CIA chief travels to Moscow for unannounced talks, US media reports

BREAKING: CIA director John Ratcliffe travels to Moscow for unannounced talks, US media reports, with flight tracking data confirming a US military C-17 flew to Russia via Latvia.

The CIA director just flew to Moscow, and nobody will say why.

John Ratcliffe arrived in the Russian capital this morning for unannounced talks, according to CBS. Flight tracking shows a US military C-17 leaving Riga just before six GMT and touching down at Vnukovo about an hour later, and you can see the plane on approach here.

Neither Washington nor Moscow is confirming who he met or what was on the table. What we do know is that Americans don't send officials at this level to Russia at short notice for nothing. A former British attaché to Moscow put it plainly, something is up. The educated guesses are escalation management, after drone activity in Germany that some link to Russia, or a deal on American detainees. Ratcliffe has done that before, he helped free Ksenia Karelina and worked the swap that got Evan Gershkovich home.

The plane was back in Riga by five in the evening. Eleven hours on the ground, and not one official word about what happened in between.

This is Dave King, reporting for HIT.