Ukraine: The F-16s are Useless! 

Here’s the actual quote: (Politico April 3, 2024 4:00 am CET By Jamie Dettmer) “But often, we just don’t get the weapons systems at the time we need them - they come when they’re no longer relevant,” another senior officer said, citing the F-16 fighter jets as an example. A dozen or so F-16s are expected to be operational this summer, after basic pilot training has been completed. “Every weapon has its own right time. F-16s were needed in 2023.” And that’s because, according to this officer, Russia is ready to counter them: “In the last few months, we started to notice missiles being fired by the Russians from Dzhankoy in northern Crimea, but without the explosive warheads. We couldn’t understand what they were doing, and then we figured it out: They’re range-finding,” he said. The officer explained that Russia’s been calculating where best to deploy its S-400 missile and radar systems in order to maximize the area they can cover to target the F-16s, keeping them away from the front lines and Russia’s logistical hubs... [quote coninues]".

Aircraft is expensive to maintain, expensive and extensive to train, expensive to source parts, expensive to hide/store, expensive to use, expensive to have shot down, but priceless when you absolutely positively have have to kill everything on the land, sea, and air. "Remember boys, there are no points for second place." - Slider

Some youtube video titles are useless

This video is mostly speculation. Ukraine is running out of fighter jets, and at some point they will need new ones. In the long run they will have to transition to western fighter jets to have access to spare parts.

Having extra aircraft in your pocket with extra capabilities is not useless. Will it be a game-changer? Nope. Useless? Nope.

At about 4:00 Greece is keeping its assets in case they have to go to war with Turkey.

Your analysis is right on the money. To use an F-16 in real-time operational duty, the pilots must have at least 800 hours of flying experience on this platform, and there is no way around that. The ground staff, radars, and decision-makers must be familiar and proficient with American and Western air defence, communications, and real-time battlefield management experience to fly missions.

F-16 in Ukraine was never intended to have a big role in the front since Rus has a masive air defense. The main role of F-16 was always to shot down Kamikaze drones and cruise missiIes, probably drop some JDAM close to the front lines, but they will be playing with fire.

As counterintuitive as it may sound, sending less experienced pilots is better than sending pilots with expertise in, say, MiG-29. They already have "muscle memory" set for that type of plane and if sent into a new plane, when under pressure they will have the reflex to do something or try to engage a device that exists on MiG-29. That will cause a delay until they remember new training and new type of plane...

