US President Donald Trump’s campaign has used an image featuring Russian fighter jets and weapons in a digital advertisement, calling for Americans to “support our troops.”
The Trump Make America Great Again Committee, made the ad, using silhouettes of three soldiers walking as a Russian fighter jet flies over them, according to Politico.
The ad uses a stock photo with the title “Military silhouettes of soldiers and air force against the backdrop of sunset sky.”
Pierre Sprey, who helped design both the F-16 and A-10 planes for the US Air Force, identified the featuring aircraft as Russia’s MiG-29, the country’s mainstay fighter jet that has been sold all over the world.
The aircraft was developed during the Cold War specifically to counter US F-15 and F-16s.
Director of the Centre for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies in Moscow, Ruslan Pukhov, also confirmed that the planes in the ad are Russian MiG-29s.
He said the soldier on the far right in the image carries a Russian-made AK-74 assault rifle.
Relations between the US and Russia have hit the lowest point since the Cold War.
The Trump administration terminated the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) with Russia last year, in a move that prompted concern among the international community over another arms race among the world powers.
Immediately after the withdrawal, the US said it was planning to place ground-launched intermediate-range missiles in Asia.
It also asserted in July that the Pentagon was moving forward with plans to acquire ground-launched missiles that fly distances that had been banned under the INF.
The New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) accord, which expires in February 2021, is the last major nuclear arms control treaty between Moscow and Washington that puts a limit on the number of strategic nuclear warheads each country can have.