Washington Neutral Towards Russian MiG Offer to Lebanon
The U.S. administration will adopt a neutral stance towards Russia”s offer to give Lebanon 10 MiG-29 fighter jets, An Nahar daily quoted an informed official in Washington as saying.
The official, however, questioned the usefulness and efficiency of the jets whose maintenance requires huge sums of money.
He told the newspaper that his government would like to receive more information on the issue before taking an official stance.
The New York Times has reported that U.S. officials seemed somewhat taken aback by the Russian announcement, saying they needed to speak with their military counterparts in Moscow and Beirut before they could confirm that Russia had made a formal offer.
"This is very early yet," said Christopher C. Straub, deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East. He said American officials had no plans to offer a fighter jet to Lebanon to try to counter the Russian offer.