In a joint press conference with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Wednesday, General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, attempted to de-escalate when asked if Russia’s downing of a U.S. drone was an act of war.
Both Austin and Milley committed to continue flying and operating wherever international law allows, calling upon Russia to operate its military aircraft in a safe, professional, and nonaggressive manner.
The incident Tuesday involved a Russian Su-27 aircraft striking the propeller of a U.S. MQ-9 Reaper drone, which U.S. officials said was on a routine mission in international airspace when two Russian jets attempted to intercept it. The unmanned drone was diverted into international waters and is now deep below the Black Sea.
“As far as an act of war, I’m not gonna go there. Incidents happen, and clearly we do not seek armed conflict with Russia, and I believe at this point we should investigate this incident and move on,” Milley said.
The general said he didn’t know yet if the contact of the Russian fighter with the American aircraft was intentional.
However, he said the intercept and the aggressive behavior certainly were.
“We know that the intercept was intentional. We know that the aggressive behavior was intentional,” said Milley. “We also know it was very unprofessional and very unsafe.”
Milley said the U.S. will continue to try to avoid such incidents, but that this behavior is becoming a pattern for Russia.
“The fact that we operate in proximity to each other is not particularly unusual, and we do try to establish deconfliction channels in order to make sure that our forces are physically separated and we don’t have incidents like this,” the general said.
Because the drone is now under 4,000 to 5,000 feet of water, any recovery operation would be very difficult, Milley said.
Asked whether the drone could be of any strategic or propaganda value to Russia, the general answered that mitigating measures were taken to ensure nothing sensitive could be recovered: “Whatever was of value is no longer of value.”
“It probably broke up. There’s probably not a lot to recover,” he added.
If the U.S. does think it necessary to recover what remains of the drone later on, there are no American surface vessels already on the Black Sea, but, as Milley put it, “we have a lot of allies and friends in the area.”
Also on Wednesday, Senators Mitt Romney (R., Utah) and Jeanne Shaheen (D., N.H.) reintroduced their bipartisan legislation that would direct the Biden administration to develop a more detailed strategy toward the Black Sea region.
Discussing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which has entered its second year, Milley reiterated that Ukraine posed no threat to Russia and that Russia launched its war on its neighbor unprovoked. Austin concurred and emphasized that the Biden administration is supporting Ukraine for the long haul.
When asked if campaign rhetoric undermines Biden’s long-term commitment to Ukraine, Austin responded that there’s consensus that Ukraine matters not only in the U.S., but also internationally. Florida governor Ron DeSantis recently said Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a territorial dispute that’s not a U.S. priority.
“Ukraine matters. It matters not to just Ukraine or to the United States. It matters to the world,” Austin said.
“This is about the rules-based international order. It’s about one country’s ability to wake up one day and change the borders of its neighbor and annex its neighbor’s sovereign territory,” the defense secretary added.