Skip to footer

Russia to the rescue in Iraq? Moscow delivers jet fighters to Baghdad.

The first shipment of ground attack Sukhoi fighters comes after Iraq complained the US wasn't delivering support its needs to fend off Islamic militants.

|
Reuters
Russian soldiers unload a Russian Sukhoi SU-25 plane in al-Muthanna Iraqi military base at Baghdad airport in Baghdad, Saturday. The first batch of Russian fighter jets arrived in Baghdad to help Iraqi forces battle Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) fighters in the country's north.

| Moscow

Russian fighter planes and military advisers have begun arriving in Iraq to help stem the advance of ISIS forces, after embattled Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki complained that the US was too slow in fulfilling its pledges of air support.

Russian media, citing unidentified official sources, say that Iraq has urgently requested help from Moscow "to raise the Iraqi army’s combat readiness in its fight against terrorists." 

According to the reports, the first five of twelve Sukhoi Su-25 "Frogfoot" ground attack fighters ordered by Iraq have already arrived in Baghdad in a disassembled state aboard a Russian transport plane, along with an undisclosed number of Russian military experts.

The Su-25 was developed in the 1970s to be the former Soviet Union's answer to the US Air Force's highly successful A-10 "Warthog" close support fighter.

"The Sukhoi Su-25 is an air-ground support and anti-terrorism mission aircraft. In these difficult times, we are in great need of such aircraft. With God’s help, we will be able to deploy them to support our ground forces on a mission against the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant militants within the next 3-4 days," the Kremlin-funded English-language RT network quoted Iraqi Army Lieutenant General Anwar Hamad Amen Ahmed as saying.

The planes were flown into Baghdad just one day after Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, speaking in Damascus, Syria, said that Russia can be relied upon to help countries of the region fight spreading jihad.

"Russia will not stand idly toward some groups' attempts to spread terrorism in the region, including Syria and Iraq," he said.

Russian experts say that Iraq contracted to buy the Su-25s long before the current crisis broke out, but that Moscow may be rushing the deliveries in light of the military emergency facing the Maliki regime.

"It's not controversial, at least. Pretty much everyone agrees that helping out Baghdad in the battle against ISIS is a good thing," says Fyodor Lukyanov, editor of Russia in Global Affairs, a leading Moscow-based foreign policy journal. "But I don't think this is part of any larger Russian plan concerning Iraq. Nobody knows how things are going to go there."

Last week, in an interview with BBC Arabic, Mr. Maliki complained that the US was dragging its heels in fulfilling a $1.9 billion contract initiated in 2011 to supply 36 F-16 fighters to Iraq. According to US media reports, the first of those F-16s was turned over to the Iraqi military in early June.

But he complained that the US was taking a "long, very slow way" and delaying the jets' delivery to desperate Iraqi forces.

"We shouldn't have just bought US jets, we should have bought British, French and Russian jets to provide air support. If we had air support, none of this would have happened," Maliki is quoted as saying.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Russia to the rescue in Iraq? Moscow delivers jet fighters to Baghdad.
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Europe/2014/0630/Russia-to-the-rescue-in-Iraq-Moscow-delivers-jet-fighters-to-Baghdad
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe