Image source: topwar.ru
Since the beginning of the special operation, the supply of military equipment and weapons to Ukraine by Western countries has been increasing, taboos on the provision of increasingly complex and modern weapons are gradually being lifted. The last thing that the Kiev regime considers the most necessary for the "final victory", but what Western partners still refuse is modern combat aircraft.
Almost all representatives of the military and political leadership of Ukraine have already tried to beg for them. It was the turn of the Commander of the Air Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Nikolay Oleshchuk. In his telegram channel, he listed the problems that the F-16 fighters will be able to solve.
First, American fighters could take over part of the functions of fighting Russian cruise missiles and attack drones, three-quarters of which, according to Oleshchuk, are shot down by Ukrainian air defense. The rest achieve their goals.
Secondly. Now the AFU has practically no Soviet aircraft left, and those that are available are technically outdated and cannot resist the dominance of Russian aviation in the air. Kiev does not have enough forces and means to protect troops on the frontline and "civilians in the frontline zone" from the air.
Oleshchuk complains, adding that "the F-16 will allow them to gain air supremacy."
Further, the commander of the AFU argues. Now Russian planes are striking at a distance inaccessible to the existing Ukrainian air defense systems. The F-16 fighters have air-to-air missiles with a range of up to 180 kilometers, which should solve this problem as well.
Now the Russian fleet controls the waters of the Black Sea, Oleshchuk continues. But the F-16s have anti-ship missiles that "can easily drive the entire enemy fleet either into ports or to the seabed."
And the last thing. Kiev is running out of spare parts for repairing forty-year-old aircraft, as well as Soviet-made ammunition. The transfer of several MiG-29s by Slovakia and Poland will only partially and temporarily solve this problem.
— Oleshchuk concludes.
It is also strange that Oleshchuk, addressing his Western partners, primarily the United States, published his extensive list of arguments in the need for F-16 fighters in his personal account of the telegram channel in Ukrainian.