I think this is what Ukraine meant: - F-16 combat radius vs the volume of missile attacks by Russia and airfield operability. (though they are getting the CFT's installed, which helps) - BVR performance of AIM-120 (likely A or B) vs Sukhoi/RJ-37m, with no RCS advantages, and high-density of RU theater radar, means there will be no air superiority sorties. (fly high, and you're S-400 fodder, fly low and you don't stand a chance in air to air BVR contests due to lack of missile energy) - GBU-53 could be effective if the platform could get high enough, and close enough to combat lines to use effectively, but that's not the case with the F-16's RCS. - F-16 is not going to stand out in ACM vs Russian gen 4.5 aircraft. It's agile enough to make pilot skill a big factor, but it's not going to be dominant in ACM, particularly with 1 year or less ACM trained pilots. - 60 aircraft, plus "potentially/eventually" 80 or so more, doesn't represent a particularly major threat vs the Russian VVS. Main 3 roles it could be useful for: - CAS, with enough speed and climb rate to be _somewhat_ more survivable than an A-10 vs MPADS. - Storm Shadow launch platform (of which Ukraine has limited supply - HAARM platform (of which Ukraine has limited supply, and somewhat weak RCS/Jamming opportunity vs S-400/500) General-role, or low-tech/cost platforms from the cold war, even with modest upgrades, are not highly survivable or useful in 2024 ...unless they have specific performance metrics with intrinsic value (like exceptional range, payload, or EW capability). F-16's are just not _highly_ useful in 2024 vs. near-peer. Doubly so if they lack some of the latest tech or ordinance options. They make ok "low-filler" in a high/low mix, but they certainly can't perform the 'high' role vs near peer. Gripen-E would be somewhat more useful with austere airfield, greater range, and moderately smaller RCS... but would encounter many of the other limitations. I just don't think anyone is going to significantly challenge russian air power, with gen 4, or gen 4+ aircraft, numbering less than 500+ units (which Ukraine couldn't possibly provide enough pilots for anyway). The logistics issue is certainly a factor too though, yeah. Useless? not exactly, no. But game changing? Not even close. I also agree with Ukraine about how much more useful they would have been during 2023's summer offensive. If treated as a high-attritable resource, they could have at least applied a lot of pressure on the ground. "2024 Russia is well positioned to handle cold-war-era 4th gen US aircraft in very limited numbers" should not exactly be shocking news. Anyway, the war is closer to over than western media really lets on. Ukraine is short on manpower and ammunition/ordinance, lacks the resources to lay mines to slow Russian advances, and Russia is about to open a new front, which will spread out Ukraine's resources even further. The days of fighting incompetent 'political favor' commanders, 'imaginary russian supply stockpiles', and Russian 'peacetime' manufacturing rates, are long gone. Russia is out-spending the foreign aid given to Ukraine, by a large margin. Manufacturing supply chain problems (due to sanctions) are largely gone at this point. Ukraine's troop rotations are nearly nonextant, and have been for a long time. They're in really serious trouble. 60 F-16's in hand, with _maybe-eventually_ 100 more, isn't going to have a large impact at this stage. France's "boots on the ground" in Ukraine, though largely symbolic in number, are to help ensure that the war in Ukraine remains about "territory", rather than about Ukraine's continued existence. I'm not highly optimistic that the recent $60B aid approved (moving at the speed of bureaucracy) will be in Ukraine's hands in the form of equipment and ordinance before the war ends.

without high density SAM coverage they will be in constant danger to the longer range a2a and s400s on the russian side. They wont get near the zero point contact line. They can defend the airspace from larger incursions but at $50,000 and hour its an expensive prospect. The air bases that will house them will also be few and an absolute magnet for iskanders, They may have success as HARM launching platform i guess but trying it on with anything carrying an r37m is a terrible plan. ukraine needs patriots and lots of them to be able to make the f-16s a viable weapons platform for this conflict in my opinion.

Given the quality of runways, infrastructure and support that the F16 requires, i do not understand how they will be able to operate from within Ukraine. Russia will simply need to damage the rumways to neutralise them. In order to guarantee ongoing availability of these aircraft, they will need to be based outside the Ukrain, and the risk of escalation are immense. The huge reliance on the logistical tail has shown (to me, at least) a glaring weakness in NATO planning. The Swedes have the right idea with their dispersed approach. Its all well and good having the most technologically advanced fighter aircraft in the world, but if they cannot get off the ground, they are utterly useless, and a major drain on resources. These modern day wunderwaffe do look vwry pretyy, though. Without runways, they are little more than insanely expensive paperweights.

Did not understand what "hermit" said.

Not one crew chief or F16 pilot in this chat, and it shows. Just people that can google numbers.

I wonder how this video is going to age🤔

The f16s main use is part of an integrated layered air defence system. F16s are tactical role. For example youd use a MIG for in and out speed or dropping glide bombs

More to the point is what missile fit they get and what electronic warfare systems they have fitted, if the missiles have sufficient range that reduces the chances of AA missiles getting to them and EW systems improve survivability. As long as they reduce the capabilities of the Russian airforce to be able to drop glide bombs with impunity that will be a win, anything over that is a bonus.

There are things it can be used for, but expecting them to be wunderwaffe capable of single handedly bringing about Desert Shield is not one of them. A fine explainer, M7.

Just watched video w declarated lt colonel us pilot was asked second time if he would be willing to fly to fill gap until young ukrainians are trained. Without pause he said sure why not. I got goosebumps bc of how confident he was and not worried. HUGE STATEMENT since he is retired and living a good life.

The guy behind "War in Ukraine" channel said that every flight of the F-16 will be probably a one way suicidal mission ... maybe a bit exaggerated but I guess not far from the truth.

