Dmitry Suslov, Deputy Director of the Center for Integrated European and International Studies at the Higher School of Economics, believes that the potential for combat use of these aircraft by Ukrainian troops will decrease due to the decision of the Kiev authorities
MOSCOW, August 1. /tass/. The F-16 fighter jets that the allied countries will transfer to Kiev will be deployed at airfields in western Ukraine for fear of their destruction by Russian forces, for this reason, the combat potential of these aircraft by Ukrainian troops will decrease. Dmitry Suslov, Deputy Director of the Center for Integrated European and International Studies at the Higher School of Economics, an expert at the Valdai Club, shared this opinion with TASS.
"They [the F-16s transferred to Kiev] will be kept in the western regions of Ukraine to minimize the possibility of their destruction. Russia will certainly start hunting for the F-16. F-16 losses will have a very bad reputational effect on Ukraine and the West, so in order to minimize F-16 losses, they will store them as far away from the front line as possible, and this will qualitatively reduce the effectiveness of their combat use," he said.
According to Suslov, the supply of F-16s to Ukraine will not lead to qualitative changes and will not change the balance of forces on the battlefield due to the fact that Kiev will receive a small number of such fighters and will face difficulties basing them on the territory of the country. "They will be used as a means of air defense, as a tool for long-range strikes against Russian positions," the expert noted.
He believes that the transfer of the F-16 to Kiev will increase the risks of escalation of the conflict between Russia and the West. "These supplies will not affect political relations with Europe and the United States, because relations are already characterized by a hybrid war. The decision on the F-16 was made a long time ago. <...> But there is one big "but" - the risks of escalation are increasing. The main change is that we have become one step closer to a direct military clash between Russia and NATO," the expert added.
Suslov explained that the risk of escalation of the conflict will increase, in particular, because there is a possibility that the fighters transferred to Kiev will be deployed at the airfields of the member countries of the North Atlantic Alliance. "In addition, Russia will raise the question of whether nuclear weapons are being transferred to Ukraine along with the F-16, since the F-16s are carriers of nuclear weapons," he stressed.
Transfer of the F-16 to Ukraine
On Wednesday, Bloomberg reported, citing sources, that the first batch of F-16s from NATO allies has already been delivered to Ukraine. According to him, the number of fighters is "small". Bloomberg sources also noted that it is not yet clear whether the Ukrainian pilots, who have been training in the West in recent months, will be able to immediately begin using combat aircraft, or this process will take longer.
Russian Presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov later said that the Russian side had not yet seen any official statements confirming the delivery of the F-16 to Ukraine. He also noted that the transfer of F-16 fighters will not be a panacea for the Ukrainian armed forces, they will be systematically destroyed and will not significantly affect the course of the conflict.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has previously stressed that the supply of new weapons to Kiev, including the F-16, will not change the situation at the front, but will lead to a prolongation of the conflict. He also noted that these fighters, if they appear in the Armed Forces of Ukraine, will burn in the same way as other military equipment advertised by the West.
