Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced Sunday the long-awaited arrival of American-made F-16 fighter jets, calling it a “new stage” for Ukraine’s air war with Russia.
Mr. Zelenskyy made the announcement while speaking to reporters at a Ukrainian air base. He said the arrival of the F-16 jets, manufactured by U.S.-based company Lockheed Martin, was the result of a major behind-the-scenes push by Kyiv to persuade the Biden administration to send the aircraft.
“This is the new stage of development of the air force of Ukraine’s armed forces,” Mr. Zelenskyy said, according to Reuters.
“We did a lot for Ukrainian forces to transition to a new aviation standard, the Western combat aviation,” he said. “We often heard ’it is impossible’ as an answer but we still made our ambition, our defensive need, possible.”
The Biden administration initially approved the deployment of F-16s to Ukraine in August 2023. The painfully slow delivery time has frustrated Mr. Zelenskyy and his military commanders, though the Ukrainian leader acknowledged Sunday that his nation still needs to train more of its pilots to fly the cutting-edge aircraft.
Eventually, the F-16s could be a game-changer for the Ukrainian side. Relying on long-range glide bombs, the Russians have found great success in aerial assaults against Ukrainian positions, which has helped pave the way for small, incremental gains by Russian ground forces.
That dynamic has begun to shift, U.S. officials have said, in the months since the White House signed off on allowing Ukraine to hit targets inside Russia with American-made weapons. The introduction of F-16s could greatly enhance the Ukrainians’ ability to strike Russian assets and stop glide bombs and other attacks before they can hit Ukrainian targets.
The Kremlin has brushed off the idea that F-16s will have a significant impact on the war.
• Ben Wolfgang can be reached at bwolfgang@washingtontimes.com.
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