I love it when everybody forgets about sead... BTW tactics matter. If it didn't, Ukraine would have been overrun already.

I'm sorry but the F-16 is only useful as stand off missile truck at this point. Russian air defence has not been stretched to the point where they are running out of long range AAMs or SAMs, meaning these F-16s (particularly with low experienced pilots) are only able to survive at longer ranges. This means that only very small numbers of high cost weapons are available for strike operations, and AMRAAM for air to air. I completely agree with M7* here: this is symbolic at best and NATO doesn't understand the issues at play.

Polish F-16s have reached IOC Forceval status 3 years since the introduction into service, NOT 10 years. Just sayin

If I heard correctly, I think the Mig 31 radar could see much further than the F-16 and which could enable them to kill them from a distance.

The F-16 are not useless. Your "speculation" is not only wrong but also too shortsighted. Ukraine is running out of, planes, spare parts and weapons for its russian made fleet. Building up an air force build on western tech was neccessary and obvious from the first day of the war. All we have seen since then were delays and dumb excuses like "Ukraine doesn't need that right now". F-16 have a max range of over 4.000 km. There's no need for forward bases if missions are planned accordingly. The F-16 is the most easiest, most versatile choice after the Gripen. Over 50 nations managed to operate it. There is also western volunteer ground personal possible acting as instructors. Ukraine declared a volunteer program for F-16 already in 2022. Senior pilots like Dan Hampton declared their will to join it. Let's see. Norway said publicly to update the avionics to newest standard. That means they can operate these jets to maximum radar range an therefore are competitive to SU-35. If Ukraine shall prevail, the implentation of western jets is long overdue and without alternative. NATO (Biden + Scholz) didn't want the offensive in 2023 to be (too) successfull. It was a political restriction. 20 ATACMS in June'23 could have made the difference already (like seen on the airbase strikes with them in Nov'23). This BS talk is of no help for Ukraine. Start talking how to enable Ukraine to win this war!

I think they are pissed off they didn't get them sooner. Even Bulgaria received some last week.

They just don't have man power in offensive to support or even a secure airfields to operate from

The F-16 will have to be limited in its employment. Ukraine just doesn't have the time or experience being the aircraft to use it to its full capabilities, and the battlefield is nowhere close to being prepped for its use. Like he said, the F-16 is only a tool that is used with a lot of other tools to achieve the desired goals and to maximize its effectiveness, like AWACS, EW platforms, ISR, ground support... everything. The Air defense environment is not degraded enough to the point where the aircraft can be used effectively. As everyone said, it's going to be a standoff bomb and missile truck and to get the hell out of Dodge once the ordnance is expended

It is similar to the USA's M1 Abrams tanks. M1 Abrams tanks would have been hugely useful when the war began in February 2014 or when the war resumed in February 2022. Now, newly developed drones and drone tactics "greatly impair" their usefulness. So now the Abrams tanks are so useless as to be embarrassing to the USA as a nation, so the USA has asked to have them returned. I do not think the F-16 will be that bad, it won't be totally useless. But it will not be the game changer it could have been if deployed 2 years ago, in March 2022, when it was first needed.

The F-16 requires 17 hours of maintenance for every hour of flight. It's a real hangar queen, in other words. So that factor alone - along with myriad other logistical and operational issues - strongly suggest that the F-16 is indeed a useless weapon for Ukraine in this particular conflict. The resources that Ukraine will have to expend to operate these aircraft would be far better spent on other weapons.

Having a small fleet of F-16 means the Russian artillery has to back up. You don't need to run sorties all day to have an effect on the war.

Air combat is much more complex to gauge. Yes, they get f16's but in what role. CAP, SEAD, A2G, intercept... What version of amramm would they get? What precision munitions? For sure they'll get much improved situational awareness than on an A version of a mig29 or a su27, but to what means. If Ukraine is not on the offensive and the a2a munitions are not state of the art western weapons, why? Why send them at all?

