inform the people, but they are not unbiased, and everything they publish should be at least a little scrutinized to make sure something hasn't been missed.<br />
<br />
I've previously spoken poorly of the British tabloid-press, but I have to hand it to the team at The Daily Star UK. While it would seem unlikely from to the paper's reputation for unbridled shameless sensationalism, they've been reporting very accurately on Russian ship movements through the channel. I know they're not the go-to name you think of when you think of Russian Navy analysis, but they're doing real journalism; talking to sources, consulting open source information - it's not all boobs and aliens (but don't worry, they still have those stories too)<br />
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<h4>
<i>But the Russians are in UK Waters!</i></h4>
<br />Russian Navy vessels are infrequently in UK territorial waters, and only when they are they're crossing The English Channel, which they have every right to, so saying they are breaching some sort of territorial boundary is simply untrue. A repeated narrative you may have picked up on are these exclamations (I believe they're goaded on by statements from the British Defence Secretary); <i>the Russians are coming</i>. <i>The Russians are "in British waters"</i>. <i>The Russians could strike at any moment with the warships they have surrounding the British Isles</i>. These narratives are all twaddle. British territorial waters, like everyone's, extend 12 Nautical Miles out to sea. A Russian Navy vessel could drop anchor 30 nautical miles of the UK and there wouldn't be anything wrong with it.<br />
<br />
The <a href="http://www.un.org/Depts/los/convention_agreements/convention_overview_convention.htm" target="_blank">United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea </a>clearly states that the Russians have every right to cross the English Channel, provided it's a peaceful transit, and the Royal Navy have every right to follow them as they do so, to make sure they don't do anything shifty. Russian Navy vessels passing the UK on their way to deployments in the Atlantic or Mediterranean are commonplace, and not an indication of immanent hostilities. If you find someone spreading that disinformation, call them out on it. Why call them out? Not worth your time? Don't want to argue with someone? I sure wish someone had been debunking pre-2016 US election rumours, rather than giving the lunatic fringe a soap box 24x7<br />(I'm looking at you Fox News)<br />
<br />
I hope the news media pays closer attention to propaganda being pushed by the Russians, as well as Western/NATO governments, and demands facts from their defence departments, rather than taking vague statements at face value.</div>
Steffan Watkinshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11450950957115187533noreply@blogger.com1