According to U.S. and Ukrainian officials, Ukraine has received the first F-16 fighter jets that it has sought for months to fight back against an onslaught of Russian missile strikes.

Ukraine has received the first F-16 fighter jets that it has sought for months to fight back against an onslaught of Russian missile strikes, a U.S. official confirmed to The Associated Press.

A Ukrainian lawmaker also confirmed Ukraine had received a small number of F-16 fighter jets. The two officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not permitted to speak on the subject publicly.

Ukraine has been pushing its Western allies for F-16s for Ukraine for months, saying they were critically needed to fight back against the onslaught of missiles Russia has fired against it. The F-16 is specialized in suppressing enemy air defenses. The West has hesitantly moved toward providing the jets, after previous concerns that arming Ukraine with advanced weaponry would further escalate the war with Russia.

The U.S. has also been training Ukrainian pilots on how to fly the jets and has already graduated the first group of pilots on its operation.

  • realitista@lemm.eeEnglish
    6·
    5 months ago

    Generally in terms of numbers, if they get all the f-16s that were promised, they will be back to something around the size of the Air Force they had when they started the war. It will still be much smaller than Russia’s, but it will be a big improvement over where they are now.

    As for additional capabilies, these are the main ones:

    • Used with the correct munitions, they will have a longer range for air to air and air to ground strikes, meaning they have a good chance to hit enemy aircraft without the enemy aircraft being able to hit them. This can help make a big dent against the glidebombs which Russia is currently using to great effect.
    • The new types of missles will allow “fire and forget” capability meaning that they can quickly get out of harm’s way once they shoot their munitions
    • New types of missles like HARM missles will allow them to more easily take out enemy air defenses.

    But it’s also worth considering that learning to use a new fighter jet even in the most basic way takes a year. To get really good in one takes many years. So it will probably take some time still before they really get proficient with this new capability.