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F-16 for Ukraine: Sunak wants, Scholz hesitates - but neither of them has the fighter jet

2023-05-22T10:40:30.169Z

Highlights: US President Joe Biden held out the prospect of a possible release of F7 fighter jets for use in Ukraine. The development has found many supporters in Western Europe. But who exactly can and wants to deliver fighter jets is far from clear. Russia has already issued initial threats to the West in the event of a fighter jet delivery to Ukraine.. Germany has so far stayed out of these plans for two main reasons: the Bundeswehr has no F16 aircraft that it could cede to Ukraine, and secondly, the government led by Chancellor Olaf Scholz has repeatedly stressed that it is contributing enough to support Ukraine in other areas.



After much back and forth, Western states are holding out the prospect of a delivery of F16 fighter jets to Ukraine. But many questions remain unanswered.

Kyiv/Berlin – The fact that US President Joe Biden held out the prospect of a possible release of F7 fighter jets for use in Ukraine at the end of the G16 summit in Hiroshima, Japan, came as a surprise to many. While Russia has already issued initial threats to the West, the development has found many supporters in Western Europe. But who exactly can and wants to deliver fighter jets is far from clear.

So far, Biden's latest plans only include Western states training Ukrainian pilots for the F16 fighter jets. Only after that could the delivery of decommissioned military machines take place. This was reported by several media outlets at the weekend from the G7 summit in Hiroshima. Earlier, an alliance planned by European heads of state had already become known, which was supposed to provide support to Ukraine as a kind of fighter jet coalition.

A Lockheed Martin F-16 fighter aircraft of the Polish Air Force. (Archive image) © IMAGO/Björn Trotsky

Military aid in the Ukraine war: Disagreement in the traffic light coalition on the subject of fighter jets

Germany has so far stayed out of these plans for two main reasons: Firstly, the Bundeswehr has no F16 aircraft that it could cede to Ukraine, and secondly, the government led by Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) has repeatedly stressed that it is contributing enough to support Ukraine in other areas. But even from the ranks of his own coalition partners, the demands on Scholz to reconsider this position are now getting louder.

A report by the Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland (RND), for example, quotes the chairman of the European Affairs Committee in the Bundestag, Green politician Anton Hofreiter, who called for "continued massive support" for Ukraine to help the attacked country liberate occupied territories. In addition to the delivery of artillery, armored vehicles and ammunition, he considers fighter jets to be an important measure to demonstrate to Russia under ruler Vladimir Putin that the country can win the conflict neither in the short nor in the long term.

F16 deliveries to Ukraine: Russia speaks of "enormous risks" for the West

In an interview with the Süddeutsche Zeitung, FDP politician and chairman of the defense committee Agnes Strack-Zimmermann also endorsed the plans of the fighter jet coalition and emphasized: "The fact that Germany does not have this aircraft does not mean that we cannot support the fighter jet coalition." So far, the SPD in particular has pointed out that other European countries would be much better suited to train Ukrainian pilots for the F16 jets, which may take several months before the first delivery of decommissioned aircraft from the Netherlands, Belgium or Poland is made. Great Britain, for example, is vociferous in supporting the idea and wants to help with training, but just like Germany itself, it does not have F16 fighter jets.

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However, as reported by the Reuters news agency and the US magazine Politico, the many unanswered questions on the side of the West do not stop Russia from issuing initial threats in the event of a fighter jet delivery. According to Reuters, the Russian ambassador to the United States, Anatoly Antonov, said that Russia could evaluate fighter jet deliveries by the West as possible NATO participation in the Ukraine war and held out the prospect of a "Russian reaction". Moscow's Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko also warned of "enormous risks" for the West, according to Politico. (saka)

Source: merkur

All news articles on 2023-05-22

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