In a recent development, Russia's defense chief, Gen. Valery Gerasimov, initiated a call with US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. CQ Brown, to discuss a large-scale Russian military exercise in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. The exercise, which involved hypersonic missiles and cruise missiles, was announced by the Russian Ministry of Defense and included participation from the Russian Navy and Aerospace Forces.
The exercise featured the launch of Tsirkon hypersonic missiles by Russian frigates and Kalibr cruise missiles by a submarine. More than 1,000 troops, 10 ships, and 24 aircraft, including MiG-31 fighter jets armed with Kinzhal hypersonic missiles, were part of the drill.
Despite the exercise, Gen. Gerasimov did not explicitly mention the missile launches during the call with Gen. Brown. The US currently has two destroyers, USS Bulkeley and USS Arleigh Burke, operating in the Mediterranean Sea.
This call marked the first communication between Gen. Gerasimov and Gen. Brown since Brown assumed the role of Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman over a year ago. While the leaders discussed global and regional security issues, the Russian side requested that the details of the call not be publicly disclosed.
Topics of discussion during the call included US concerns over the deployment of North Korean troops, Russia's use of intermediate-range ballistic missiles, and Ukraine's permission to fire long-range ATACMS missiles into Russia. The US and Russia maintain deconfliction lines in certain combat zones to prevent unintended encounters between their forces.
Despite the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, communication between the US and Russian military chiefs has been limited in recent years. The call between Gerasimov and Brown follows a previous conversation between Gerasimov and former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. Mark Milley in 2023.
