Turkey first acquired Phantoms in 1974, meaning those remaining aircraft will have served for over 50 years when they are finally retired by or around 2030.
like you re seeing. what is happening? reporter: nicole, let me put it in terms that your viewers will immediately recognize. what i saw today was the second day of turkey s shock and awe campaign. i saw turkish artillery and planes bombarding the syrian kurdish areas just on the other side of the border. you know, we can wring our hands about how president trump has let down the kurds, america s allies, but the genie is out of the bottle. this now has a momentum. we did see some pushback from the kurds, mortars being fired. they did kill some people here on the turkish side. and actually, one mortar threw right over us, right over our team s head and landed in a field close by, which is a point of which we decided to move away from that place. but that is not the kind of retaliation that is, i think, going to have a huge impact. mortars aren t much against turkish f-16s. and to continue the analogy, i
responding to the violation of the rules of engagement. i think this is in essence. what are you hearing, matthew, about this dispute with turkey? well, the russians are absolutely furious that this has taken place. not just because they ve had one of their warplanes shot out of the sky by turkish f-16s but they lost one of the pilots. he was shot dead as the rebels filmed themselves machine gunning him as he parachuted to the ground. another marine, russian marine, was killed in the search and rescue operation that followed. so this has caused a massive political rupture here in russia. the russians are already talking about economic sanctions on turkey. the prime minister of russia, dmitry medvedev, has spoken to his prime minister, saying let s make a list of targets we can sanction, looking at gas supplies, food supplies.
you re hearing tonight? reporter: well, the state television here in russia has been broadcasting those comments of the surviving navigator who was on board the plane shot down by turkish missiles yet. basically saying that look, we didn t get any warning. we didn t even know there was any turkish planes in the vicinity. we haven t crossed into turkish air space. he said the first time they knew that they were being intercepted by these turkish f-16s is when the tail was blown off and spiraling in a fire ball at which we seen all over the media and internet. so a very compelling testimony from this navigator who survived the pilot of course was killed on his way down but rebels on the ground who shot at him as he was parachuting after he ejected