Despite repeated warnings from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that the U.S. is driving the rise of tensions at Ukraine's eastern border, the U.S. Air Force has deployed four B-52 bombers with nuclear capabilities to the U.K., where one official acknowledged that the deployment is at least partially connected to Russia's recent military activities.
Two B-52 Stratofortress aircrafts arrived at Royal Air Force Fairford on Thursday, with two more following. The bombers integrated with other NATO members' forces en route to Fairford, according to the Air Force, including "British Typhoon aircraft and Portuguese F-16s currently assigned to NATO's Icelandic Air Policing mission."
The U.S. military downplayed the deployment, saying it was a "long-planned Bomber Task Force mission," but one U.K. defense source told The Telegraph, "Is this aligned to current tensions? Yes and no."
According to The Telegraph, a former British intelligence official noted that the Pentagon could launch air strikes from Fairford as it has before.
"From Fairford they could operate against a range of targets: troop concentrations in southern Russia and Belarus, Moscow/St. Petersburg, even the naval bases in the White Sea," the former official told the outlet. "In 1991 they hit Baghdad from Fairford, flew on to Diego Garcia, refueled and rearmed, bombed Baghdad again on the way back, and returned to Fairford."
The bombers sent from Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota are capable of carrying precision-guided and nuclear weapons.
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