French and Swedish fighter jets scrambled from Šiauliai Air Base in northern Lithuania on 2 June to intercept six Russian military aircraft operating within the Baltic Area of Responsibility, NATO Air Command confirmed.
The six aircraft spanned four distinct mission categories simultaneously — air superiority, strike, heavy transport, and aerial reconnaissance — a breadth of Russian activity that has not been typical of single-day intercept events in the Baltic region since NATO expanded its air policing presence following Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Aircraft intercepted
The Russian package included a Sukhoi Su-35 air superiority fighter, a Sukhoi Su-24 low-altitude strike aircraft, and a Sukhoi Su-34 strike bomber. On the transport and collection side, the intercepts covered an Ilyushin Il-76 heavy military transport, an Antonov An-12 turboprop transport, and an Antonov An-30, a dedicated aerial survey platform equipped with camera stations and a glazed nose section used for imagery intelligence collection.
The An-30 is derived from the An-24 regional turboprop and carries multiple camera stations in its fuselage. Its presence alongside strike aircraft and a large transport in the same day's activity indicates a broad-spectrum Russian assessment of NATO positions and response patterns, according to the report.
Responding aircraft and mission framework
Two French Air and Space Force fighters from the Baltic Air Policing rotation at Šiauliai conducted the intercepts jointly with two Swedish Air Force Gripen fighters. Sweden joined NATO in March 2024 after more than 200 years of military non-alignment; its aircraft now participate in alliance air defense missions under that membership.
Šiauliai hosts the primary NATO Baltic Air Policing base, where allied nations rotate fighter detachments on a quarterly basis to maintain continuous fast-jet coverage over Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania — three member states that do not operate their own combat aircraft capable of policing their own airspace. The intercepts were conducted under Operation Eastern Sentry, NATO's standing framework for air policing and quick-reaction alert operations on the alliance's eastern flank.
Baltic Air Policing has operated continuously since the three Baltic states joined NATO in 2004. NATO has since added a separate Baltic Air Surveillance and Interception mission to expand coverage over the Baltic Sea and its approaches, a development that followed the marked increase in Russian military aviation activity in the region after February 2022.
