The Race to Find Turkey's Shot Down Fighter Jet

AP
Connor Simpson 2,112 Views Jun 23, 2012

Turkey and Syria are currently working together to locate the wreckage of the downed Turkish fighter jet shot over Syrian airspace on Friday, but the world is waiting to see how Turkey is going to respond. 

Despite their cooperation in searching for the plane, it doesn't sound like the relationship between the two countries is going to get better anytime soon. Turkish President Abdullah Gul told reporters "whatever is necessary will no doubt be done," following the incident. Gul defended his pilot saying it was "routine" for planes to briefly violate other countries' air space for short periods while flying at high speeds. Gul didn't elaborate on what exactly that meant. 

Reuters suggests in this report both sides are looking to avoid a military conflict, but are also now reporting Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan is having his second security meeting with top officials in less than 24 hours to discuss how to respond to the actions from Syria. For Syria, a military conflict would mean fighting wars on two fronts: domestically against rebel forces and then against Turkey, the second largest army in NATO. 

It hasn't been confirmed by any news agencies if the weapons used to shoot down the Turkish fighter jet were the same anti-air and sea defense weapons a Russian arms dealer told The New York Times he sold to Syria about a week ago. 

Want to add to this story? Let us know in comments or send an email to the author at connorbsimpson at gmail dot com. You can share ideas for stories on the Open Wire.

Topics: ,
Related Articles   More by Connor Simpson

How Banned Foreign Journalists Are Covering Syrian Refugees

Turkey Is 'Begging' the U.S. for Drones

Turkey and Syria Trade Cross-Border Attacks

 

Yahoo! Promises 'Not to Screw It Up' on Tumblr

Teens Are This Excited About Yahoo! Buying Tumblr

Elsewhere on the Web

User Comments

Please type your comment and click Post. If you’re not already logged in you will be prompted to log in or register

  • The Atlantic Wire on Twitter
  • The Atlantic Wire RSS Feed
  • The Atlantic Wire iPhone App