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US approves sending F-16s to Ukraine from Denmark and Netherlands

https://www.reuters.com/world/us-approves-sending-f-16s-ukraine-denmark-netherlands-2023-08-17/#:~:text=WASHINGTON%2C%20Aug%2017%20(Reuters),U.S.%20official%20said%20on%20Thursday.

The United States has approved sending F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine from Denmark and the Netherlands to defend against Russian invaders as soon as pilot training is completed, a U.S. official said on Thursday.

US approves sending F-16s to Ukraine from Denmark and Netherlands

"I am writing to express the United States' full support for both the transfer of F-16 fighter aircraft to Ukraine and for the training of Ukrainian pilots by qualified F-16 instructors [...] It remains critical that Ukraine is able to defend itself against ongoing Russian aggression and violation of its sovereignty" said Blinken.

Will this solidify a Ukrainian victory?

U.S. officials have privately said that F-16 jets would have been of little help to Ukraine in its current counteroffensive and will not be a game changer when they eventually arrive given Russian air defense systems and contested skies over Ukraine

Or will Russian radar and missle systems tear them up?

60 comments

jeffw

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Fuck Putin, any little bit helps

HappyMeatbag

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Other than cost, I haven’t understood the hesitancy to give Ukraine all the weapons they ask for, immediately.

When war breaks out, it means diplomacy has failed. It only makes sense to no longer consider diplomacy a major factor when making wartime decisions - especially when providing support to a country that’s defending itself from an unprovoked invasion, which is a violation of international law. Half measures only prolong the war, which ultimately makes it more expensive for supporting countries. For Ukraine, civilians and soldiers are dying every day.

This war should have ended by now. I’m glad that most of the world is condemning Putin, but we’re not doing enough.

unscholarly_source

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I'm not an expert or anything, but as it has been explained to me, the geo-political consequences of Ukraine having NATO weapons is enormous.. If Ukraine were to have access to F-18s, F-35s, or any NATO asset, it would implicate NATO, and further escalate the conflict towards a NATO-Russian war (World War 3), and the precipitation of nuclear assets. This is why even France's own Dassault assets and Sweden's Saabs were not offered. F-16s are old enough, and used enough by non-NATO forces that this might be okay.

A prolonged war, while incredibly tragic, might still be less costly than World War 3...

HappyMeatbag

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Grrr. Damn geopolitics. I appreciate the response, though!

Kangie

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I'm not an expert

Clearly.

Ukraine were to have access to F-18s, F-35s, or any NATO asset, it would implicate NATO

Bullshit. Everything you just listed is in use by non-NATO countries. The primary drivers for "unlocking" new varieties of aid to Ukraine appear to be:

battlefield utility in the near future (javelin, himars/m270, western IFVs, tanks etc).
sending a message to that western support is locked in for the long term (repair facilities, announcements around reconstruction aid)

the geo-political consequences of Ukraine having NATO weapons is enormous.. ... [It would] ... further escalate the conflict towards a NATO-Russian war (World War 3), and the precipitation of nuclear assets.

Russia has claimed that every single new weapons system delivered is "escalatory" and threatens nuclear war every single time. Please stop spreading their propaganda for them.

This is why even France's own Dassault assets and Sweden's Saabs were not offered.

Are you sure that it has to do with this and not the fact that there were more F-16s produced than each of the alternatives combined?

unscholarly_source

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Lmao what's with the salty tone lol

HappyMeatbag

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I’m having reddit flashbacks

Kangie

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You can always stick to beehaw if you want nothing but butterflies and puppies.

I'm going to counter Russian misinformation wherever I see it, and these are the same old tired claims, just dressed up with a little hat and bow tie this time.

HappyMeatbag

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Oh, please. Don’t try and pretend your behavior is justified because you’re spreading Truth.

You could have made your point without being obnoxious and condescending, but chose to throw civility out the window. I don’t want “nothing but butterflies and puppies”. I want mature people who are able to communicate like adults.

supercriticalcheese

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It takes years to train pilots, maintenance staff, logistics to bring a fighter jet to be ready into active operation in a hostile environment under normal conditions.

HappyMeatbag

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True, but I’m not just talking about jets. I’m talking about ALL weapons, like rockets and such. There’s been resistance over a lot of things.

N1cknamed

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yetAnotherUser

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Well, anything worsening the relation between nuclear powers could be considered a step closer to nuclear war. The question is how much of a step it is and how far away from nuclear war we are.

yogthos

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Any sane person would want to actively work to reduce escalation between nuclear powers instead of finding out what the breaking point is.

Echo71Niner

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I haven’t understood the hesitancy to give Ukraine all the weapons they ask for, immediately.

