It is kind of comforting - in a strange way - to return to the old days of the 'Cold War'. I think, personally, that the world was a much more stable place during those days than it is now

Baz 81, Alicante, Spain

Yeah, great shot of a US F-15 Eagle illustrating a story about RAF Tornadoes...which happened to be shot off Alaska.....

Steely Dan, Glouester,

This action by the Kremlin was only a test of British defensive capabilities and a reminder that Russia is still a strong nuclear player.
The real threat Britian will face is a surprise nuclear attack by submarine leaving little British rection time not such a visible threat from a bomber we can detect. They may use a stealth bomber but I'm not sure how many russia has.
Russia has a advantage in numbers of troops and tanks but not allies or a high quality in their armed forces.
Although this will never go to war, or even an arms race I do believe that russia will soon be testing how close a sub can get to london in similar style to the aircraft exercise.

Joe McGinn, Wigan, United Kingdom

Europe does not know that it can be destroyed by Russia becouse Europe is a tail of the USA. And we remember flows of lie from the West during 90...

Borislav, Norilsk,

This lot had me in fits of laughter! But the real truth is if you have Nukes you get to sit at the big table and have a say in what happens in the world and if you don't have nukes you will probably be ignored! Its sad but true! Anyway its good to see we can still get a couple of aircraft into the air when needed. Tally ho................

widey, manchester, UK

It's nice to see the Russians steping up, their missile test was also a good sign of Power balance to force the Americans to moderation of their World Conquer objective as a natural consequence of their imperialism since they are the dominant empire in turn.

Also, the chinese can nock down American satellites so this world is beggining to sound more safe to all of us that live in non military powers but are still under treath of the american bully in the classroom.

Carlos, Tijuana, Mexico

Hm... Our political science professor - retired colonel - told our group today that actually aircrafts had made a flight around British Isles and only after that were "made" to turn back :-)

Lets build brave new world together or take back your democracy with our rusty warheads ;-)

Konstantin , Ukhta/Moscow, Russia

It is ordinary practice of soldiery - to collect reconnaissance information about each other, exactly during soldiery studies.
Concerning 50-years-old age of Bear. B-52 USAF also 50 years flies and yet will fly while there is possibility of him to modernize. B-2 USAF is too dear and has no special advantages, really only in war against Iraq.
To the connoisseurs of military technique from Richmond, VA,USA - this 50-years-old Bear can take the half of Europe one volley, not flying in it.

Oleg, N/Novgorod, Russia

Wow! Due to sky-rocketing oil prices russians now can afford the kerosine
for their 50 year old spy bombers. I guess they will be able to buy
a couple of new jets in few years. Obviously, the old times are coming back.

Tim, Richmond, VA,USA

Don`t worry gays ! :) We simply look flew.

To some americans - Putin doing all right. America only want`s to make "democracy" in all countries, as an Iraq. Were it`s killed for 2 years more people, then Saddam for 30- years. The main to have time to to withdrew the someone else oil.
Hirosima and Hagasaki - thats too manifestations of the american humanism.

P.S. i'm not communist :)

Andrey, Perm, Russia

Neil, you're perfectly right. Putin does want to get things right back. Exactly as much of the rest of Russia does.
Little did you know, similar operations are routinely performed by RAF, USAF and the rest during Russian naval exercises. Moreover, although Russia ceased most of it's power demonstartion during 90's, the rest of the world didn't. So it appears kinda normal to me, things just roll back in a way they should be.
Would it be agression or power demonstration, not just vigilance, RAF would face a bunch of modern supersonic tu-160 bombers, escorted by fighters, not these lovely old grumbler-teddies.

Mike Shaft, Princeton, NJ, US

Obviously Putin is longing for a return to the past days of Soviet glory when Soviet power mattered in the world areana and the KGB was an organization which had real power. Actually, a bipolar world order might be a nice thing to have again. It's certainly much more stable than the multi-actor non-nation-state violence we're experiencing now.

Thomas, Atlanta, GA, USA

Calm down everyone! This was almost certainly a training exercise for the Russians. The next Bear F seen in UK airspace will probably be on its way to an airshow in Lincolnshire!! :)

Danny, wellingborough, UK

This reminds me of the old RAF ad with the Bear and RAF intercepting aircraft . The caption read " These things are sent to try us " !

S R Hector , Worcester, UK

Take it easy guys, that plane is really a pile of trash just to take photos - if we wanted to bomb you we would send Tu-160 Blackjack ;) But personally I love UK so I hope we never go to war.

Sergei, Russia

Sergei, Samara, Russia

As the article says, we do it as well.

Ray, London,

Well not only that Chris, but even if our whole military was here we'd be screwed anyway because let's face it, you could probably find more planes on 1 russian base than we have in our entire air force, thanks to decades of cuts and cancellations.

Even should we be able to shoot down a couple of their bombers, we cannot attack them as we have no equivalent long range bombers of our own. We have to rely on the US for that, and who says they are going to help.

J, Nottingham,

Russan planes are in the air, the rockets are going into space and back without blowing up and most of former Russian terrorists are dead except those that are hiding in London. New Russia is a good country these days. Just another scary thought : who is an evil empire then?!

