(Bloomberg) -- The first delivery of F-16 fighter jets from NATO allies has arrived in Ukraine, in a long-awaited move that may boost the war-torn nation’s ability to repel Russian attacks.
The deadline for the transfer of the US-made warplanes was the end of this month and it has been respected, according to people familiar with the matter, who spoke under condition of anonymity. The number of jets is small, they said.
It’s not clear whether Ukrainian pilots, who have trained with their western allies over the past months, will be able to immediately use the warplanes or the process will take longer, the people said.
Even if small at first, the transfer of jets should over time help Kyiv build the capacity to put a dent in Russia’s aerial superiority, which has allowed the Kremlin to decimate the country’s power infrastructure, leading to rolling blackouts.
A spokeswoman for Ukraine’s defense ministry Diana Davityan declined to comment. Spokespeople for US Department of Defense and the National Security Council also declined to comment.
It took more than a year to get here. President Joe Biden dropped his opposition to sending F-16s to Ukraine in May 2023, after repeated pleas by President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and NATO allies to allow their transfer.
That came alongside intense debate as to whether F-16s would give Ukraine any decisive advantage. Veteran pilots told Bloomberg last May that the jets wouldn’t be the game changer Ukraine claims.
The move has been bedeviled by delays, questions around spare parts, and a language barrier between Ukrainian pilots and their foreign trainers. Planners have also worried that the country doesn’t have enough runways — and those it does have are vulnerable to Russian attacks.
So far, Ukrainian pilots have trained with F-16s abroad including in the US. In the meantime, the battlefield has changed, with both sides increasingly relying on cheap drones and Russia bolstering its air defenses.
Denmark and the Netherlands are supplying the planes, with Belgium and Norway also pledging jets. Jake Sullivan, Biden’s top national security adviser, has said the F-16s are expected to defend front-line forces in the short term and help retake territory “down the road.”
(Updates with response from US administration in fifth paragraph, details on countries pledging jets in last.)
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