By Chris Muhizi for MCN Thursday June 15/2023.
According to the secretary general of NATO, Ukraine is training fighter pilots to fly F-16 aircraft. Kyiv announced this as it claimed fresh small victories in its counteroffensive against Russian forces in the country’s east and south.
The pilots will be prepared to fly the planes once training has begun, so we have the option of also choosing to deliver them, the former Norwegian prime minister said as he arrived at a meeting of defense ministers in Brussels.
The change comes after months of internal discussion in Washington about the dangers of Ukraine using F-16s to attack targets on Russian soil and perhaps intensifying the conflict. The re-export of the planes from any nation that has them in its arsenal is under US control. #The guardians reports.
The so-called fourth-generation US fighters have yet to be agreed upon by partners, but Jens Stoltenberg said that Ukrainian personnel training was already underway.
The Ukraine’s pilots, who had previously mostly flown Soviet-style aircraft, will still need to undergo months of training. Even without NATO partners agreeing to supply the equipment, Ukraine does not yet have runways adequate for F-16s.
“The Ukrainian army has significantly improved its experience and expertise on the battlefield this year, and we are prepared and will continue to fight until the full liberation of our own territories, even with our bare hands,” stated Hromov. This will occur more quickly with heavy weaponry from our friends.
In the vicinity of the village of Mala Tokmachka in the Zaporizhzhia region, as well as up to 4 kilometers away from a settlement south of Velyka Novosilka in Donetsk, the Ukrainian army is believed to have made gains.
There is a slow but steady progress of the armed forces, according to Hanna Maliar, deputy minister of defense for Ukraine. The enemy is also putting up strong resistance [on the southern front]. The enemy is gathering more reserves, to prevent any further advancement of Ukrainian forces.
Ukrainian forces still had enough armament, according to Lloyd Austin, the US defense secretary, for the upcoming conflict. He claimed, “I believe the Russians have shown us the same five cars roughly 1,000 times from 10 different viewpoints. However, the Ukrainians still possess a great deal of fighting strength and capabilities.
In addition to providing training for fighter jets, it was stated in Brussels that the US, UK, the Netherlands, and Denmark were sending “high priority” air defence weaponry, including hundreds of missiles to Ukraine, and that the delivery would be finished in a matter of weeks.