Don, New York, USA

I don't think it's "nice to know the Russians are out and about again.” Russia, despite its oil and gas wealth, is a sorry mess. More worryingly, it has again picked up the Soviet baton of obstructionism, screeching contstantly like a spoiled eight-year old brat whilst taking mortal offence at nothing and all the time seeking to dominate, dominate, dominate. Communism's body count is now estimated worldwide at 400 million dead, and how many other millions of lives destroyed? As for the poor Estonians, Latvians, Poles, Czechs, Lithuanians, Ukrainians, Hugarians, Slovaks, Rumanians, Bulgarians, Germans and all the others who had to live under 55 years of Communist tyranny, their illusions (if any) about the Russians were shattered by the latter's brutality a long time ago. Russia will cause constant trouble until the day that its people find the moral courage to apologise to the entire world for the demonic ideology of which it was the champion. It'll be a long time coming.

Benoit, Moscow, Russia

I am impressed, we still have two fighters capable of flying ? As a couple of other people have mentioned, the second cold war has started, so its time Brown stopped running the forces into the ground and started proper re-arming.

Neil Murphy, Cromer,

Yeah, we will come to ruin you... on a eight-propellered airplanes:))). I think they might have simply lost their way down to the base. Navigation system gave a break as usually :)). That's a fun.

Andrew, Moscow, Russia

Well, mates, it didn't start just when those two showed up. It started when the West screwed the Russians with all the nice promises it gave them about non-expansion of NATO to the East, about not surrounding diminished and weakened Russia with hostile allies, breeding and guiding and arming them, with ignoring Russian interests and opinions and bombing anyone and anybody against their advice. In fact the First Cold War has never ended. It was just that the West was happy when Russia was begging for humanitarian aid. Then it was "democratic" and "moving in the right direction". Now that she thinks of herself as of an equal - that is a rude awakening to the cost of broken promises. I guess the West should brace for more to come - it will. Not that another stand-off is on the way, but just keep an eye on the Russians. They remembered that they have interests of their own. And means to defend them too. And they just love Putin.

Rooster, Bogotá,

2 Andrew Thornhill
It's not 50-s bombers, it's modernized planes with new avionics, engines, armaments, etc...
And Yankees B-52 - 50-s too... ^)

Alex, Moscow, Russia

"Putin crushing democracy" or is it Putin stopping the west from looting natural resources rich Russia under a pretences of helping them out with democracy. For Pet's sake - stop watching CNN and similar brainwashing junk.

victor, toronto, canada

In response to Robert J. Van den Broeck, have you heard of Trident?

james macinnis, sawtry, cambridgeshire

Perhaps Robert J. Van den Broeck would care to only comment on subjects that he actually has a clue about? Only our ground forces are a spent force.... And well a Canadian is the last person who should be commenting on matters such as this! lol

Jamie Brown, Maidstone, England

Yet another sign that Presiden Putin wants a return to Stalinist ways. Someone should have a quiet word with him to say that the rest of the World has moved on from the Cold War days and we won't tolerate him trying to go back there. I lived through it, with the daily, albeit remote, threat of them bombing us with nuclear weapons. I don't want to go through that again.

Neil J, Derby, England

so a canadian is tellin us that the bristish army is no good? HAHAHAHAHAHA

thats the funnest thing ive heard all week.

and russian weponry if u belive reports that are written has largely been sold on the black market. so i dont think we really have to worry about them too much. and yeah we could do that for real, blow them out the sky no problem. two F3s are more than a match for a 57 year old turboprop aifcraft

KF, wolverhampton, ENGLAND

They both met up - honour even - so let us not all get too over excited. Both have nukes anyhow so it all seems rather paltry.

Bjorn Svensson, Malmo, Sweden

russia would crush the uk if they went to war we already fighting two wars theres not enough people in the uk to fight a third

safwaan patel, uk,

Thats only to show that we are alive :)
if you are watching our military exercises, thats normal, but if we do like you doing, thats mean cold war?

SER, Stambul, Turkey

The crushing of democracy in Putins Russia and now 1950s soviet bombers poking at the edges of British airspace, sounds familiar i think. As for Robert J. Van der Broeck's comment, I belive that is of complete irrelavence, there is a difference between sending dated aircraft to nosey on an excercise and full blown international war. A lot would have to happen for allies to come to blows.

Andrew Thornhill, Cirencester, UK

Probably right not to depend on the Mounties.....
Actually the UK has only got about 11% of UK miltary resources tied up with iraq, dont know what percentage of the total commonwealth that is.

Jim Edwards, London, Europe

Begun, this Cold War has

Yoda, Tatooine, Far Far away

"You must be joking. England and all it's commonwealth companions would fall to the wayside in a deathmatch with Russia. The English military is all but spent in Iraq"

British please note English (I'm English by the way. Do you really think any armed forces is as strong as in 1990? This is an article on an air intercept, not a war comfrontation - get real please!

Gary West, Essex, UK

All the RAF are doing is telling them, ‘We could do this for real if we wanted to, so go and tell your mates back home’.” You must be joking. England and all it's commonwealth companions would fall to the wayside in a deathmatch with Russia. The English military is all but spent in Iraq. The days of empire are long over for Britain.

Robert J. Van den Broeck, kouchibouguac, Canada/New Brunswick

The Second Cold War has started.

Chris Coles, Medstead, Alton, United Kingdom