Chinese fighter jets intercepted a U.S. reconnaissance aircraft in international air space over the East China Sea in an “unsafe” manner Tuesday, U.S. Pacific Command said.
Navy spokesman Cmdr. Dave Benham said one of the jets approached a U.S. Air Force RC-135 at “an unsafe excessive rate of closure,” but that it appeared the speeding jet seemed to be displaying poor flying skills, rather than being intentionally provocative.
“Initial assessment is that this seems to be a case of improper airmanship, as no other provocative or unsafe maneuvers occurred,” Benham said in a statement.
The statement also said the Pentagon is addressing the issue with China through “appropriate diplomatic and military channels.”
At the just concluded Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, U.S. Pacific Command chief Adm. Harry Harris said a recent meeting with the Chinese in Hawaii, aimed at preventing dangerous encounters in the air and at sea, was “very productive.”
“We’ve seen positive behavior the last several months with China. Every now and then you’ll have a — you’ll see an incident in the air that we may judge to be unsafe. Those are really over the course of time rare,” Harris said before this latest encounter.
