Russian Air Force Chief Mocks NATO
Air Force chief Vladimir Mikhailov on Monday ridiculed NATO over what he called its slow response to the intrusion of a Russian fighter jet that crashed in the alliance's new member, Lithuania.

Lithuanian Defense Minister Gediminas Kirkilas said the country's air force chief had been fired in connection with the investigation into the crash.

The Su-27 crashed on Sept. 15 while traveling from St. Petersburg to the exclave of Kaliningrad. The pilot, who ejected safely and was detained, is accused of violating Lithuanian airspace.

Mikhailov said the incident highlighted the weakness of NATO's air defense.

"We, of course, hadn't planned to probe NATO defenses, but they turned out to be good for nothing," Mikhailov said in remarks broadcast on state-run Channel One television.

"The much-praised German pilots were on duty there, drinking beer or doing I don't know what, but when they were scrambled the plane had already hit the ground," he said.

Mikhailov added that if NATO had spotted the Russian plane earlier, German jets could have escorted the intruder to their base. "In that case, we wouldn't have lost the plane," he said.

A NATO spokesman has said that two of the four German F-4 jets responsible for policing the airspace over Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania for NATO intercepted the crashing jet after the pilot had ejected and just before it hit the ground.

In Vilnius, Kirkilas said he could not elaborate on why he fired Lithuania's air force chief, Colonel Jonas Marcinkus, except that it was in connection with the crash. Marcinkus has been accused by Lithuanian media of taking too long to alert the NATO jets.

Investigators, with help from Ukrainian experts, began decoding the plane's two flight data recorders on Monday. Kirkilas said he expected the investigation to conclude this week.

The crash has worsened already tense relations between Russia and Lithuania, a former Soviet republic that joined NATO last year. Moscow has demanded that Vilnius hand pilot Major Valery Troyanov and the crashed plane back to Russia, saying the crash was an accident and the pilot should therefore have immunity from prosecution.