The RAF deployed its two operational Rivet Joint surveillance aircraft on 17 separate missions during October, with repeated flights focusing on Kaliningrad, a heavily militarised Russian enclave between Poland and Lithuania on the Baltic Sea. The month-long operation involved collecting electronic and communications signals while monitoring areas close to Russia's borders with NATO members and neighbouring Belarus.
Intensive surveillance operation
A senior defence source told the Daily Mail: "It is extraordinary that that level of activity was aimed over that period of time. The use of such an exquisite asset would suggest there was a very special request for information that was felt only Rivet Joint could have answered."
Flight data analysed by the Daily Mail indicate that the RAF carried out more than four times as many Rivet Joint missions in October as it did in May, when just four sorties were recorded. The aircraft were launched from RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire, the RAF's Intelligence, Surveillance, Target Acquisition and Reconnaissance (ISTAR) hub.
Russian nuclear warning
This comes after Russia warned NATO it would be ready to resort to nuclear weapons if the Western alliance attempted to cut off Kaliningrad. According to Reuters, the Russian document accused NATO of being on a "dangerous and reckless course" that entailed "high risks of the outbreak of a direct armed conflict".
The message said on September 30: "Russia will be ready to use the entire arsenal of forces and capabilities at its disposal, including nuclear weapons, in order to defend its territory should NATO countries undertake any attempt aimed at isolating the Kaliningrad Region from the rest of the country."
NATO response
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said at the Euronews Defence & Space Summit in Brussels: "We have prepared for this, we have planned for this, and this is true for the whole of NATO. We will defend every inch of NATO territory. That threat is not there, and if anything happens, we are ready to counter it."
He added: "We are a defensive alliance. Stop the nuclear threat. This is absolutely not called for and not helpful. And particularly stop the war in Ukraine, which is an unprovoked war of aggression against Ukraine. Everybody knows that he [Russian President Vladimir Putin] can never win against NATO. I don't take this seriously. But of course, we have to reply and make clear that NATO is a defensive alliance, as I said, and stop the war in Ukraine and stop the nuclear threats."
The Ministry of Defence has not publicly disclosed details of the operation.
