A British RC-135 ‘Rivet Joint’, a dedicated electronic surveillance aircraft, has completed a mission at the border of Belarus from Polish airspace.
The UK has been gathering intelligence about the build-up of Russian forces. It should be noted that these flights are designed to be visible so that the public and Russia know they’re happening.
A British RC-135 was deployed to monitor the border of Belarus yesterday. The aircraft didn’t enter Ukraine and appeared to focus on monitoring forces in Belarus, something unusual for this kind of deployment in recent times as such aircraft often orbit over western Ukraine too, with only one of the last 10 deployments flying in this specific area.
https://twitter.com/geoallison/status/1496414073184997377
British surveillance aircraft being over the area isn’t unusual but we are seeing a significant increase in the frequency of the flights over the last few weeks for obvious reasons. American assets are also present.
What does the RC-135W do?
According to the Royal Air Force website, the RC-135W Rivet Joint is a dedicated electronic surveillance aircraft that can be employed in all theatres on strategic and tactical missions. Its sensors ‘soak up’ electronic emissions from communications, radar and other systems.
“RC-135W Rivet Joint employs multidiscipline Weapons System Officer (WSO) and Weapons System Operator (WSOp) specialists whose mission is to survey elements of the electromagnetic spectrum in order to derive intelligence for commanders.”
The Royal Air Force say that Rivet Joint has been deployed extensively for Operation Shader and on other operational taskings. It had been formally named Airseeker, but is almost universally known in service as the RC-135W Rivet Joint.
The UK operates three of these aircraft.
Off topic but…..nteresting snapshot of the state of things at the moment in the ‘related articles’ above. 6 articles of which 5 are UK articles of which 3 report delays, 1 is an exercise and 1 reports on a vague potential to buy additional a400 which is probably just the reinstatement of the 3 that were cancelled when the initial order was reduced from 25 to 22.
I believe the original 3 that were cancelled were intended as 2 point flying gas stations, until someone read Air Tankers small print.
What do you mean AirTankers small print. I am aware that in essence the A330 MRTT fleet is outsourced…
Air Tanker had a clause written into the contract that they had sole ownership for air to air refulling assets.
If the RAF/MOD wanted say an A400 equiped as a tanker for operations the penalty clause would have been prohibitively expensive.
I see.
Looks like Homer21, one of America’s Rivet Joints is now up over Romania.