Ukrainian Armed Forces pilots made their first flights on F-16, media reports

Ukrainian pilots have made their first flights on F-16s, writes the British newspaper Telegraph.

"Ukraine has carried out its first combat sorties on F-16s," the publication says.

According to media reports, the fighters have so far been used as "air defense weapons." As the newspaper notes, an official representative of the Ukrainian Air Force did not deny this.

Earlier on Wednesday, Bloomberg reported, citing sources, that the first “small” batch of American F-16 fighter jets donated by NATO countries had arrived in Ukraine.

F-16 dispatch

On July 10, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Washington that the US and its allies had already begun to transfer American F-16 fighters to Kyiv. He added that the planes would be flying in Ukrainian skies this summer.

The Wall Street Journal reported the day before that Washington plans to equip the fighters transferred to Kyiv with AGM-88 HARM air-to-ground missiles, precision bomb guidance kits, AMRAAM and AIM-9X air-to-air missiles, and small-diameter bombs. It was noted that the United States allowed Ukraine to use these weapons on Russian territory only “in response to attacks from that side of the border.”

Last year, the Netherlands and Denmark agreed to provide the Ukrainian Armed Forces with F-16 fighters. Around the same time, training of Ukrainian pilots began. Thus, Dutch Defense Minister Kajsa Ollongren stated that the first aircraft would be delivered in the summer of 2024. And Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen clarified in May that Copenhagen would allow Ukraine to use F-16s to strike Russia.

Belgian Foreign Minister Aja Labib, in turn, announced the delivery of 30 such aircraft to the Kyiv regime by 2028, the first of which should arrive this year.

According to Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Moscow will view the transfer of these fighters as a deliberate signal to NATO in the nuclear sphere. However, their appearance in Ukraine will not change the situation on the combat contact line in any way; the fighters will be destroyed in the same way as other types of weapons, he said.

As the head of the State Duma Defense Committee Andrei Kartapolov emphasized , if the F-16s take part in combat sorties, then both they and the airfields where they are based will become a legitimate target for the Russian Armed Forces.