Zelensky confirms F-16 arrival in Ukraine

KYIV, Ukraine

Ukraine has received and is already using its first batch of F-16 fighter jets, President Volodymyr Zelensky said Sunday. Their arrival provides the country with a much-needed morale boost in its grinding war against Russia, though experts say they are unlikely to have a major impact on the battlefield.

“F-16s are in Ukraine. We made it happen,” Zelensky said in comments posted in a video on Telegram and on the official presidential website. “I am proud of all our guys who master with high quality these planes and have already started using them for our state.”

Belgium, Denmark, Norway and the Netherlands have pledged to supply Ukraine with the American-made F-16s. Zelensky did not provide further details about how many planes had been delivered, which nations had supplied them or how they were being utilized.

Ukrainian officials have been lobbying for F-16s since the early days of the war, but the United States resisted. A year ago, Washington changed its position and allowed other countries to send the jets, though the effort has been marred by delays.

In his statement Sunday, Zelensky acknowledged the resistance Kyiv encountered in adding the planes to its outdated fleet.

“We have often heard the word ‘impossible’ in response, but we have made possible what was our ambition, our defense need, and now it is actually a reality, a reality in our skies,” Zelensky said, in comments delivered on Ukraine’s Air Force Day.

Ukraine is dependent on Western arms and has urged Washington throughout the conflict to send a wide variety of weapons to repel Russia’s invasion. While the U.S. and its allies have provided increasingly advanced technology, such as the Patriot antiaircraft system, fears of escalation with Russia have sometimes slowed deliveries — much to the exasperation of officials in Kyiv, who have watched Russian forces advance.

Officials declined to say exactly how many jets Ukraine will receive this year, but it won’t be more than one squadron, about 20 jets. Just six pilots were projected to complete training this summer because the program has limited spots and Ukraine has few pilots to spare.

Though Ukraine has previously been limited in using Western weapons to strike targets in Russia, Western nations donating the F-16s have not disclosed any restrictions on how they can be deployed.

But Ukrainian and Western officials said the fighter jets are unlikely to fly too close to the front lines, as there are too few of them — and too many Russian air defense systems that can shoot them down.

The first F-16s would probably boost Ukraine’s air defenses, officials said, taking out incoming missiles, drones and aircraft.

“I think people are waiting for this climactic moment of the jets arrive and everything shifts, and it just doesn’t work like that,” Michelle “Mace” Curran, a former F-16 pilot, told The Washington Post last month. “It’s exciting, but we have to be a little bit patient to see the results.”