11-05-2025
How RAF pilots are facing down Russian threats on the Nato border
Soaring thousands of feet above Nato's Baltic border with Russia, British fighter pilots are acutely aware that one false move could trigger a global conflict.
'It would be very easy, if I waved, to fold up my hand into this [a middle finger], and then that goes out on the news and suddenly it's an international incident,' a plucky Royal Air Force pilot said as he described intercepting a Kremlin spyplane in his Typhoon jet.
The flight lieutenant, 32, is among a handful of aviators from II (AC) Squadron who have been given the task of tracking down and deterring aircraft that encroach on alliance airspace.
Speaking to The Times from the tarmac of Malbork airbase in Poland — about 50 miles from Kaliningrad oblast,
