Originally Posted by
dead_pan
There was a concentration of NATO ISR effort along the very eastern edge of Romania in the days prior to the attack on the Moskva (as discussed on various spotter blogs). My working assumption at the time was that 'we' were trying to get a handle on events in eastern Ukraine, but who knows?
That said, Moskva's whereabouts would have have been relatively easy to determine, given that it is one enormous radio/radar emitter.
What is intriguing is the deployment of six USN EA-18G into Poland a few weeks ago. Why these particular aircraft, given the USAF have their own EW assets? USN keen to get in on the action, or maybe they have some specific capabilities useful for engagements with Russian naval vessels?
I and others have commented on social media that Russia could quite easily - and credibly - implicated NATO in the sinking. The fact that they didn't even hint at this speaks volumes.
The USAF currently has no deployable tactical EW assts. They are in the process of standing up a unit. Currently they use the Growlers by agreement.
The USAF has been without a dedicated electronic warfare aircraft since it retired the General Dynamics EF-111A Raven in 1998. Instead, the service has relied on the US Navy’s (USN’s) Northrop Grumman EA-6B Prowler and most recently the Boeing EA-18G Growler via the Joint Airborne Electronic Attack Program. As part of that joint effort, personnel from the USAF’s 390th Electronic Combat Squadron are based at NAS Whidbey Island in Washington State.