MOSCOW, March 16. /TASS/. Russia and the United States had exchanges via military and diplomatic channels over the incident involving the US drone, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the media on Thursday.
"Communication channels were activated," the Kremlin spokesman said. He recalled that exchanges took place between military officials - Russa’s Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov and Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu.
"Both had a word with their counterparts. There were diplomatic exchanges, too," Peskov said, when asked whether the Washington-Moscow hotline, created after the Caribbean crisis for urgent negotiations between the leaders of the Soviet Union and the United States, was activated during the incident. On March 15, Peskov said that there had been no top-level Russian-US exchanges after the incident involving the drone.
The Washington-Moscow hot line was established on August 30, 1963. During the Cold War, the line served well in emergencies, but in recent years, the presidents of Russia and the United States, if necessary, preferred to use the telephone.
According to the Russian Defense Ministry, Shoigu and his US counterpart Lloyd Austin held talks on March 15 to exchange views on the causes and consequences of the incident involving the US drone crash in the Black Sea. The two men noted the importance of maintaining military communication channels for discussing crisis situations by major nuclear powers. The talks were held at the initiative of the US side.
Also, according to the Russian Defense Ministry, Gerasimov held a telephone conversation on Wednesday with the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the US Armed Forces Mark Milley. A written statement by the JCS spokesman said that Gerasimov and Milley had discussed a number of security concerns, but that in accordance with the customary practice no specific details would be disclosed.