Ukraine

Introduction

The Ukrainian air force inherited a major part of the ex-USSR inventory at the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. Independance was gained in the same year and the new Ukrainian air force had a vast amount of aircraft including Mig-21, Mig-23, Mig-25, Mig-27, Mig-29, Su-15, Su-17, Su-24, Su-25, Su-27, Tu-16, Tu-22M, Tu-95, Tu-160, Yak-28. It totalled roughly 2,000 aircraft. A very limited number of those were sold to the Russian Federation shortly after, but most of these types were withdrawn from use in the years after the independance with some flying along untill roughly 2004. With these aircraft also came a number of nuclear weapons, meaning Ukraine became a nuclear armed nation upon independance. These weapons and their carriers were abolished in the 1990's.

History

The war in Ukraine has seen two major stages. Russia invaded Crimea and the Donbas region in the southeast of Ukraine in 2014. The country fought against the Russians on its own strenghth. While the situation in Crimea was stable, fighting did occur alongside the frontline with the Donbas region. This continued up untill 2022 when Russia started a fully fletched invasion of Ukraine, hoping to overthrow the regime in a couple of days. This plan failed however and Ukrainian resistance was much fearser then the Russians anticipated. Together with the fact that the Russians made some major invasion blunders and also the influx of Western military suplies to Ukraine, the Russians were pushed back in Northern Ukraine, although they maintain a very large presence in the South and Southeast of the country with continued fighting going on in 2024 with an end to the conflict not in sight.

Inventory

Gift

Ukraine requested for Western aircraft in early 2023 already, but got a negative answer from its allies at first. With the war going on it its second year, European countries and the US started to rethink their position. In May of 2023 a training coalition was setup between a large number of NATO countries to train Ukrainian personnel on the F-16. The months thereafter Denmark pledged to deliver up to 19 F-16s which they were retiring for the F-35. The Netherlands also pledged to deliver up to 18 aircraft which they were selling, but redirected to Ukraine instead. Norway already sold the bulk of its F-16s to Romania, so was only capable of delivering up to 6 with Belgium finally agreeing to deliver the bulk of its fleet - being 30 aiframes. These will be delivered later since Belgium has only recently begun to replace them by the F-35, so it could take up to 2028 before they can all be delivered.

In August of 2024 the first ex-Danish jets were delivered to Ukraine with up to 20 to be delivered by yearend. The rest of the Danish and Dutch aircraft will be delivered in 2025 with the remainder in the years after. This means over 70 F-16s will be delivered to Ukraine eventually.

Operational Service