The U.S. Navy and the British Royal Air Pressure have carried out coordinated aerial surveillance flights over the Black Sea close to the coast of Crimean Peninsula and Russia’s Krasnodar, with an American P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol plane and a British RC-135W Rivet Joint alerts intelligence plane noticed flying prolonged reconnaissance patterns within the area. Flight monitoring knowledge exhibits the P-8A carried out a wide-area patrol mission, whereas the RC-135W first flew parallel tracks additional west, earlier than then getting into the identical operational zone because the P-8 nearer to the peninsula. The repeated racetrack patterns the plane adopted have been per maritime surveillance and digital intelligence assortment operations. The 2 plane have complementary capabilities, with the P-8 deploying a radar and electro-optical and infrared sensors, whereas the RC-135W is a devoted alerts intelligence plane designed to have the ability to acquire, analyse digital emissions and geolocate their sources.
NATO members’ intelligence assortment flights have performed a central function in bolstering the continued Ukrainain warfare effort from February 2022, complementing the availability of intelligence from a number of hundred Western satellites to the Ukrainian Armed Forces. The deployment of appreciable numbers of Western Bloc personnel on the bottom within the Ukrainian theatre, together with for advisory and fight roles and to facilitate using complicated weapons comparable to cruise missiles, has reportedly allowed intelligence collected to be utilised extra successfully attributable to their coaching to function with such intelligence help. Intelligence collected from NATO members’ flights close to Russian territory are thought-about extremely prone to affect the planning of the warfare effort, and should even present concentrating on knowledge a lot as Western satellites have to permit Ukrainain forces to launch precision strikes in opposition to excessive worth targets. Russia’s lack of a comparable reconnaissance functionality by satellite tv for pc or by air stays a major issue within the favour of Ukrainian and Western Bloc forces within the battle.
In August 2025 it was confirmed that U.S. Navy P-8s had begun operations within the Black Sea outfitted with the uncommon and extremely secretive AN/APS-154 Superior Airborne Sensor, a brand new radar pod developed by Raytheon which was was seen mounted beneath the plane utilizing a Particular Mission Pod Deployment Mechanism (SMPDM). The lively electronically scanned array radar was designed particularly to function in coastal environments, offering shifting goal indication and artificial aperture imaging. The radar reportedly permits P-8s to trace shifting targets at sea and on land, and might produce high-quality pictures underneath at night time and in poor climate as required. This permits the Navy to leverage the scale of its P-8 fleet to extra successfully carry out roles apart from anti-submarine warfare, which was the first function for which the plane was designed. A defining function of the AN/APS-154 is its means to scan each water and land concurrently, permitting it to conduct coastal reconnaissance whereas additionally monitoring submarines and floor vessels.
Crimea is among the many most closely fortified Russian-controlled territories, and has repeatedly been prioritised for assault, together with utilizing ATACMS ballistic missiles, missiles from S-200 air defences fired ballistically, and a variety of unmanned techniques. In September 2025 Ukrainian Navy spokesperson Dmytro Pletenchuk highlighted the appreciable efforts made to strengthen air defence capabilities, observing: “I do not know what new air-defence techniques the Russians may nonetheless deploy in Crimea. They’ve already positioned there every thing they possess. The Russians have lengthy concentrated S-500 Prometey techniques there. For them, Crimea has at all times been and stays a vital location in each sense.” “The peninsula has strategic and geopolitical significance for them,” he concluded.
Talking on the Warsaw Safety Discussion board in October 2025 , former British Defence Secretary Ben Wallace, who is taken into account some of the influential figures within the British defence institution, referred to as for a serious escalation in assaults on Crimea to severely disrupt civilian life. he pressured on the time that nations throughout the Western world wanted to help efforts to make sure Crimea was “not inhabitable.” “Now we have to assist Ukraine have the long-range capabilities to make Crimea unviable. We have to choke the life out of Crimea,” he acknowledged, including: “If it’s not inhabitable or not doable for it to operate… I feel, if we do this, [Russian President Vladimir] Putin will out of the blue realise he’s obtained one thing to lose.” Targets hit on the Peninsula have included seashores, key infrastructure comparable to bridges, in addition to navy targets together with air defence techniques and main airfields, with Western and Ukrainian forces thought-about to nonetheless have appreciable room to additional escalate assaults.
