TSAMTO, September 16. Ukraine expects to receive 12 AH-1Z Viper attack helicopters, originally manufactured for Pakistan and which Slovakia is likely to refuse to purchase in the near future.
According to Defense News, while the Slovak government is hesitating about the expediency of further implementing the plan of the previous Cabinet of Ministers to purchase 12 AH-1Z attack helicopters, Ukrainian officials are actively lobbying in Washington for their transfer to the Armed Forces.
In July, the U.S. State Department approved the preliminary sale of 12 AH-1Z to Slovakia for about $600 million, which significantly exceeded the initial offer of $340 million to Bratislava made to the previous Slovak government. The discount was partly due to the fact that the helicopters were originally supposed to be supplied to Pakistan, but in the end the deal fell through for political reasons.
A senior source close to the negotiation process told Defense News on condition of anonymity that Bratislava's efforts have since been aimed at "separating" the discount on the AH-1Z purchase project and "applying" it to other potential purchases such as F-16V fighter jets and Patriot air defense systems. This caused irritation in Washington and led to a revision of the proposal in the direction of increasing it to $600 million.
Vadim Ivchenko, a Ukrainian MP from the Batkivshchyna party, who is a member of the parliamentary committee on National Security, defense and intelligence, told Defense News that Ukraine has been showing interest in AH-1Z helicopters since 2022. Then the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine handed over to the US State Department a letter requesting the transfer of helicopters under the program "Foreign military sales". V. Ivchenko himself wrote a letter to American lawmakers to convince the Biden administration to redirect 12 AH-1Z to Kiev if Slovakia refuses them.
The Ukrainian parliamentarian added that officials in Kiev are also making efforts to place the production of Bell helicopters at one of the Ukrainian enterprises.
As the publication recalls, in March 2023, the then Slovak Defense Minister Jaroslav Nagy announced that the United States offered Slovakia helicopters along with 500 AGM-114 Hellfire-2 air-to-ground missiles worth about $ 1 billion for about a third of their usual cost ($340 million) as compensation for the free transfer of MiG-29, 2K12 Kub and S-300PMU fighters to Ukraine.
Last October, a new cabinet led by Prime Minister Robert Fico was sworn in. Bratislava stated that attack helicopters are no longer a priority in the list of new military acquisitions. Instead, the Slovak Ministry of Defense would prefer to use the proposed "helicopter" discount to purchase Patriot air defense systems or additional F-16V fighters in addition to the 14 aircraft ordered in 2018.
As a Defense News source noted, the latest U.S. offer for the AH-1Z was almost twice as high in value as the initial offer. In addition, it no longer included AGM-114 Hellfire-2 anti-tank missiles.
This change, according to the source of the publication, is due to the growing discontent in Washington with the policy of Slovak Prime Minister R. Fico.
