US Military Tries to Restore Communication Hotline With Moscow

The so-called 'red telephone' that was put in place to connect the US high command with its counterpart in the Kremlin following the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 went cold a long time ago and has seldom been used, says the magazine.

Interestingly, the famed link was never red nor a telephone; the image is a product of Cold War fiction.

"First a teletype, then a fax, and now a secure email and chat link, the emergency hotline was designed to prevent nuclear Armageddon,” Politico reports.

The lines of communication which once facilitated meetings, exchanges and training exercises between the former Cold War foes virtually all went dead, the outlet admits, due to the dispute over the Ukrainian crisis.

According to the magazine, the most recent case of US and Russian forces coordinating their operations in a war zone appears to be when the two armies met at the Elbe River in Germany in 1945, when the two allies were mutually dedicated to defeating Germany in World War II.

However, US military leaders are now trying to find a new mechanism “for regular communication to avoid a larger confrontation between superpowers in the air and on the ground”, as “the stakes are considered extremely high.”

"This can escalate if someone shoots another one’s plane down or if you are bombing the wrong place or the wrong airfield," the magazine quotes retired Army Gen. George Joulwan, the former commander of NATO, as saying.

Pentagon officials, however, are pushing for things to be done their way when it comes to what they call the “incorporation of Russian air operations in Syria."

They may be offering three options, according to some “military officials who were not authorized to speak publicly about the internal deliberations.”

The first is to “simply draw up 'sectors,' which the US and Russia would agree upon and keep their units within.”

“The second would be 'procedural de-confliction,' in which the two sides would agree to talk on a regular basis about where and when they planned to operate so they could respond accordingly.”

“The third option might be a full partnership in which Russia joined what the US calls its '60-nation' coalition fighting the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq. A Russian liaison officer might join the other international officers posted to the Combined Air and Space Operations Center at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar.”

Russia, however, has already established an alternative coalition in the region with Syria, Iran and Iraq.

According to “a person with knowledge of this week’s secure teleconference between the Pentagon and Moscow,” Moscow has invited the US “to join their intelligence cell in Baghdad”, which was opened for the purpose of sharing information with representatives from Iraq, Iran and Syria.

“Moscow also invited the US to send its own liaison officers to help with 'de-confliction' in Syria, but Washington appears unlikely to agree; the US does not want to deal with Iranian or Syrian intelligence officers and officials are already working to put up boundaries between the Americans and Russians in the Iraqi capital,” the magazine says.

The issue, however, is still pending and the final decision will require some “shrewd leadership on both sides,” while Russia has already offered the US direct military contacts over Syria.

“I haven’t heard of any plans of the United States counteracting our operations in Syria, or from anyone else for that matter. We have contacts set up with the Americans in regard to this issue,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Monday.

Lavrov said that contacts are on the level of Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Barack Obama, as well as on the level of the two countries defense ministers. He added that there has also been a video conference between representatives of the US Pentagon and the Russian Defense Ministry.