"I'm confident that we are still communicating between the coalition operations centre and the Russian operations center", he said, adding that "I think the worst thing any of us could do would be to address this with hyperbole".
The statement followed after a U.S. warplane shot down a Syrian army jet on Sunday in the southern Raqqa countryside.
And that got the attention of Syrian President Bashar Assad's chief protector, Russia.
The Russian military alleged that in Sunday's incident, "the command of the coalition forces did not use the established communication channel for preventing incidents in Syrian airspace".
At the White House, spokesman Sean Spicer said: "It's important and crucial that we keep lines of communication open to deconflict potential issues". Russia's Defense Ministry announced earlier today they were halting use of the hotline in protest of the USA shooting down a Syrian Su-22 bomber yesterday, but Pentagon officials indicated the hotline was still being used within the last few hours.
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Australia has temporarily halted air operations over Syria after the United States downed a Syrian military jet that dropped bombs near US-led Coalition fighters in western Raqqa.
Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Joe Dunford says that the United States is looking to reestablish its hotline with the Russian military as relates to deconfliction efforts in Syria.
Russia said its warplanes were flying over Syria at the time of the shootdown and the USA failed to use the existing deconfliction channel between US military officers at al-Udeid air base in Qatar and Russian officers at Hemeimeem air base. Russian Federation called it a "cynical" violation of the Arab country's sovereignty.
Russia, the Syrian government's main ally, also said it was halting communications with the U.S. aimed at preventing such incidents.
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