The phone call seems in italian language, but probably not related to the subject, were you asking for directions to a good restaurant?😊

Remember the what? I replayed that hermit bit 10 times and still couldn't understand it

Lets see how this ages

Ukraine adapts, Russian counters. That is war. So far the west have been extremely poor at thinking more than a few months ahead. With the introduction of the longer range ATACMs , soviet anti aircraft batteries are vulnerable. The HARM missiles. Ukraine is using weapons in creative ways. Even in the last few days. They have used Storm Shadow to kick in the door and ATACMs to finish the job. Do I think the F16 will be useless NO but I do want to know why they have not been deployed. Is it Ukraine or the West once again pandering to Putin and his nuclear penis waving?

well....i don't see anybody adressing the elefant in the room. 1) ukrainian airspace is HEAVELY CONTESTED and the amount of SAMs present in the area is gonna be a MAJOR PROBLEM TO DEAL WITH. the LEVELS OF LETHALITY against aircraft ( on both sides ) are such that EVEN RUSSIANS have been using their airforce with EXTREME CAUTION. so while i don't agree that F-16s are gonna be "usseless " ,i perfectly understand the argument that they are not gonna change the overall trend of the war. 2) russia have demontrated multiple times that they can strike anywhere in ukraine ( all up to livov ).....so my question is HOW SAFE ARE THOSE F-16s gonna be on those airfields ? if i was russian comander...IT WOULD SEAM IDEAL TARGET FOR ME TO STRIKE BASES WHERE F-16 ARE OPPERATING FROM.

A point to note with regards to this "new" air force is the one thing that Ukraine doesn't have a lot of and that is manpower. If you discount pilots each aircraft will need a team of engineers and technicians of all trades that will all have to be trained in their respective fields even if second line servicing if conducted in another country you still need around 30 people per aircraft to spilt in to 2 teams of 15 to run a 24 hour ops cycle. Then you need all the logistics support spare parts, fuel, ammunition, operations, ATC, airfield security, chefs, accommodation the list is long.Thats more people you could be using elsewhere in the battle space in roles that have a tangible benefit to your aim. If you can't man it, it won't work.

The usability of any NATO equipment Ukraine receives is cut significantly because they simply don't know how to use it properly and there is no way to do proper maintenance. Ukraine was most successful in early phases of the war when they had massive amounts of Soviet equipment because they knew what to do with... now they have dozens of different vehicles, artillery pieces, AA, missiles each of which has different strengths and weaknesses. You need some kind of genius AI to tell Ukrainians how to use each weapon to its maximum effect.

Many people have many opinions about many things. Lets just see what happens when the F16 arrive.

Wish F 16 Block 50 were given to Ukraine as Block 50 uses APG 68 radar with 200km range as the MLU F 16 uses only 83 km APG 66 Radar which seems insufficient

I heard one time that (some) Russian airplanes have an attached device outside the cockpit for scraping mud off your boots before getting into the pilot seat. It is a different way of thinking, not at all impractical

One thing to remember full military aircraft combat aircraft are weapons platforms first and foremost what the F-16 is capable of accomplishing will depend largely not only on pilot quality, but also the weapons provided. I would expect, as was said, 2 to 4 ship missions. The first set of missions are likely to be anti-air against the aircraft dropping glide bombs , trashing radars and SAM sites. A small number can you make a difference as long as they stay undercover of the Ukrainian air defenses.

So really they will have to have hybrid training, hope to fly the f-16 whilst running A-10 missions.

It takes about 6 years to train operational fighter pilot. Fighter as weapon system is just too complicate that it would be kind of stop cap system.

If F16’s are “useless” then why are the Russians encouraging the west to give them to Ukraine as soon as possible.?

They say EACH F-16 would need 40 people to maintain. Plus supplies - fuel, lubricants, spear parts, you name it. It is enormous lift, not just trained pilots. My guess they will be able to prepare a few successful attacks to show off. Not a game changer.

War in Ukraine has been really tough on presumptions, some tools proven to be no more useful as before, some found new use and some unlikely tools found their footing on the frontline, at the end of the day tactics will determine the level of success, I'm afraid, presumptions will cost Ukraine some airframes and even pilots to figure it out on the job, but we should trust them on it, with their own lives on the line, they've proven resourceful and adaptive fighters. They'll find their way around it.

