Trump claims he still hasnt been briefed about | Political News

President Donald Trump on Friday claimed he had not been briefed by intelligence officers on three Russian fighter jets that ignored alerts from Italian pilots when they violated Estonian airspace.

The Russian pilots didn’t reply to alerts on Friday after NATO’s Baltic Air Policing Mission deployed Italian jets, a senior Estonian army official said. Though the Kremlin denied having entered Estonia’s airspace, Estonian officers said the violation was confirmed by radar. They instructed the maneuver could have been performed to divert Western sources away from Ukraine.

Asked by reporters on Saturday about whether or not he had been briefed about the breach, Trump said: “No, I haven’t been briefed on it.”

The 12-minute incident on Friday was what appeared to be the most latest attempt by Russia‘s army to probe the boundaries of its potential to enter NATO members’ airspace. On Sept. 10, 20 Russian drones entered Polish airspace.

It still “needs to be confirmed,” if the border violation was deliberate or not, Col. Ants Kiviselg, the commander of Estonia’s Military Intelligence Center, told The Associated Press. Regardless, he said, the Russian jets “must have known that they are in (Estonian) airspace.”

After claiming during his 2024 presidential marketing campaign that he would clear up the Russia–Ukraine struggle on his first day in workplace, by late September, Trump had made little progress in brokering peace between the 2 nations.

Trump’s repeated threats against Russia promising extreme sanctions from the U.S. if it didn’t take steps to end its invasion have confirmed to be empty. Russian President Vladimir Putin has continued to bombard Ukrainian troops in violation of the supposed deadlines with no incident.

While Trump runs victory laps around a doubtful record of global wars he claims he has personally ended, he has been criticized for treating too gently the Russian chief who in 2016 boosted his presidential run through a hacking and disinformation electoral-influence marketing campaign.

“No one has been tougher on President Putin. I am not thrilled with Putin,” he said earlier this month, despite having rolled out a real purple carpet in Anchorage for the Russian chief in August. Putin is needed by the International Criminal Court on accusations of struggle crimes.

Sen. Dick Durbin said the repeated violations of NATO airspace by Russian drones represented a calculated risk from Russian management. “Vladimir Putin is testing our resolve to protect Poland and the Baltic nations,” he wrote on Sept. 9. “After the carnage Putin continues to visit on Ukraine, these incursions cannot be ignored.”

The Russian MIG-31 fighters entered Estonian airspace between 9:58 a.m. and 10:10 a.m. local time Friday in the area of Vaindloo, a small island located in the Gulf of Finland in the Baltic Sea, the Estonian military said. A ministry statement said it was the fourth airspace violation by Russia this year.

The Russian pilots didn’t pose a “military threat,” Kiviselg said.

But although they acknowledged communication from the Italian pilots flying F-35 fighter jets, they apparently ignored it and “didn’t actually follow the signs,” which is partly why they have been in Estonian airspace for so long, he added.

“Why they didn’t do it, that’s a question for the Russian pilots,” Kiviselg said.

The Russian jets got here from an airfield close to town of Petrozavodsk, in northwestern Russia, and have been heading to Kaliningrad, the Russian exclave on the Baltic Sea sandwiched between Lithuania and Poland. They have been tracked by two Finnish fighter jets before being escorted by the 2 Italian jets, which took off from Estonia’s Ämari Air Base and adopted them into worldwide skies, Kiviselg said.

Trump responded Friday by telling reporters he will probably be briefed by aides on the incursion. “I don’t love it,” he said, including: “I don’t like when that happens. It could be big trouble, but I’ll let you know later.”