After more than a year of requests, Ukraine is finally about to start receiving General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcons to aid in its efforts against the ongoing Russian invasion. General Breedlove shares his professional insight.

After more than a year of requests, Ukraine is finally about to start receiving General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcons to aid in its efforts against the ongoing Russian invasion.

Months back, the Netherlands announced plans to transfer 42 F-16s to the embattled nation just as soon as Ukraine’s pilots have been trained to operate them, with Denmark following suit with a promise for 19 more, and Norway announcing that it will also give a handful.

But while this is certainly a victory for Ukraine, it’s important to understand not only what these highly capable jets can do, but also… what they won’t.

Ultimately, a fleet of F-16s will provide Ukrainian forces with a significant increase in both air-to-air and air-to-ground capabilities, but the platform is 47 years old.

Further, no single platform or system – not even one as capable as the F-16 – can win the war for Ukraine. And what will ultimately matter most is how these aircraft are leveraged within a broader overarching combat strategy.

F-16: NEW FIGHTERS REQUIRE NEW TACTICS

Ukraine’s fighter fleets, composed of Soviet-era MiG-29s and Su-27s, may look similar to those operated by Russia, but they carry even older avionics that further limit these dated fighters’ performance.

“A Russian jet can see 2-3 times further with its radar than our fighter,” Yurii Inhat, a spokesman for Ukraine’s airforce command told the Wall Street Journal. “Our fighter is simply blind, it cannot see.”

As a result, the F-16s Ukraine will receive will offer a significant increase in capability, even if they are largely carrying systems that first emerged in the 1990s. However, it’s also important to remember that technology is only one piece of the combat puzzle, and the ways in which these platforms are leveraged in the fight will dictate a great deal of their value.

“The integration of avionics, weapons systems, and weapons are decades ahead of what [Ukraine is] flying now,” retired Gen. Philip M. Breedlove, a former F-16 pilot as well as NATO Supreme Allied Commander, said. “There will be an increased capability, increased radar range, increased weapons range, etc. But this is not the be-all to end-all.”

As retired U.S. Air Force Brigadier General John Teichert has explained, the United States’ approach to fielding new weapons comes with a great deal of education, training, and combat exercises intended to ensure their use comes as second nature to American aviators. While Ukrainian pilots are being trained to operate these fighters, it would be nearly impossible for them to demonstrate the same level of proficiency in the near term.

As General Breedlove explained, if Ukrainians aren’t well-versed in the proper tactics to leverage these more advanced fighters, “you’re not going to realize any of the benefits of having a real four-plus generation aircraft. If you take an F-16 and fly it and use it like a MiG-29, you’re just going have a hotrod MiG-29, and that’s it.”

It’s also important to understand that system updates, upgrades, and replacements happen over time, meaning two F-16s of the same designation and flying for the same country may offer different capabilities based on the systems they have onboard and the weapons they’re capable of carrying. The single-seat F-16AMs and two-seat F-16BMs being provided to Ukraine are indeed pretty dated – receiving Mid Life Updates in the early 2000s to bring them approximately on par with the Block 50/52 F-16s the United States operated during Desert Storm.

There are a veritable ton of variables that could affect the F-16’s performance in Ukraine, and while it’s all but certain that they will offer a big boost in combat capability and capacity, anyone who purports to know exactly how these new fighters will change the dynamics of this conflict is either ignoring the complexities of the situation or being downright dishonest.

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