The sinking of the cruiser Moscow shocked the world, but what led the Neptune missile to attack is a matter of opinion.
1. NATO Secret Group
Russian Satellite News Agency news on the 12th, a source from the Russian law enforcement agency quoted him as a informant in the Ukrainian army, revealing that a secret NATO monitoring team began to work in Odessa, Ukraine, tracking Russian ships in the Black Sea to guide the Ukrainian 'Neptune' anti-ship missile. "In a suburb of Odessa, there is a secret base of a NATO monitoring team equipped with equipment that can determine the precise coordinates of any vessel with a radius of up to 200 kilometers in the Black Sea waters," the sources reportedly said. However, this claim has not been confirmed by NATO.
2. Starlink satellites
On April 16, Indian media reported that the Starlink satellite angered Russia after reports that the Satellite had been used to guide and assist the missile cruiser Moskva, which caught fire and eventually sank, in an attack on the Russian Black Sea Fleet. But Medvedev has denied it. But it's a good idea to emphasize the destruction of the Starlink moons, although it's too early to do so, and since there is a request, we'll look into it. He also thanked those who made the suggestions. It was also accompanied by a crying and smiling expression.
3. U.S. P-8 maritime patrol aircraft
Recently, a report in the British media has given a new idea. According to the British newspaper Times, an American P-8 Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft had been tracking moscow for hours before it was attacked, and then provided its location to the Ukrainian military. The P-8 took off from Italy and was stationed on romania's Black Sea coast in an attempt to determine the location of the Russian Black Sea Fleet. NATO's series of surveillance platforms and drones have been spying on Russia since the invasion of Ukraine. Operations from the Polish coast, the Ukrainian border all the way to the Black Sea. Before reaching the Black Sea coastline, Poseidon turned off its transponder, so it could no longer be tracked online. Before returning to the radar screen, it was "invisible" for nearly 3 hours in total. Aviation data analyst Smith said that on the day of the attack, there were slightly more U.S. aircraft operating in the Black Sea coast.
However, the U.S. Navy declined to confirm whether they helped Ukraine carry out the attack by providing intelligence data. A Defence ministry source added: "To maintain our support for NATO's east flank, we have conducted some limited air patrols off the coast of Romania. "But we will not disclose the details of the operations.
Is the P-8 possible?
American scholar Tom Cooper believes that this is possible. Because situational awareness accounts for 90% of modern warfare. If you know where your enemies are, but the enemies don't know where you are, you can attack, and the enemies can't. Moscow is so far away from Ukraine that a large number of radars in service in Ukraine cannot detect it. A maritime patrol aircraft like the P-8 is a perfect solution: it can detect and track targets and report their location. After all, this kind of work is usually done.
The P-8 is a powerful aircraft
The P-8 is a maritime patrol aircraft developed by boeing corporation in the United States, and its main business is anti-submarine warfare. However, due to its powerful reconnaissance equipment, it can also act as a reconnaissance aircraft. The P-8's main reconnaissance equipment is the AN/APY-10 radar, which weighs only 408 kg and has a maximum peak power of 4 kW, which can be used as a multi-functional radar for both weather radar and navigation radar. The AN/APY-10 performs surface search missions in two main modes: synthetic aperture radar mode and inverse synthetic aperture radar mode. Radar can identify targets with a radar scattering cross-section of 1 square meter within 29 nautical miles (36 km) in high-resolution search, and can search for large targets within 200 nautical miles (370 km) at low resolution, and the system can track up to 265 targets simultaneously. At present, the P-8 searches for radar signals the size of the submarine's periscope, and the search distance in the reverse synthetic aperture radar mode can reach 32 nautical miles (59.2 km) In addition, the P-8 has a broadband satellite communication system, which is convenient for joint operations with ground command, sea surface ships and underwater submarines. Therefore, the P-8 can fully play the role of guiding missile attacks.
Previously, the United States said that Ukraine enjoys real-time intelligence support provided by NATO, and that ukraine is indeed surrounded by various reconnaissance aircraft and drones of the United States and NATO. However, it was all intelligence support before, and did not directly participate in the war. If it is confirmed, the nature will be different, and it will inevitably cause a strong backlash from Russia, and even cause a firefight between the United States and Russia. This may be the real reason why the U.S. Navy refuses to confirm it. (Power talks about the world / Zhang Mi)