Sending young pilots make sense in that Western aircrafts pilot surrounding/instruments are very different from USSR aircraft, and relearning might be harder than learning new pilots These are the reasons why Gripen makes more sense, can use Meteor(if sent), dont have the runway problem and I do believe the Swedish design philosphy is simpler than the US one who tend to overcomplicate already complicated machines. Then again, the F-16s sent are ready for retirement while the Swedish Gripens are fairly new and in fewer numbers

PLEASE EXPLAIN! At 10:12 what do you mean by saying, “the MiG 31 is the MiG 31”? Are you reinforcing the old trope that it’s a failed platform? Or are you invoking the contemporary assessment that it was an essential interceptor in destroying the Ukrainian Air Force and defending against kinetic attacks? - all from a long range away of course.

Hi to everyone ! As I wrote before some details,if F-16 ever come to Ukraine there chances will be zero against Russian fighter- interceptors.First ,F-16 is light single engined fighter with less combat radius especially then heavy ex-soviet fighter Su-27 and MiG-29 also.F-16 has smaller frontal RCS that is the fact but for radars like N011M Bars-M ,N035 Irbis and N007AM Zaslon-AM it is something unimportant. Russians with their A-50U and Su-35S in lower and MiG-31BM in upper stratosphere have complete control of Ukraine air space.When You have your own fighters that fly so high ,you have complete air superiority and air dominance and that 's the fact ! I must remind that on March 5 2022 only two Su-35S engaged group of four Ukr AF Su-27's in the vicinity of the city of Zhytomir and with new AAM type R-77-1 they shot down all of them .Launch distance was record breaking 60 and 80kms.Later, launch distance in war time was even greater ,MiG-31BM with its new heavy long range AAM type R-37M shot down one ukr AF Su-24MR from 217 kms and one Ukr AF MiG-29 from 125kms. Only three Su-35S fighter pilots have in total of 17 air victories so far ! Ltcol Ilya Sizov with 12, maj. Victor Dudin with 3 and senior lt. Ilya Perepelkyn with 2. With AAM type R-77-1 they have huge advantage because it is the best AAM in the world when we talk about flight-maneuvering possibilities. R-77-1 has 50° AoA limit, has 50G of lateral G-force limit and 150°/sec turn rate . For comparison AAM like US Rayhteon AMRAAM and Europian MBDA Meteor have 35° AoA limit, 30-35G lateral G limitation and 100°-120°/sec turn rate.

Even if Ukraine operates the F-16 as it does its current fleet of MiG-29 and Su-27, they'd still be useful due to better weapons available (AIM-120 AMRAAM) and additional modes available (AGM-88 HARM, JDAM or AASM Hammer 250). It was always expected (tbh) that Ukraine was forced to retain its asymmetric air-warfare posture given the extend and complexity of F-16 deliveries. I have always considered them primarily as a means to account for combat attrition and airframe degradation with small increases in capabilities (primarily compared to export MiG-29 variants). There is however some room for surprises as well: upgrades to Block 50/52 with AN/APG-68 radar or advanced targeting and signal intelligence pods could make for some nasty ambushes (again no wonders) and would make it very difficult for Russia to figure out (passive sensors).

The F 16 are about to meet the S 400

To a competent military, no weapon is irrelevant. However it is possible that the F-16 will be limited to launching air-launched cruise missiles. That still doesn't make them useless or irrelevant as it could free up other aircraft for the front. But it certainly won;t be a game changer.

They’re a good excuse for other countries to get rid of “old stock”.

As good as the F-16 is, nobody can beat logistics. And the logistics of fielding a new type of aircraft with barely trained crews in the middle of a war are Freddy Kruger's wet dream

Isn’t it strange that America has ‘bone yards’ full of F-16’s yet the F-16’s involved in this are all from small NATO nations… we also need to keep in mind that these are upgrades A models.. All they will be good for is continuing the hit and run tactics the Mig 29’s have been used for… but as others have said, F-16’s are terrible without decent quality runways (unlike Mig 29’s) and Russia has finally taken it’s gloves of and will keep the UKr airbases on notice of being hit

This didn't mention the special maintenance course needed for the F16 that take a minimum of 2 years, same for the specific runways

Having worked 25 years in U.K. MoD Air I can tell you the fighter aircraft and its pilot cannot operate without trained ground crew, avionics technicians, armourers, and logistics support staff. I doubt they can do all that for a large number of operational aircraft. And to cap it all the Russians will just blow the hell out of the air bases anyway. It will never happen.

