Massive US Air Force warplane movements in Bulgaria raise stakes for Iran talks

BERLIN — Bulgaria’s Sofia International Airport briefly suspended civilian air operations twice over the weekend while a fleet of American military aircraft staged at the facility, fueling speculation that Washington is positioning forces ahead of a potential strike on Iran.

A Notice to Airmen (NOTAM), verified by the Bulgarian investigative outlet Obektivno.BG , showed the airport restricted non-military operations on Feb. 23 from 01:15 to 02:50 local time and again on Feb. 24 from 01:05 to 03:35. Commercial flights are not ordinarily scheduled during this time frame.

Airport authorities attributed the brief closures to routine runway repairs and explicitly denied any link to the American military presence.

Photographs circulating on social media showed at least six KC-135 Stratotanker refueling aircraft from the 6th Air Refueling Wing at MacDill Air Force Base, Florida, along with C-17 and C-130 cargo planes and Boeing 747s typically used for troop transport, parked at the airport’s Terminal 1, according to Obektivno.BG.

Bulgaria’s Ministry of Defense confirmed the U.S. Air Force presence, describing the deployment as support for “training related to NATO’s enhanced vigilance activities,” with American personnel engaged solely in aircraft maintenance. Caretaker Foreign Minister Nadezhda Neynsky acknowledged her ministry had limited information and had ordered officials to collect additional details.

The Sofia staging is a small part of a much larger American military mobilization. The Bulgarian investigative journalists have tracked more than 120 U.S. Air Force aircraft that crossed the Atlantic within days, including four dozen F-16s, three squadrons of F-35A stealth fighters, and 12 F-22 Raptors.

Similar deployments, including F-22s staged at RAF Lakenheath, preceded last June’s Operation Midnight Hammer strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities. The USS Gerald R. Ford carrier strike group is also en route to join the USS Abraham Lincoln, which is already positioned in the Arabian Sea.

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer has refused to grant Washington permission to use two critical British-controlled installations − RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire, the European forward base for U.S. heavy bombers including the B-2 and B-52, and the joint US-UK facility at Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean − for any potential strike on Iran, The Times of London reported.

The buildup coincides with high-stakes nuclear diplomacy. American President Donald Trump, speaking at the inaugural meeting of his Board of Peace on Feb. 19, said he had given Tehran roughly ten days to reach a nuclear agreement, warning that “bad things will happen” if talks collapse. U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner met an Iranian delegation in Geneva last week, with Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi describing agreement on a set of “guiding principles,” though significant gaps remain between the two sides.

Bulgaria, a NATO member since 2004, maintains a Defense Cooperation Agreement with Washington signed in 2006 that permits U.S. forces to use Bulgarian military facilities.

Linus Höller is Defense News' Europe correspondent and OSINT investigator. He reports on the arms deals, sanctions, and geopolitics shaping Europe and the world. He holds master’s degrees in WMD nonproliferation, terrorism studies, and international relations, and works in four languages: English, German, Russian, and Spanish.

柏林——保加利亚索非亚国际机场周末期间两次短暂暂停民用航空运营，原因是美国军用飞机编队在该机场集结，这引发了人们的猜测，即华盛顿正在部署兵力，准备对伊朗发动潜在的打击。

保加利亚调查媒体 Obektivno.BG 核实的一份飞行员通告 (NOTAM) 显示，该机场于 2 月 23 日当地时间 01:15 至 02:50 以及 2 月 24 日当地时间 01:05 至 03:35 限制非军事活动。商业航班通常不会在此时间段内安排。

机场当局将短暂关闭归因于例行跑道维修，并明确否认与美国军事存在有任何关联。

据 Obektivno.BG 报道，社交媒体上流传的照片显示，至少有 6 架来自佛罗里达州麦克迪尔空军基地第 6 空中加油联队的 KC-135 同温层加油机，以及 C-17 和 C-130 运输机和通常用于部队运输的波音 747 飞机，停放在机场 1 号航站楼。

保加利亚国防部证实了美国空军的存在，并称此次部署是为了支持“与北约加强警戒行动相关的训练”，美方人员仅从事飞机维护工作。看守外交部长娜杰日达·涅因斯基承认，外交部掌握的信息有限，已指示官员收集更多细节。

索非亚的这次演习只是美国大规模军事动员的一小部分。保加利亚的调查记者追踪到，几天之内有超过120架美国空军飞机飞越大西洋，其中包括48架F-16战斗机、3个中队的F-35A隐形战斗机和12架F-22猛禽战斗机。

类似的部署，包括在莱肯希思皇家空军基地集结的F-22战机，在去年6月对伊朗核设施发动“午夜铁锤”行动之前就已经进行过。“杰拉尔德·R·福特”号航母打击群也正在前往与已部署在阿拉伯海的“亚伯拉罕·林肯”号航母会合的途中。

据《伦敦时报》报道，英国首相基尔·斯塔默拒绝允许华盛顿使用两个由英国控制的关键设施——位于格洛斯特郡的费尔福德皇家空军基地（美国重型轰炸机，包括B-2和B-52的欧洲前沿基地）以及位于印度洋迪戈加西亚岛的美英联合设施——对伊朗进行任何潜在的打击。

此次会谈的酝酿恰逢高风险的核外交。美国总统唐纳德·特朗普在2月19日举行的其和平委员会首次会议上表示，他已给德黑兰大约十天时间达成核协议，并警告称，如果谈判破裂，“将会发生糟糕的事情”。上周，美国特使史蒂夫·威特科夫和贾里德·库什纳在日内瓦会见了伊朗代表团，伊朗外长阿巴斯·阿拉格奇称双方就一系列“指导原则”达成一致，但双方之间仍存在重大分歧。

保加利亚自 2004 年成为北约成员国以来，一直与华盛顿保持着 2006 年签署的防务合作协议，该协议允许美军使用保加利亚的军事设施。

林努斯·霍勒是《防务新闻》的欧洲记者和开源情报调查员。他报道影响欧洲乃至全球的军火交易、制裁和地缘政治。他拥有大规模杀伤性武器不扩散、恐怖主义研究和国际关系三个硕士学位，并精通英语、德语、俄语和西班牙语四种语言。