Latest Articles
1
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s long-standing desire for F-16 Vipers took a big step closer to becoming reality Sunday, as the Netherlands and Denmark committed to providing the fourth-generation fighters, the first such concrete promise.
Zelensky said he and Dutch Prime Minster Mark Rutte agreed Sunday that 42 F-16s will be “transferred to Ukraine once our pilots and engineers have completed their training.”
- Denmark also announced they will provide 19 F-16s to Ukraine.
- “At this moment, the Netherlands still owns 42 F-16s,” he said, according to CNN. “Out of these 42, we need planes to help training in Denmark and later on in Romania,” Rutte said.
- He added that the Netherlands would look into whether all of the remaining planes could be supplied but stated that he could not yet give a definitive number.
But while Rutte didn’t commit to a specific figure, the 42 number could also mean the Netherlands would be furnishing 23, for a total of 42 between the Netherlands and Denmark. Although, based on the 42 figure being discussed in regards to just the Netherlands, the total could be 61 between both countries. You can read our analysis of all the sources and inventories of F-16s that could potentially supply Ukraine here.
"It makes me proud that Denmark, together with the Netherlands, will donate F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine's fight for freedom against Russia and their senseless aggression," said Defense Minister Jakob Ellemann-Jensen. "Denmark's support for Ukraine is unwavering, and with the donation of F-16 aircraft, Denmark is now leading the way."
- We are working in close cooperation with the U.S. and our other international partners. This is a next step in our support for Ukraine.”
- Repeating frequently expressed sentiments about when F-16s might actually be flying over the skies of Ukraine, Rutte said that it’s not something that will happen in the near future.
“The F-16s will not help immediately now with the war effort. It is anyway a long-term commitment from the Netherlands,” the Dutch leader said. “We want them to be active and operational as soon as possible. … Not for the next month, that’s impossible, but hopefully soon afterward.”
- It also follows statements made Saturday by Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov that training for an initial cadre of F-16 pilots, engineers and technicians was already underway and would take at least six months.
"Training on F-16s has already begun," Reznikov said, according to Ukrainian Pravda.
- "This period of training will be spent on continuing the project so as to understand when we will receive the aircrafts – and, most importantly, how many," Reznikov said.
- As we have reported in the past, there are several challenges to ensuring Ukrainian pilots are not just able to fly the fourth-generation fighters, but to be able to do so in combat and in sufficient numbers.
- Concerns about Ukrainian pilot language skills and how long it will really take them to be highly combat capable as opposed to having merely the basic skills to operate the Vipers on basic missions are questions we addressed back in May, which you can read about here.
Back in February, we wrote about what it would take to ready Ukrainian F-16 pilots for the kinds of missions they could be confronted with over the battlefield in Ukraine.
- But they won’t fly for Ukraine until next year at the earliest and that it won’t be until about 2027 before its pilots reach full combat proficiency in sufficient scale.
- U.S. Air Force Gen. James Hecker, head of U.S. Air Forces in Europe (USAFE), as well as NATO's Allied Air Command and U.S. Air Forces Africa (AFAFRICA) made the comments to reporters on Friday during a Defense Writers Group virtual briefing.
He said training was already underway in the U.K. for young Ukrainian pilots with limited experience. But it will take a while to turn them into combat pilots.
“You can get proficient on some weapons systems fairly quickly,” Hecker said. “It takes a while to build a couple of squadrons of F-16s and to get their readiness high enough and their proficiency high enough. This could be four or five years down the road.”
- You can read more about Hecker’s assessment of the training timeline for Ukrainian F-16 pilots and what roles the aircraft could play on the battlefield in our story here.
- Maintaining decades old 4th generation western fighters in what is still a war zone represents an entirely different set of problems to overcome.
- As noted, maintainers need to be trained and reach high proficiency, which could take years to fully realize.
- The infrastructure needed to sustain the aircraft is also extensive and the fact that Russia will target it at all costs complicates things even further.