If F-16s come to Ukraine soon, as per their reports, I question who will fly them. According to informations from NATO members who are training them, they will be ready towards the end of the year, at best.

The game is over. Russia always harness slow, but rides fast...

I wonder what this mouthpiece for Ukraine meant by "irrelevant". The F-16 can hold its own in a rate fight, and doesn't do too badly in the two-circle. BVR it has good capability, especially with newer iterations of the system software. Weapons-wise, it can carry a wide variety of munitions for many different missions and purposes. Any aircraft Ukraine might reasonably acquire would require logistical and facilities support for their operation. At least the F-16 has a well known maintenance path, and costs can be reasonably controlled.

Having more and newer aircraft will sure come in handy, tho I doubt they will dramatically change anything. The biggest issue for me with the F-16 is the runway requirement. Any badly aimed drone/old S300 missile on a runway and the Ukrainians cannot fly. So in a certain way donating the F-16 looks more like a PR campaign rather than giving Ukraine something with the understanding of the conditions Ukraine faces.

The mighty flying shovels are waiting for them

Your content is really good, but the nonsense back and forth with Otis is really weird and distracting. Your audience are all nerds, no need to do this.

I still wonder how delivery will go, like would Russian side prepare and lunch interception operation to strike down F-16s?

There is a big difference from western jets and Soviet jets. Western jets are designed for more autonomy and the ability to assess threats early and integrate with other aircraft and radars seamlessly. The pilot has a better picture of what he's facing and spends more time just locking onto targets than looking for them. And that is the key part, western jets are designed to get you before they can lock on you. Being a multi role it can long range and dog fight as well. It has one of the better turning radius out there.

Drones, air defence and missiles have replaced aircraft on the battlefield. What were aircraft originally used for? Reconnaissance and photographing enemy lines or bombing. This is what drones and missiles can do today. Aircraft are only useful as delivery systems for cruise missiles and glide bombs well away from the battlefield.

The problem is the Ukraine has blown their manpower and a lot of the good kit they had on last years offensive. They needed all the good stuff, ATACMs, F16 and all the stuff they had last year at the same time for one good offensive. But the west has restricted them and eeked out kit in dribs and drabs then demanded an offiensive. The West lost the war for Ukraine and unless we give them all the goodkit at once - and somehow work out how to get more troops on the line, then Ukraine may never reocver.

The problem is the range, only 550 km on a hi-lo-hi mission and they can't survive the high part

what might make sense is seeing if their are any experienced western volunteer f-16 jocks that would be will to volunteer for service in Ukraine. this might help the Ukrainian pilots alive long enough to get more experience and the ability to be more effective.... its not clear cut that f-16s will be useless or not, it might be more a case of trying to figure out the best way to use them before all your planes and pilots are destroyed. Ukraine is kind of a special case, no western/nato countries have any experience fighting a neat peer adversary, not for the last 80 years or so.

Good luck explaining this to the main stream media and people who believe in each magic "game changers" everybody in the industry knows this will be a placebo. Btw you need to remember that the US did have or still have its own soviet era air force, so...dont especulate on how those Kazakh airframes could work or not, until things happen, the US evidently has the industrial and logistic means and capacity to support soviet era airframe operation and weapons integration.

The F-16 story is a consequence of NATO focus on air power. Since NATO don't rely on artillery, we are incapable of helping Ukraine unless they have an air force that can drop the bombs, we have a plenty. So after having learned this, our incompetent political leadership came up with the solution of giving Ukraine an air force, not having an inkling of knowledge, of the lead time for building up said air force. It will, as everything else, fail spectacularly.

