Russia is going to attempt to recover the wreckage of the US MQ-9 Reaper drone that crashed into the Black Sea on Tuesday, said Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolay Patrushev.
He did admit that it is unclear whether this recovery effort will succeed, but insisted that it still must be attempted.
"I am hoping that it will be a success," he added.
Patrushev also suggested that this incident confirmed that the United States actively participates in military operations against Russia, despite the US leadership's claims to the contrary.
"Americans always say that they do not participate in military activities," he told media. "This [incident] is yet another confirmation that they directly participate in these activities, in war."
On March 14, a US Air Force combat drone, an MQ-9 Reaper, went down over the Black Sea after an alleged encounter with a pair of Russian Su-27 fighter jets near the Crimean Peninsula.
The Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement that the drone was flying towards the Russian border with its identification transponders switched off, and that the UAV was "violating the boundaries of the temporary airspace regime established for the special military operation."
The ministry pointed out that the Russian military aircraft did not come into contact with the drone and did not fire upon it, and that the MQ-9 lost control and crashed after making radical maneuvers.
Meanwhile, the US military claimed that the drone went down after one of the Russian aircraft clipped the UAV's propeller.