- Using contractors in-country to assist in all this will have significant risks.
- Still, these problems can be overcome and Ukraine has proven very resourceful in all of these regards.
- On Saturday, Lieutenant General Mykola Oleshchuk, commander of Ukraine’s Air Force, said that Ukraine is currently preparing its runways [for F-16 jets].
"We are making the necessary alterations, improving the surface, improving our airfields’ infrastructure, and building new defense facilities," he said, according to Ukrainian Pravda. "So I think we will be able to bring these aircraft to Ukraine as soon as we acquire them."
- Given the timeframes involved at this point, there is no way of knowing what the conditions Ukraine’s trained F-16 pilots will see when they are finally ready to take their prized mounts into combat.
Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com
__________________________________________________________________________
2 BYTYLER ROGOWAY
Aug 20, 2023
Tu-22 Backfire Destroyed In Drone Strike Deep Inside Russia
Russia now admits one of its aircraft was “damaged” in a drone attack using a “copter type” at a Tu-22M bomber base.
Soltsy-2 airbase, which is home to Russian Tu-22M3 Backfire swing-wing bombers, was hit by a drone strike yesterday. Images of black smoking billowing from the base further solidified those reports, but it wasn't clear what was burning. Now, photos have emerged that show a Tu-22M3 engulfed in flames at the base.
The images first appeared on Telegram and have since made their way onto other social media platforms. Russian MoD has said one unspecified aircraft was damaged due to a drone attack, stating the following on its Telegram channel:
"At around 10:00 Moscow time today, the Kiev regime carried out a terrorist attack using a copter type UAV against a military airfield in Novgorod region.
▫ The UAV was detected by the airfield's observation outpost and was hit with small arms fire.
▫ As a result of the terrorist attack, a fire broke out in the airfield parking lot, which was promptly extinguished by firefighting teams.
▫ One airplane was damaged; there were no casualties as a result of the terrorist act."
- This puts it about 415 miles north of the border of Ukraine. Kyiv's long-range drone arsenal has expanded dramatically in recent months, with regular attacks on Moscow now a reality.
There have also been sabotage attacks on Russian airfields far from Ukraine and the possibility of the use of smaller drones for localized attacks by such teams has been a major threat.
The Soviet-era Tu-22Ms have been a major problem for Ukraine since not long after Russia's all-out invasion of the country.
- They have been used to launch old supersonic Kh-22s and newer Kh-32 variants — which are primarily heavy anti-ship missiles — against Ukrainian targets.
- The high speeds of these missiles meant Ukraine had little defense against them, until the Patriot air defense system arrived. However,
- Ukrainian Patriots are still few in number and primarily cover the capital, Kyiv. The first video of Kh-22/Kh-32 missiles being launched at Ukrainian targets emerged in May 2022.
These huge missiles are not that accurate and have hit civilian targets with horrible results, including striking a mall and a high-rise apartment building. According to Ukrainian prosecutors, the latter attack was executed by the same bomber unit hit by the drone strike yesterday,
Tu-22Ms were produced between 1969 and 1993, with over 500 examples built. Today, Russia’s long-range bomber force features about 60 Tu-22M3 bombers at three operational bases — Belaya, Olenyegorsk, and Shaykovka — plus additional aircraft at the Ryazan training base. So, hitting just one would be a significant loss for Russia.
Tu-22M3 with a Kh-22/32 under its wing. (Dmitriy Pichugin via Wikicommons)
- If this attack was executed by a small quadcopter, or another hobbyist or commercially available drone type, as the Russian MoD indicates, it will have sent a chill through the country's aerospace forces out west.
- Defending against these types of local attacks is very tough to do persistently and this one is also a reminder that teams with this intent and capability are operating deep inside Russia far from Ukraine's borders.
We will update this post with new information over the next 12 hours.
Contact the author: Tyler@thedrive.com
.jfif)
No comments:
Post a Comment