More ‘trade’ for a busy Baltic Air Policing ‘rotation’
December 14, 2024
The General Staff of the French Armed Forces revealed in a post on X that two French Rafales had intercepted a converted Ilyushin Il-18 ‘Coot’ airliner of the Russian Federation Aerospace Forces off the coast of Estonia on Friday 13 December 2024. NATO Air Command said that the mission was the Rafale’s first scramble since the start of the current Baltic Air Policing (BAP) deployment (or ‘rotation’) on 28 November. This was the eighth French BAP rotation, during which the Rafales are partnering a deployment of Italian Eurofighter Typhoons. This means that there are currently eight NATO fighters at Šiauliai, with four more at Ämari in Estonia.
The Rafales were scrambled from alert at Šiauliai, Lithuania to intercept an Ilyushin Il-18 aircraft off the coast of Estonia.
Their target had not filed a flight plan and was not “conforming to safety norms” (eg was not in contact with ATC) which is routine for Russian military aircraft operating in the Baltic. The aircraft wore a quasi-civilian colour scheme, but positively bristled with ventral antennas, perhaps indicating a COMINT (communications intelligence) function.
The Il-18 intercepted belongs to the 354th Special Purpose Aviation Regiment, part of the 8th Aviation Red Banner Special Purpose Division at Chkalovskiy, East of Moscow. This was the unit targeted by sabatouers who damaged An-148 and Il-20 aircraft with explosives in September 2023. The unit operates some of the Kremlin’s the most sensitive reconnaissance aircraft, while other elements of the Division operate Russia’s command and control platforms, including President Putin’s ‘Doomsday’ airborne command post.
NATO’s Baltic air-policing mission provides an air defence Quick Reaction Alert (QRA) for the three Baltic countries of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, which lack their own air forces. Other NATO air forces therefore take turns in guarding their airspace, mounting three month (four month since 2006) rotational deployments at Šiauliai in Lithuania since 2004, and Ämari in Estonia since 2014, augmented by occasional deployments to Malbork in Poland, and on one occasion (from March 2024, while Ämari Air Base underwent vital reconstruction work) to Lielvārde in Latvia.
Baltic Air Policing is not just about the high state of readiness and proficiency of the fighters, of course. To ensure NATO’s continued vigilance and 24/7 awareness in the region the alliance employs proven and tested command and control links from the Baltic Control and Reporting Centres to the Combined Air Operations Centre at Uedem, Germany in order to monitor and preserve the integrity and safety of the airspace above and adjacent to the Baltic States. The alliance’s radar stations and command and control infrastructure generate a recognized air picture of all potential threats or unsafe situations in the vicinity of its airspace.
