F-16
Ukrainian pilots will begin training to fly F-16 combat aircraft this summer in a school to be set up in Romania.
A coalition of 11 NATO countries are backing the initiative, which was agreed to on July 11 during the ongoing NATO Summit in Vilnius, Lithuania.
Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, Canada, Luxembourg, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Sweden, and the UK signed agreements with Ukraine to provide training to both pilots and technical and support personnel for its war with Russia.
“The purpose of the training effort is for the Ukrainian Air Force to have the basic skills and prerequisites to fly, service and maintain F-16 aircraft,” the Danish defense ministry said.
Denmark and the Netherlands—both of which operate the F-16j—are working on developing a training model, with the other nations expected to provide support.
Denmark’s existing F-16 training facilities will be used, with personnel from Norway supporting that training in Denmark. Dutch Defense Minister Kajsa Ollongren said her country would provide the F-16s for the training center.
“It is absolutely crucial that the Ukrainians are given the opportunity to defend their airspace,” Denmark Defense Minister Troels Lund Poulsen said. “The first step is to train the Ukrainians to be able to fly, service and maintain F-16s on a basic tactical and technical level.”
Ukraine Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov said on social media that the training program may also consider other unnamed types of aircraft. The coalition was also “ready to consider other means of granting fully functional F-16 capabilities,” Reznikov added.
A decision by the U.S. has yet to be made on whether F-16s will be transferred to Ukraine. Washington has previously suggested that transfers of combat aircraft could trigger Russian retaliation or escalation. But the U.S. stance has softened, particularly with increased support from Europe for such an initiative.
The training and preparation of Ukrainian pilots to fly the fighter should make a transfer decision easier to make.
“This [initiative] is a major and long-term effort,” Poulsen said. “It is therefore important that we are now a broad circle of countries joining forces to begin the task.”
Ukraine reportedly wants to receive around 40-50 F-16s, equivalent to around three-four squadrons worth, to try to retake control of its skies and support its ground-based air defenses.
Kyiv is hoping that the red lines around the transfer of combat aircraft will fade in the coming months, in the same way that concerns about the handover of rocket artillery and main battle tanks diminished as the war wore on.
