Nothing makes a great afternoon than Islamic on Islamic violence. Syria shot down a Turkish F-4 Today near its Mediterranean coast.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish prime minister claimed that Syria had apologised for shooting down the plane, according to Turkish media.
“Syria immediately offered a very serious apology for the incident and admitted it was a mistake”, Haberturk daily newspaper quoted Mr Erdogan as saying onboard a plane on the way to Turkey from Brazil.
Mr Erdogan also said the pilot and navigator had survived: “At this moment the air force and navy are conducting search and rescue operations … luckily our pilots are alive, we have just lost a plane.”
The incident prompted the calling of an emergency security meeting to be led later on Friday by Mr Erdogan and attended by top military and intelligence chiefs.
Let them kill each other.
Tags: Syrian War
They’re still flying F-4′s,
How primitive.
Too bad the plane couldn’t have crashed into the source of the shoot down. “Antagonist” and “protagonist” are indistinguishable.
Translation:
Stay the hell away; our gunners are very slow learners…
Stick it up your ass Erdogan!
If they go to war lets stay out of it. Nato ally or not.
darkwords wrote:
We need to get out of NATO and regardless they should get as much help from us as they gave in Gulf War II. Still I’m loving this, this is the last thing Iran needs.
Newly-supplied Russian Pantsyr-1 anti-air missile used to down Turkish warplane
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report June 23, 2012, 8:41 PM (GMT+02:00) Tags: Turkey Syria Air force Russian missiles NATO
Russian Pantsyr-1 air defense missile in Syria
To ambush the Turkish Air Force F-4 Super Phantom Friday, June 22, over Latakia Syria used Russian-made self-propelled medium range anti-air Pantsyr-1 missiles recently supplied by Moscow (not as first reported anti-air Buk-M2 missiles). This weapon can down aircraft flying at altitudes up to 12 kilometers and cruise missiles. The unit responsible for the ambush was the 73rd brigade of the Syrian army’s 26th Air Defense Division.
Since the sophisticated weapons were delivered to the Assad regime in recent weeks, it must be assumed that local missile crews had not finished training in their use and would have had to rely on help from their Russian instructors to fire one.
This would be the first instance in the 15-month Syrian uprising of an advanced Russian-supplied weapon hitting the military target of a NATO member. Hence the comment from Washington by US State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland who said: “We’ve seen the reports… We have obviously been in contact with our Turkish ally…. To my knowledge, they haven’t raised this at NATO at this point.”
Ankara has repeatedly threatened to ask NATO to invoke the pact’s article 5 obligating members to come to the aid of a fellow member coming under attack. In this case, however, the Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan’s rhetoric was relatively restrained. He vowed to “determinedly take necessary steps” in response “once the incident is fully clarified,” leaving Ankara’s response deliberately vague.
President Abdullah Gul spoke out more strongly: “It is impossible to ignore our fighter jet being shot down by Syria,” he said after Damascus admitted to shooting down the plane, claiming its air defenses acted according to standard procedure before realizing it was a Turkish air force jet. Both are searching for the two missing pilots.
DEBKAfile’s military experts add: This was also the first time in five years any weapons system with Israeli manufacturing input had faced a Russian weapon acquired by Syria.
The first time was September 6, 2007, when Israeli fighter-bombers demolished the Iranian-North Korean-built nuclear reactor in the northern Syrian town of Al-Kibar. Airspace over the reactor was guarded by Russian Pantsyr-S1 anti-air missiles. Israeli bombers got through by disabling the Russian missiles’ radar so that Damascus never realized its reactor was being bombed until it had been smashed and Israeli bombers were home.
Five years later, Turkey has lost a Super Phantom which had undergone partial upgrading by the Israeli Aerospace Industry. However, two years ago, Ankara broke off its security and military ties with Jerusalem after a clash at sea between Turkish Mavi Marmara and Israel troops wich intercepted the vessel on its way to break Israel’s Gaza blockade, leaving nine Turkish pro-Palestinian activists dead.
By severing those ties, the Erdogan government left Israel’s improvements unfinished and the Turkish air force’s F-4 short of counter-measures for evading or attacking the latest Russian-made air defense weapons fired by Syria.
According to, DEBKAfile’s military sources waylaying a Turkish military plane over the sea was therefore a simple matter for the new Pantsyr-1.
Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan admitted Saturday that the jet was shot down over the Mediterranean around 13 kilometers west of the Syrian port of Latakia. He did not explain what a Turkish bomber fighter was doing over Syrian territorial waters, but the suggestion, which Western military sources have confirmed, was that Turkish military jets have lately been carrying out almost daily reconnaissance flights over the Syrian coast. Moscow and Damascus apparently decided it was time to stop the missions which among other things spied on the Russian arms supplies transiting Russian bases at the Syrian ports of Tartus and Latakia.
Actually this situation in Syria is a lose lose for the West.
If the Alawite regime in Syria manages to hold on then the 12 1/2% of the Christian population will be protected by the Alawites against the Sunni majority … but the Iranians will be empowered.
If the Alawite Syrian regime falls then the Sunnis will take over and we will have a Christian massacre and the Syrian version of the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood will take over.
@ Aussie Infidel:
Everything coming from DEBKA needs to be treated with skepticism.
Interesting note from Michael Yon on corruption in Pakistan that favors the Chinese
George Galloway incites Arabs against the Crusaders.
Total Recall updated.
The Other Les wrote:
The F-4, while old, is still a good plane. There are only about ten jets in the world better. It is on par with our F-16 for capabilities.
It is faster then hte F-16.
It has a greater combat radius then the F-16
It has a higher service ceiling then the F-16
It can carry more munitions then the F-16
The F-16 has a higher rate of climb, and a higher thrust to weight ratio. The F-16 also has higher wing loading which depending on your view may not be a good thing.
When the F-16 replaced it, they were not capable of filling the entire roll. They lacked the all weather capability of the Phantom.
Yup, its an oldie, but its a goodie.
Fast and Furious is trending on twitter right now.
Bill Whittle hits it out of the park. Fast And Furious is watergate with 300 dead people. At a minimum. IF the GoP doesn’t retain him to make some political ads they are dolts.
@ JeremyR:
The F-16 is far superior to the F-4 and the only good thing about the F4 is that it is a twin engined jet. The speed is about equal.