Ukraine war: NATO expands Mihai Kogălniceanu air base in Romania

Six RAF Eurofighter Typhoons are parked on the runway, two of them with their engines roaring as ground crew rush around putting the finishing touches on the plane before take-off.

In the distance, a cloud of dust rises in the summer haze above the construction site of the second, 3.5-kilometer-long runway next to the first. The hot north wind whips the new and old hangars.

Mihai Kogalniceanu (MK) Air Base is named after the nearby village, which in turn is named after a 19th-century liberal politician.

Now it is the unlikely setting for the construction of the largest NATO base in Europe, which is set to be even larger than Ramstein in Germany.

Russian President Vladimir Putin justified his war in Ukraine by saying that NATO was harassing Russia’s European flank. In response to his invasion, more pieces moved forward on the NATO chessboard.

The MK base will soon have a squadron of Romanian F-16 fighter jets – recently purchased from Norway – as well as MQ-9 Reaper drones and a military town that will rotate NATO army, air force and navy personnel from 32 countries.

The last arrivals are the Finns. The base is located just 20 km from the Black Sea coast, 300 km from Odessa (as the crow flies) and 400 km from Sevastopol in the Russian-occupied Crimea.

This is RAF pilot Flt Lt Charlie Tagg’s third and final tour of duty here.

“There is a much larger U.S. presence here, much more infrastructure, accommodation, people and equipment.”

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has changed both the areas over which he flies and the strategic direction of the mission, he says. In 2021, on his last tour, NATO fighter pilots flew well over international waters in the Black Sea. But now they stay in the 12-nautical-mile zone over Romanian and Bulgarian territorial waters “to avoid misunderstandings and escalating situations with the Russians.”

“We used to be here to create a deterrent against any Russian aggression. Now it is more of an assurance to other NATO countries like Romania that we are here and ready to defend ourselves.”

Since his arrival, there has been no call to intercept a Russian aircraft, he says, although there have been some during previous missions over the Baltic Sea.

“They will just stumble through – it’s not against international law, they have the right to do that. But we will put an aircraft next to the enemy aircraft. From a self-promotional point of view, it shows the Russians … that we are active. We are flying armed jets, so we are sending a clear message.”

“And it also provides us with valuable information. We record the serial numbers of the aircraft and the weapons that these aircraft carry. So it also flows into the overall reconnaissance picture.”

Late at night, in the British grounds of the MK base, he watches on his radar screens how the war spreads in neighboring Ukraine.

“We could see Shahed drones flying into Odessa. The heat sources on the ground where the weapons hit, all the way to radar transmissions tracking aircraft, both friendly and not so friendly aircraft. So it’s pretty surreal.”

Although NATO jets avoid unnecessary encounters with the Russians, two incidents have been reported over the Black Sea. In September 2022, a Russian pilot misunderstood a ground control order and narrowly missed shooting down a British reconnaissance aircraft with a crew of up to 30 men.

In March 2023, a US MQ-9 Reaper drone flown from Romania was deliberately brought down over international waters by a Russian SU-27 Flanker jet.

Despite all this, everyday life at the MK base is largely quiet. In front of the office building of the base commander Nicolae Cretu, seagulls and crows are noisily harvesting a row of cherry trees. In his semi-permanent office, Scott Delay of American Army Support – Black Sea is planning the logistics for the 1,840 US soldiers that the base is currently supporting.

“We try to make them feel at home while they’re here. So it’s no different than any other community. It’s just surrounded by a fence.”

He says that it is difficult for US soldiers to get used to the fact that the delivery time for items ordered online in Romania can be not just hours but weeks.

Before I leave the base, British pilot Charlie Tagg shows me his plane. Up close, the Typhoon looks strong but a little old. But the weapons, he explains, are constantly being improved. It can now drop three different types of bombs.

“And we are getting new radars that will enable us to detect and combat threats even further away.”