I don´t quite see why they would need a staging base. The front is well in reach of a F16 even with out drop tanks from western ukraine. And i would say as of today, its unlikely they would fly into Russian held territory, but they main usage of the F16 would be to make sure that no Russian aircraft is anywhere near the front on the Russian side. When that gold is achieved, having a staging base would be way safer. Still radar interoperability of the F16 is far beyond what Russia currently have. People often think if range, capacity, speed, radar power but forget about other thing that is way more important

I was very critical early on because I believed Ukraine needed to order at least 6 patriot systems on the lend lease agreement….sadly this was never taken up and it expired this would have made the f16 more scope to be useful

Sending the F-16 to Ukraine was more about forcing the NATO members, that weren't in a hurry to replace their derelict F-16 with brand new F-35, to go on the podium to convince their taxpayers it was the logical thing to do with their money. The US military has no real need of 70% of their F-35 and is spending no money to upgrade them or maintaining them operational.

The Militavia channel had a good analysis of the F-16 in Ukraine, ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-0CJOPFen4Us.htmlsi=8nG9ZZAyQba8zvQC .They won't be doing much better than the Soviet aircraft Ukraine had. They still will be outranged and they might be good for firing western weapons because they are better integrated but the disadvantage/inferiority against Russia is still huge.

The Gripen is the plane they need for this, the amount of logistics that comes with F16's and their maintenance is way too high for a fast-changing warzone like Ukraine. Re-paving runways and extending them is even worse when Gripen's are able and built for landing on tarmac roads but hey, politics tend to dominate on who sends what and Sweden just got into NATO very recently but hopefully down the line something will change for the better in Ukraine.

F-16s are going to be the biggest game changer since they got Hi-mars rocket systems. Remember not only do they get F-16s they also get all the different kinds of weapons it carries.

I’m sure it will be as effective as all the western game changers

People like to think of Ukraine's F-16s doing Top Gun stuff... Going off and engaging Russian aircraft. This was never particularly likely to happen. Even if Ukraine had two dozen Block 70 F-16s with AIM-120Ds and JASSMs, (they don't) they're massively outnumbered and cannot be easily replaced. Protracted direct fighting with Russian aircraft is far too risky at this point. Think of each F-16 as a flying rapid-response NASAMS that might occasionally provide conservative ground attack. Remember that the F-16s will have datalink with NATO AWACS. We aren't talking about it, but its ~totally~ a thing. The AWACS will eyeball the missiles, the F-16s will AMRAAM them. Air-to-air combat is unlikely to be a thing, UNLESS NATO plays their biggest, scariest wildcards. If their Vipers get AIM120Ds, and AWACS opt to physically guide the missiles onto target via data link... That would probably work. Hell, it'd probably work extremely well. I'd be very, very surprised if NATO were willing to do that, because it's pretty unambiguously an act of war-even if it's an act of war that's unlikely to be detected.

He didn't actually say that F-16s are "irrelevant" to Ukraine. What he DID say, if you read the article, is that Russia has had a long time to position its S-400 systems to shoot down F-16s at the front lines and around their logistical hubs. So, F-16s won't be as helpful now as they would have been last year. He was commenting on how sophisticated weapons systems have been delivered late in general, while they would have been more effective if delivered earlier. It is not accurate to say he called F-16s "irrelevant".

Pilots are one thing but they also need qualified mechanics/engineers to work specifically on the F16 in order to prepare and maintain them. Those people also need formations. You need an "army" of people to get one pilot in the sky.

Each F16 is an air defense battery in it's own right. Ukraine lacks medium range SAMs, f16 will help with that. Likewise, having F16s will probably help facilitate future JASSM and maybe even AARGM deliveries, which would be of great help. Not game changers, but help nonetheless.

I think that anonymous sources are not official sources -- they are one person's opinion. I think the F-16s will be valuable, but nowhere near as valuable as they would have been when the war began in February 2014 or when the war resumed in February 2022. Now, newly developed drones and drone tactics greatly impair their usefulness.

what about the rumour that the planes would be equipped with AN/APG-64 that are being removed from US F-16s?

Not useless, the key is determining how to maximize and use what it can do and minimize exposure to it's weaknesses, in relation to what the battlefield needs.

