CIA Director John Ratcliffe took trip to Moscow aboard C-17– www.washingtonexaminer.com
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EXCERPT:
CIA Director John Ratcliffe secretly visited Moscow aboard a not-so-secret C-17 Globemaster to engage in high-level discussions with Russian officials.
His visit was reported by CBS News and was cited by Russian state media, including TASS. U.S. and Russian officials both declined to comment or claimed ignorance. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he wasn’t aware of any visit or meetings. If confirmed, it would be Ratcliffe’s first known visit to Russia.
The use of the U.S.’s largest aircraft to visit Moscow stirred widespread speculation. The flight was viewed by both air traffic monitors and filmed by locals. In one of the most widely circulated videos on social media, a local was heard joking, “We are under attack!”
The flight remained a mystery for several hours. A convoy of vehicles with U.S. diplomatic plates was recorded in the streets of Moscow shortly after.
Ratcliffe’s visit was soon confirmed by other outlets, including the Wall Street Journal, Axios, and several Ukrainian outlets. The last known trip by a CIA director to Russia was by former President Joe Biden’s CIA Director William Burns, who visited in November 2021 to warn against an invasion of Ukraine.