DefenceTalkAny attempt to end Russia’s blockade of the Ukrainian port Odessa would be a “high-risk military operation”, top US General Mark Milley has said as he embarked on a European tour. Milley, speaking in London on Tuesday ahead of stops in Finland and Sweden as they bid to join NATO, noted Black Sea shipping lanes […]https://www.defencetalk.com/top-us-general-says-ending-black-sea-blockade-high-risk-78857/

DefenceTalkOn the day that two Russian fighter jets suddenly scrambled to intercept a US bomber refueling mid-air near Crimea, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin was visiting three Black Sea states. The high-profile trip for the normally low-key Pentagon chief demonstrated that aside from facing down Chinese military expansion in the Indo-Pacific, the administration of US […]

DefenceTalkUS Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin urged more defense cooperation among Black Sea allies Wednesday ahead of a NATO ministers summit. Following talks in Bucharest with Romanian Defense Minister Nicolae Ciuca, Austin said action was needed by littoral states of the Black Sea amid Russia “militarization” of the region. “The security and stability of the Black […]

DefenceTalkNowhere in the world has Russia reconfigured the balance of power over the last decade as effectively as it has in the strategic Black Sea region. The militarization of the breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia following the war with Georgia in 2008 and the annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014, in conjunction with an […]https://www.defencetalk.com/russian-build-up-focuses-concerns-around-the-black-sea-66836/

DefenceTalkBulgaria was hosting joint navy drills with fellow NATO members in the Black Sea on Friday, as the United States tries to reassure a region worried about Russia’s intervention in Ukraine. Navy ships from the United States as well as Greece, Romania and Turkey, and four destroyers from NATO’s maritime immediate reaction force and a […]https://www.defencetalk.com/bulgaria-nato-allies-hold-black-sea-drills-60057/

DefenceTalkThe US Navy is sending a guided missile cruiser to the Black Sea, the Pentagon said Tuesday, the latest bid by Washington to to reassure allies worried over Russia’s intervention in Ukraine. “I can confirm the Vella Gulf, a Navy cruiser, will be going in to the Black Sea probably later this week,” Pentagon spokesman […]https://www.defencetalk.com/us-sends-another-warship-to-the-black-sea-59648/

DefenceTalkThings just got a lot tenser between the United States and Russia. Yesterday, a Russian fighter jet deliberately and repeatedly “buzzed” the USS Donald Cook, a destroyer that was transiting the Black Sea towards the Romanian port of Constanta. This was no accident; the Sukhoi-24, an all-weather strike fighter, made a dozen passes over the […]https://www.defencetalk.com/what-the-is-a-us-destroyer-doing-in-the-black-sea-59335/

DefenceTalkRussian attack aircraft repeatedly flew near the USS Donald Cook in international waters in the Black Sea on April 12, a Pentagon spokesman said today. The USS Cook was patrolling in the western Black Sea when an unarmed Russian Su-24 Fencer attack aircraft repeatedly flew near the Navy ship, Army Col. Steve Warren told reporters. […]https://www.defencetalk.com/russian-aircraft-flies-near-us-navy-ship-in-black-sea-59321/

DefenceTalkRussia has begun preparations for terminating bilateral agreements with Ukraine related to the status and operation of the Black Sea Fleet, a Kremlin spokesman said Friday. The decision was made at a meeting of the country’s Security Council chaired by President Vladimir Putin. According to spokesman Dmitry Peskov, the measures to be scrapped include a […]https://www.defencetalk.com/russia-moves-to-scrap-black-sea-fleet-agreements-with-ukraine-59186/

DefenceTalkA US Navy guided-missile destroyer will remain in the Black Sea to conduct more exercises with allied ships, its commander said on Saturday, the eve of a breakaway vote in Crimea. The USS Truxtun this week conducted joint exercises with Romanian and Bulgarian naval forces just a few hundred kilometers (miles) away from the disputed […]https://www.defencetalk.com/us-navy-destroyer-to-conduct-more-black-sea-drills-commander-59058/