US and Russia use communication lines in the war in Ukraine
2022.11.28 13:22
US and Russia use communication lines in the war in Ukraine
Budrigannews.com – A U.S. official told Reuters that the United States and Russia’s communications line that was set up at the start of Moscow’s war on Ukraine has only been used once so far.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, stated that the United States initiated a call via the “deconfliction” line to express its concerns regarding Russian military operations close to vital Ukrainian infrastructure.
Beyond regular testing, Reuters is the first to report on the use of the deconfliction line.
The specific incident that prompted the call on the line, which connects Russia’s National Defense Management Center and the European Command of the U.S. military, is poorly understood.
The authority declined to expand yet said it was not utilized when a deviant rocket arrived in NATO-part Poland on Nov. 15, killing two individuals.Although a Ukrainian air defense missile probably played a role in the explosion, NATO claimed Russia was ultimately to blame because it started the war at the end of February.
Although the official from the United States declined to specify which Russian activity sparked the United States’ concern, incidents of Russian fighting in the vicinity of vital Ukrainian infrastructure have been publicly acknowledged.
These include Russian activities in and around the largest nuclear power plant in Europe, Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia, which is under Russian control.
Additionally, Russia has raised concerns about the Nova Kakhovka dam, which prevents the overflow of a sizable reservoir in the southern part of Ukraine.If the dam were to burst, a wall of water would flood the communities below it, including the strategic regional capital of Kherson, which Ukrainian forces retook on November 11.
Since the beginning of Russia’s invasion of its neighbor, communications between the United States and Russia have been the focus of attention due to the serious risk that either side could make a mistake that leads to a direct conflict between the nuclear-armed nations.
The deconfliction line is just one of many communication channels that the Russian and American militaries still need to use.
Rare high-level talks between U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu are another military channel.His office stated that, since the beginning of the war, the top generals of the United States and Russia, U.S. Army General Mark Milley and Russian General Valery Gerasimov, have also spoken on two occasions.
Bill Burns, director of the CIA, and Jake Sullivan, national security adviser for the White House, have also communicated with Russian officials.
However, relations between the United States and Russia are at their lowest point since the Cold War, and on Monday, the State Department of the United States reported that Moscow had postponed talks in Cairo aimed at resuming nuclear weapons inspections. The postponement of the talks was confirmed by the Russian foreign ministry.Neither side offered a justification.
When questioned about the deconfliction line, the Pentagon provided no additional information beyond stating that it would continue to use a number of channels to “discuss critical security issues with the Russians during a contingency or emergency for the purposes of preventing miscalculation, military incidents, and escalation.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Defense stated, “We are encouraged by recent senior DoD calls with Russian counterparts and believe continued dialogue is critical.”
Both the defense ministry in Moscow and the Russian embassy in Washington did not respond to inquiries for comment.
At the point when it was reported in Spring, the Pentagon said the deconfliction line was made to stay away from any accidental conflicts in NATO airspace or on the ground.
A senior U.S. defense official stated at the time, “It’s not meant to be an all-purpose complaint line where we can just pick up the phone and register concerns about what Russia is doing in Ukraine.”
The United States and the Soviet Union operated these hotlines at varying levels during the Cold War.
Alexander Vershbow, a former senior Pentagon and NATO official and U.S. ambassador to Moscow, stated that the most recent deconfliction line was intended to concentrate on day-to-day operations rather than the more strategic discussions between high officials like Milley and Gerasimov.
Vershbow drew comparisons to Syria’s much more active deconfliction line, where U.S. and Russian military forces occasionally operate in the same airspace or terrain.
According to Vershbow, who spoke with Reuters, “We’ve seen this in Syria, where having the direct operational channel can at least clarify intentions during a fast-moving situation where maybe Washington is asleep.”
According to the U.S. official, calls conducted in Russian are used twice daily to test the deconfliction line. According to the official, those calls are initiated from Wiesbaden, Germany, by a Russian speaker working for the U.S. European Command.
The Pentagon’s new Security Assistance Group-Ukraine, or SAG-U, is based in Wiesbaden and provides remote support to the Kyiv government’s defense against Russian troops.
Anonymous U.S. officials have stated that early conflict planners believed the deconfliction line could be useful in the event that the United States needed to evacuate Americans from Russian-occupied territory in Ukraine.
The United States of America was under the impression that Russia might be able to quickly take over Ukrainian territory and ensnare American citizens before they could leave.
It could have also been used if a Russian fighter jet chased a Ukrainian aircraft into Polish airspace or if a Russian missile crossed NATO airspace, according to a government official.
