Mark Milley: American drone lies at a depth of 1500 meters

The head of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, said that the US military has taken measures to ensure that nothing of value among the wreckage of the MQ-9 Reaper reconnaissance drone could fall into Russian hands.

Source. This was reported by the BBC.

According to Millie, when it hit the water, it broke into pieces, and the wreckage sank to a depth of 1200-1500 meters, so it will be difficult to recover it.

This roughly corresponds to the depths in the central part of the Black Sea. Divers cannot work at such a depth, the newspaper notes.

Earlier, US media sources reported that the US had remotely destroyed confidential data from the drone before it sank.

Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev said that Russia would try to raise the wreckage of the US drone from the seabed.

General Milley also said that the interception of the drone by Russian Su-27 fighters was intentional (this was immediately acknowledged by the Russian Defense Ministry), but it is unclear how intentional the collision with one of the fighters was and whether the fighters were trying to shoot down the drone. Russia denies the collision and claims that the UAV drowned on its own.

According to Milley, he is scheduled to have a phone conversation with the Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, Valery Gerasimov, who is also in charge of the war in Ukraine.

Meanwhile, the head of the Pentagon, Lloyd Austin, had a telephone conversation with Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.

Austin, according to his version, told Shoigu that "the United States will continue to fly and operate wherever international law allows. And the professional and safe handling of its own military aircraft is Russia's responsibility," Reuters quoted him as saying.

Austin added that "it is important for great powers to be examples of transparency and communication."