USS Donald Cook

At 1 p.m. on Friday, the breaking news on the New York Post and the United Press Twitter feeds was that the Chinese had attacked US naval ships with missiles and that the “US Navy was engaged in active combat with Chinese vessels in the South China Sea.”  The UPI Twitter feed also reported naval combat and also featured a photo of Pope Francis with the quote, “World War II has begun.”  None of it was true. The Twitter feeds had been hacked. By now it should not be breaking news that one should never necessarily take anything in the Internet at face value.

That being said there is a very interesting story floating around the net about an incident last April in which the Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer USS Donald Cook was “buzzed” by a Russian SU-24 fighter jet. The fighter made 12 “close-range, low-altitude” passes near the Cook while the ship was in international waters in the western Black Sea near Romania, Pentagon spokesman Col. Steve Warren told reporters. The fighter was observed to be unarmed. A second unarmed SU-24 fighter jet was also observed in the area.

Warren said the destroyer was never in any serious danger, especially when faced with two apparently unarmed aircraft. “The Donald Cook is more than capable of defending herself against two SU-24s.”  The Pentagon wasn’t happy, however.  “This provocative and unprofessional Russian action is inconsistent with international protocols and previous agreements on the professional interaction between our militaries,” Warren said.

What makes the story more interesting is that the Russians, specifically, Major General Pavel Zolotarev, Deputy Director, Institute of USA and Canada, a Moscow think tank, is claiming that the fighter plane carried jamming equipment that completely disabled the Cook‘s Aegis missile defense system.

The Aegis is considered to be one of the most advanced missile systems in the world.  The account goes on to say that all attempts to restart the Aegis system failed.  It was also claimed that “after the incident, the foreign media reported that “Donald Cook” was rushed into a port in Romania. There all the 27 members of the crew filed a letter of resignation. It seems that all 27 people have written that they are not going to risk their lives. This is indirectly confirmed by the Pentagon statement according to which the action demoralized the crew of the American ship.”

The new Russian jammer is claimed to be called Khibiny, named for a mountain range on Russia’s Kola Peninsula. “Khibiny is the newest complex for radio-electronic jamming of the enemy,” Russian Radio explained. “They will be installed on all the advanced Russian planes.”

Does this account make any sense at all? As the USS Donald Cook was in the Black Sea near Romania in order to conduct joint exercises with the Romanian Navy, the fact that the ship proceed to a Romanian port does not seem overly suspicious. The reported resignation of “all 27 crew members” sounds like badly written propaganda. The USS Donald Cook has a complement of over 280 officers and crew.

Not surprisingly, the conspiracy blogs have been posting and reposting the Russian claims. My favorite of these is the Truth Frequency Radio Blog, which asks, “Did Russia Disable US Ship With Alien Technology?”  They quote Preston James, a columnist from the blog, Veterans Today, that he has heard many reports saying the Russians were getting alien technologies from a group of aliens known as the “Tall Whites” or Nordics. (Well, OK then, I guess that settle it.)

In more mainstream sources, the story has been met with skepticism.  Michael Peck writing on the Medium publishing platform, for example, is succinct in his comments — “It’s a bullshit story.”  As Cook points out, if the Russians have developed a breakthrough jamming device capable of crippling the most advanced US missile defense system, letting the US know this by jamming a single ship, doesn’t make any particular sense. Cook also points out that Zolotarev has been bad-mouthing the the US missile defense technology for some time.

“The ground component of the [anti-ballistic missile] was tested in ideal conditions and showed a low efficiency,” said Zolotarev. “This fact is concealed by the Pentagon. The most modern component, the sea-based system Aegis, also showed its shortcomings in the present case.”

In the mean time, in November, the Navy announced a successful round of testing the latest Aegis system off Hawaii.  Also, the USS Donald Cook returned to the Black Sea on December 26 as part of the ongoing U.S. and NATO presence in the region. If the Navy is concerned about an Russian electronics warfare breakthrough, they are not showing it.

Thanks to Richard Bailey for passing the story along.