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President Biden’s blunt refusal to fulfill Ukraine’s request for F-16 jets was met with skepticism at the Pentagon, where some officials, citing the government’s reversal pattern after initially rejecting other requests from Kyiv, an eventual Permission or foresee a scenario in which American allies do the aircraft with regulatory approval.
The suspicion among US defense officials follows the commander-in-chief’s one-word response Monday when a reporter asked outside the White House if he would send F-16s to Ukraine. “No,” Biden replied.
A senior defense official, who, like some others interviewed for this report, spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, said that while the Pentagon’s calculus is unlikely to change any time soon, there is a possibility that the “M1-ed” discussion, a reference to Biden’s recent commitment to M1 Abrams tanks after months of government officials implying that the sophisticated weapons were too complex for Ukraine to sustain.
Another senior defense official acknowledged that there is growing frustration at the Pentagon among those who want to do more to help Ukraine, but their views are being hampered by others who prefer a more cautious approach. That official said while Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and some of his senior staff were reluctant to approve the Abrams tanks and, weeks earlier, the advanced Patriot missile system, Biden eventually did.
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A Pentagon spokesman, Brig. Gen. Patrick Ryder, said the United States and its allies have provided near-term support to “maintain and strengthen Ukraine’s existing air capabilities” and that they are communicating with Ukraine about their long-term needs to advise. The Pentagon said in April some allies had agreed to supply spare parts for planes Ukraine already has.
“The war remains fluid and dynamic, so the nature of our support will continue to adapt and evolve as needed to provide Ukraine with the training, equipment and skills it needs to be effective on the battlefield,” Ryder said.
The Ukrainian request for additional fighter jets dates back to the first weeks of the war, almost a year ago. The country’s air force then had a few dozen MiG-29 fighters designed by the Soviet Union, reinforced by smaller numbers of Su-24, Su-25 and Su-27 jets. Ukrainian pilots have flown them sparingly while facing a complex array of Russian surface-to-air missiles, and some have been shot down.
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An assessment of the air war over Ukraine by the Royal United Services Institute in London found that Russian pilots have remained “highly effective and deadly” against their Ukrainian counterparts, thanks to long-range missiles on their planes and overall superior technology. Ukraine’s air defenses, equipped with newer systems from the West, have also improved, prompting the Russian Air Force to stay away from the battlefield, the assessment said. It indicated that even a small number of Western fighter jets could have a significant deterrent effect, even when confronted by Russian air defenses.
In late January, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told a gathering of American and European defense leaders in Germany that they must act quickly to supply his government with tanks, long-range missiles, air defense systems and F-16s. Days later, arrangements were made to send the tanks. Other requests remain elusive for now.
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Ukrainians want the F-16s in part because there are more than two dozen nations that fly them, which creates a large pool of potential donors, said David Deptula, a retired Air Force lieutenant general. Given the limited number of aircraft and spare parts available for the MiG-29, Ukraine will eventually have to adopt a western aircraft.
“What Ukraine needs is a game changer, and that is aerospace power,” said Deptula, the dean of the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Power Studies. “We need to stop asking what happens when we provide airflow and start asking what happens when we don’t.”
If the Biden administration had started training experienced Ukrainian pilots to fly the F-16s last year, they would already be using them in combat, Deptula estimated. He estimated that a fighter pilot trained on other aircraft could learn to operate the platform in a matter of months.
Another retired Air Force general, Herbert “Hawk” Carlisle, said he also prefers to send F-16s to Ukraine and begin pilot training, although he starts with a small number of experienced pilots and evaluates their performance before doing so program expanded.
Carlisle, chief executive officer of think tank Stimson Center, said Ukraine will also face challenges in servicing the planes. But “it’s not insurmountable.” To reduce such a burden up front, he said, he would recommend sending planes that have recently undergone significant maintenance.
Other analysts fear the Biden administration will continue to increase its involvement in the war. Daniel Davis, a retired Army officer and senior fellow at Defense Priorities, said it was unreasonable to expect Ukrainian pilots to be able to master the F-16 in just a few months and that the continuing threat posed by Russia’s air defenses made it unlikely that the Jets are a game changer.
“Even American F-16 pilots would fight Russian air defenses,” he said. “There’s no reason to think they’re going to be insensitive to that.”
Davis said he doesn’t think deploying F-16s alone would prompt Russia to escalate its war, but if Ukraine threatens to retake the Crimean Peninsula, which Russia illegally annexed in 2014, Moscow could take drastic action.
“This is a different set of rules, and if you don’t realize you’re dealing with a nuclear force, you’re putting us at risk,” Davis said. “This is inconsiderate in the highest degree.”
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