It's clear that you're unaware of the extensive corruption in Ukraine. Political corruption, Bribes, Judicial corruption, Corruption in the public sector, Corruption in higher education, Corruption in the social security system, not like Russia is any different, but Ukraine like to pretend they are honest while they pickpocket you.

HappyMeatbag

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I’m not unaware, but I got too worked up and simply forgot. It amounts to the same thing, though. Whoops.

You make a good point. Corruption is a good reason to think carefully about any requests. There’s no use in a country donating billions of dollars worth of military hardware unless that hardware actually makes it to the front lines.

lntl

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It's justifying the cost more than the cost itself. It is hard to justify freely giving to a foreign nation when there are domestic issues that don't have funding.

The state must build the narrative that the money being spent abroad is going to help the people more than if it was spent at domestically. This is not an easy trick to pull off and then even more challenging to maintain.

HappyMeatbag

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In my opinion, it’s hard to justify because it’s bullshit. Problems remain unsolved because the will isn’t there, not because we can’t afford it. Anyone who says, for example, that American public schools are underfunded because of our Ukraine policy will (and should) be laughed out of the room.

lntl

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Thanks for doing your part to build and maintain the narrative comrade

Echo71Niner

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How fucking long have they been saying Ukraine will get F-16? The war will end before they get them! It's likely they won't be operational in Ukraine before 2025.

FiskFisk33

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it's very possible the war will go on way past that

autotldr

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This is the best summary I could come up with:

WASHINGTON, Aug 17 (Reuters) - The United States has approved sending F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine from Denmark and the Netherlands to defend against Russian invaders as soon as pilot training is completed, a U.S. official said on Thursday.

"We welcome Washington's decision to pave the way for sending F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine," Dutch Foreign Minister Wopke Hoekstra said on messaging platform X, formerly known as Twitter.

A coalition of 11 countries will start training Ukrainian pilots to fly the F-16 fighter jets later this month in Denmark, the Danish defence ministry said on Friday.

NATO members Denmark and the Netherlands have been leading international efforts to train pilots as well as support staff, maintain aircraft and ultimately enable Ukraine to obtain F-16s for use in its war with Russia.

"I am writing to express the United States' full support for both the transfer of F-16 fighter aircraft to Ukraine and for the training of Ukrainian pilots by qualified F-16 instructors," Blinken said in a letter to the two officials, a copy of which was seen by Reuters.

Kyiv will not be able to operate U.S.-built F-16 fighter jets this coming autumn and winter, Ukraine air force spokesperson Yuriy Ihnat told Ukrainian television late on Wednesday.

The original article contains 573 words, the summary contains 207 words. Saved 64%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

Commiejones

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Did they solve the issue of F16s needing pristine runways to take off and land? Russia as been able to damage Patriot AA in the heart of Kiev months ago so any airstrip in Ukraine is basically a sitting duck. A kinzal missile has an effective range 1.5-2x a F16 and all it has to hit is the runway to ground every f16 on an airbase. That said theyd still probably get more flight time than the average F35

Dolores

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europeans insisting they're independent countries but they need Uncle Sam's permission to send their own military hardware anywhere 🤔

CMDR_Horn

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Still contains secrets that the US doesn’t want to fall in to the hands of her enemies. I’m sure part of the purchasing agreement is non-transfer clauses and the such to limit the risk. That said Ukraine should’ve had access to these last year

420blazeit69

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The first F-16 flew in 1974, half a century ago. Considering how widely they've been used, no one is going to learn anything significant if a few more are shot down or captured.

ikilledtheradiostar

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Which is going to happen 30s after getting into country. The weapons trickle is a cruel joke at this point. The last Ukrainian to die is going to be in an Abrahams.

Firemyth

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Yeah? And the last Russian to die is going to be in a recommissioned t55.

ikilledtheradiostar

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Cope

Firemyth

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No you

Hyperreality

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Sorry, but I'm going to be blunt. This is an ill informed comment. This is in fact normal with most weapons sales. For example:

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/swiss-government-refuses-re-export-arms-ukraine-2023-03-10/

By your logic, Denmark, Germany and Spain aren't independent of Switzerland, simply because they were able to refuse reexport. But of course that's nonsense. It's just that arms and weapons contract invariably include clauses which prohibit reexport without permission of the country of origin. To not include these clauses would make weapons trafficking far too easy. Simply export to a second country which isn't on the sanctions list, then have them re-export to another country, then another country, then another country, then North Korea or wherever because the second to final country doesn't have laws that prohibit it or has insufficient checks.

In this case, the US doing it publically bolsters US allies. The US has publicly said it's ok, so that if shit hits the fan, the US can't say "we didn't approve of this weapons sale, so it's their own problem".

