Dead Drop: April 5

WOULD HE LIE?  Rest easy NATO, Reuters says Russian president Vladimir Putin promises that he “has no designs on any NATO country and will not attack Poland, the Baltic states or the Czech Republic.”  Putin claims that the notion of such an attack is “…complete nonsense. It’s just drivel.” That’s comforting because Vlad has never misled anyone about such matters –  right? It is not like he is going to launch a “special military operation” or anything. Putin did say, however – that if the West supplies F-16s to Ukraine they will be shot down by Russian forces. Russia does have enormous recent experience in shooting down aircraft. However most of those shootdowns (like the one in this video of a fighter being splashed in the Black Sea) –are of Russians accidentally shooting down their own aircraft. There was some debate online if the most recent plane shot down by the Russians was an SU-35 or a SU-27 – but everyone agrees it did not belong to the good guys.

MUSIC TO THEIR EARS: While Putin is swearing on a stack of “God Bless the USSR” Bibles that he has no intention of striking NATO, Russian State TV talking head Vladimir Solovyov was on the air with someone identified as “military expert” Vladislav Shurygin hinting that such a strike might happen.  The two men talked about how much Moscow is learning about the West as a result of Russian armed forces attacking weapons systems provided to Ukraine by NATO countries – and they speculated that this info will be useful to Russia in the future.  Russia media monitor Julia Davis posted a clip of Shurygin telling Solovyov of an old song about Soviet troops landing in New York and Washington and that he listens to it whenever he wants to cheer up.