Beirut: A special operation that rescued the missing Russian pilot, whose plane was downed by a Turkish fighter jet, was carried out by an elite commando unit from the Syrian Air Force Intelligence.
The 12-hour operation was conducted by 11 troops and one translator, according to sources in Damascus. A Syrian Army colonel directed the operation with air cover and surveillance from a Russian drone, which provided images and the exact location of the missing Russian pilot. The Syrian unit “penetrated 3.5 kilometres beyond enemy lines” in Al Otayra, a small village on the outskirts of Aleppo.
When they found the pilot, they unit confirmed their identity with a secret password which included the words “Syrian Flag”.
The Turkish army on Wednesday released a series of audio recordings of apparent warnings issued to a Russian jet before it was downed near the Syrian border.
“This is Turkish Air Force speaking on guard. You are approaching Turkish airspace. Change your heading south immediately,” a voice in one of the recordings can be heard saying in English, repeating the message several times.
The surviving pilot of the Su-24 bomber shot down on Tuesday said earlier that no warning had been given and the aircraft did not violate the Turkish air space, although Turkey insists that it gave 10 warnings in five minutes.
Turkey says its F-16 jets shot down the Russian plane under its rules of engagement, while Moscow says the act was a “planned provocation.”
The downing has threatened ties between two major rival players in the Syrian war and raised fears it could escalate into a wider geopolitical conflict.
-Sami Moubayed is a Syrian historian and former Carnegie scholar. He is also author of “Under the Black Flag: At the frontier of the New Jihad”