Also, don't forget that the F16 is used as a delivery mechanism for nuclear weapons as part of nuclear sharing, so it's not a crate of automatic rifles. It's a serious escalation, given the Russians can never be entirely sure that the Ukrainian F16 flying towards their border isn't actually a Dutch F16 armed with nukes. In the case of the Netherlands the B61 with a yield of 300 kilotons of which IRC they have 200 of at their disposal if shit hits the fan. The US really isn't the bad guy for including stringent conditions on the reexport of a plane potentially capable of nuking Moscow.

TLDR The US may have undue influence on smaller NATO members, but this really isn't a good example of that.

Ooops

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By your logic, Denmark, Germany and Spain aren't independent of Switzerland

By his logic the US isn't independent of Norway because they couldn't send NASAMS to Ukraine without approval...

So his "logic" might just be bullshit.

Madison_rogue

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Since it's an arms deals via NATO, with weapons provided by the U.S., it seems fairly obvious the terms of the treaty include consent and/or approval when repurposing arms to non-member states.

Ooops

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Welcome to the real world where US jets can't be re-exported without the US' approval, where nobody can re-export Isreali-build missiles without Israel's approval, where Switzerland blocks the delivery of ammunition produced by a Swiss company or where Estonia couldn't even send old howitzers to Ukraine without Germany's approval although those were actually soviet-build and only for a short time owned by Germany (via ex-GDR stocks)...

This has exactly zero to do with the US or Europe but with the internationally agreed terms of arms export that absolutely everyone agreed upon... or most arms trade would mostly cease to exist.

But that's okay... we can live with the US being dependent on Europeans to send NASAMS to Ukraine and having to ask for approval first.

But nice atttempt at trolling...

selokichtli

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Yeah, you had me until "... or most arms trade would mostly cease to exist".

Lols

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europeans do not need uncle sams permission to send their own military hardware anywhere, they need uncle sams permission to send US patented and classified materials anywhere

similar to how the US needs permission to send [european country here]'s patented and classified materials anywhere

sunbeam60

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Correct! If the US wanted to send a batch of their NSMs to another country, sure as shit Norway would need to approve first.

It’s got zero to do with European independence and everything to do with how a purchasing contract is set up.

Firemyth

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Hexes gonna hex

Commiejones

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HA! And now you have been hexed too! If you were quiet we wouldn't have known to hex you but now you will forever be noticing that your shoes are untied and have rocks in them. haha ha ha!

Grimble

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mayonaise_met

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TokenBoomer

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Ask yourself; why does the US have to approve this?

OKRainbowKid

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I don't have to ask myself, this is a well known fact, not some secret gotcha.

gornar

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Exactly, literally documented!

UnfortunateShort

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That's what they want you to think.

Leviathan

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You can actually look it up. Munitions cannot be sold or transferred without the consent of the fabricating country. Asking yourself is so much better when you've got facts!

mind

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TokenBoomer

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Ask yourself, why are we selling/ leasing weapons?

Akasazh

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Why telling people to ask themselves, when you could just say what you want to say?

If you're trying to communicate and get a point across that's way better.

TokenBoomer

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Because people don’t want to be told what to think. It’s more effective if they discover it themselves.

Akasazh

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A discussion is not about telling people what to think, but rather that you disseminate what it is you think, so that people may respond to it.

So you do want to change the way people think, ideally into the way you think... butttt you want them to find out by themselves.

If that's your way of communicating, in my personal opinion, thats not very efficient, and a bit ~~dumb~~ counterproductive..

TokenBoomer

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You know what’s dumb? Calling someone dumb whose mind your trying to change. I don’t want people to think like me, but I do want them to think for themselves. Not just reapplying jingoistic talking points they pull from the ether.

mind

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Akasazh

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I'm not trying to change your mind at all, nor would I see myself as capable of doing that. I was merely saying that your method of discourse might be detrimental to what you are trying to say.

I will retract my dumb statement and will reword it to say 'counterproductive', sorry for the insult.

SaakoPaahtaa

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Ask yourself, why James Bond is never seen having a shit?

TokenBoomer

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Ask yourself why people are apathetic and make jokes about war?

bingbong

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Ask yourself why Chuck Norris doesn't just RKO pootin out of a 10th story window 🤨🤔🧐

TokenBoomer

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Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the clouds of war, it is humanity hanging on a cross of iron.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

Mananasi

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I did ask myself. Then I looked it up and the reason makes perfect sense.

TokenBoomer

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Then you’re not asking the right questions. Who is benefiting monetarily from this war?

AngryCommieKender

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Because we made the things and only lease them to other countries? Mainly cause other countries don't want the full maintenance costs of our platforms.

I don't know that is the case, but it seems like a fairly logical way to ensure that our platforms don't get sold on the black market by anyone other than US