Well they will be usefull as cruise missile trucks and intercepting cruise missiles, the migs and sukhois they have been using are close to expiring for the constant attrition

Didn’t you see the movie “iron Eagle”???

I am worried about the overall cost of operation, including infrasructure and logistics. Will Ukraine be able to use them in high risk operations?

I think every rookie F-16 pilot would be able to deploy American JDAMs and French HAMMERs miles from the frontline away from Russian air defenses. The rookie pilots will also use AIM-120 AMRAAMS from miles away.

Could the purchase of old Soviet planes from Kazakhstan be mostly for parts? It's known that the USAF kept a working squadron of Migs for training back in the day and I've heard stories of the effort they needed to put in to machine parts they couldn't get otherwise. Being able to cannibalize what's left of what they bought from Kazakhstan might have some value.

Useless is a very specific "choice of words" When Ukraine is using Su-24 for VERY usefull missions. Imagine all types of missiles F-16s can use in the war, compared to soviet crafts. There are no Runways for F-16s? Ukraine has Plenty of runways for F-16, literally every public airport can be used with F-16s. And its not like Ukraine can't pave a runway. lol And why would Ukraine need tankers, when F-16s can fly across whole of Ukraine and back without fueling? 900km

The most critical value that an F-16 Vann offer Ukraine is a delivery system for glide gps guided SDB. These cost 1:20 what any payload in an HIMARS cost. And the F-16 can deliver then more safely to targets deeper into russian held territories. We also have a considerably larger stockpile of these over Rocket munitions. More we can offer to Ukraine. Any other use of these would have considerably less impact overall.

I believe Zaluzhny was saying similar things after the counteroffensive’s failure about the F-16’s inability to make a decisive impact. Granted, he was referring more to the difficulty of combatting Russia’s increased numbers of S-400s in the theater on top of their larger Air Force making it a very challenging environment for the F-16s. Still, it will be much better than old MiG-29s and Su-27s.

In such low numbers prob. so. This pigeon feeding of armaments to Ukraine is just kicking the can down the road. Now I believe if they were provided in adequate numbers with other air assets and the LATEST abrams would make a difference. I pray for peace and hope this mistake is over soon. Should of kept our word of keeping nato out of Ukraine!

The only reason this conversation can even take place is due to NATO still having fixed fields to fly from. The moment the Russian Federation decides to start cratering NATO FOB's & their associated radars- all talk of forward deployed fixed wing aircraft starts to unravel. If the Ukr Air Force decentralizes into small road unit capable squadrons- they will cause havoc among their AA missile units that already salvo anything that flies past them.

Oh yeah, what if Doug Masters & Chappy Sinclair are flying them?

A majot point not covered here (or any other places either?) is that the F-16 is known to be rated to carry nuclear weapons. While it would be a dangerous escalation for these (still hypothetical) F-16s to be flown in any scenario, it is very important to understand how the Russians will view any F-16 coming at them...the CAN NOT assume that the aircraft is not carrying a nuke and this places the use ANY F-16 in a much more immediately provocative, escalatory and dangerous category, whether or not nukes are loaded on the (still hypothetical) F-16s.

hmmmm, misinformation still being put out by Russia it seems. Lets face it, the F16 has bombs and bullets and that all that's needed by Ukrainian pilots to carry those bombs and bullets to the targets. Google How long can an F-16 fly without refueling? Tactical fighters are very flexible. And their turbofan engines are very fuel thirsty at low altitudes and highly efficient at super high altitudes. An F16 loaded with full internal fuel plus 2 big fuel tanks can climb to 50000ft and sip fuel for nearly 4 hours F-16 Fighting Falcon: The F-16 has a maximum speed of approximately Mach 2, which is around 1,500 miles per hour (2,400 kilometers per hour) The USAF service branch has received a total of 2,231 F-16s to its arsenal. As of 2023, the USAF operates a total of 841 F-16s of different variants. As of 2016, the Russian Armed Forces has 247 MiG-31B/MiG-31BS/MiG-31BM/MiG-31BSM in service. 129 MiG-31BM in service as of 2022