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Ukraine’s allies, such as the US, are limiting the use of long-range weapons they have supplied to attack Russia.
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Military experts told BI that these rules make the F-16s more vulnerable and less effective.
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This is because Russian weapons can more easily attack Western-supplied fighter jets.
According to military experts, Western restrictions on the way Ukraine can attack targets in Russia have made Ukraine’s F-16 fighter jets less effective.
Many of Ukraine’s allies, including the US, do not allow the country to use the long-range weapons they have supplied to attack targets on Russian soil.
That means Ukraine can’t destroy the source of many Russian attacks. Instead, Ukraine must try to stop each attack as it happens. That’s a much harder task.
This gives Russia more opportunities to hit Ukrainian fighter jets, making them more vulnerable and less able to fly close to the front lines.
George Barros, a Russia analyst at the U.S. Institute for the Study of War, said the relationship between Western restrictions and the effectiveness of Ukraine’s F-16s is “underestimated.”
According to him, the current restriction means that Ukraine can only attack in a limited area, allowing Russia to concentrate its air defenses in those regions.
If Ukraine is allowed to fire missiles further toward Russia, Russia would have to make difficult decisions, Barros said, such as where to place its air defenses and what to protect.
Russia would then likely pull back some of its air defenses to protect its rear, where Ukraine currently cannot attack, Barros said — a move that would move Russian weapons further away from Ukraine itself.
“This will provide greater operational depth for the Ukrainian F-16s, allowing them to operate over a larger part of Ukrainian airspace, even closer to the front lines and in limited cases even over Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory,” he said.
If the restrictions are lifted, Ukraine could also attack more Russian defenses, Barros added, allowing it to “carry out operations that could actually degrade Russia’s air defense position.”
Michael Bohnert, an expert on air warfare at the RAND Corporation, said Ukraine’s task is now made much more difficult and that “shooting an archer is always better than shooting an arrow.”
Western borders
Ukraine has repeatedly urged his allies to drop the arms restrictions, because that would allow the country to fight much more effectively.
Multiple softened their position in Mayallowing Ukraine to use short-range weapons on Russian soil to a limited extent.
According to war experts, it quickly made a difference.
But current restrictions on long-range weapons mean Ukraine cannot use some of its most powerful weapons, such as Storm shadow/SCALP And ATACMS missiles to attack military targets in Russia.
Instead, Ukraine relies on less powerful drones for these attacks.
ISW estimated last month that at least 250 militarily important targets in Russia were within range of Ukrainian ATACMS missiles. However, due to restrictions in place, ISW can only attack 20 of them.
It was stated that Ukraine “must be able to attack Russian air defenses with Western-supplied long-range weapons to enable the deployment of F-16 fighter jets.”
A separate update said Ukraine would only be allowed to deploy the fighter jets close to its borders if it could destroy Russia’s air defenses.
Retired Major General Gordon B. “Skip” Davis, Jr., formerly NATO’s deputy assistant secretary general, told BI he “strongly advocates removing all restrictions” on the use of Western systems on Russian soil.
Davis said Ukraine’s attack on Kursk last month — where Ukraine says it controls 500 square miles of Russian territory — proves that Russia’s repeated threats of escalation if red lines are crossed are false.
“That has not happened and it is not going to happen,” he said, adding: “I don’t think that is even a possibility, despite the bluff of Putin and some spokesmen.”
A limited number of F-16s
The effectiveness of the Ukrainian F-16s also faces other challenges.
The most important thing is the small number of jet aircraft it has at its disposal.
Denmark, Norway, Belgium and the Netherlands have delivered more than 85 F-16s to Ukraine. An unknown number will be delivered in August.
But according to many aerial warfare experts, these measures are not enough to be effective.
Michael Clarke, an expert on Russia and Ukraine and a UK national security adviser, previously told BI that Ukraine needs at least 200 of them for the jets to be truly effective, along with the support systems they require.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in May that Ukraine needs about 120 to 130 advanced fighter jets to properly combat Russia in the air.
Ukraine began requesting F-16s shortly after the Russian invasion. Keir Giles, a senior consultant at Chatham House’s Russia and Eurasia Programme, said earlier this month that the delay meant that “Russia has had ample time to plan for and adapt to the arrival of the new Ukrainian aircraft type.”
Ukraine and its allies, as well as war experts, describe the F-16 program as still in its infancy.
Ukraine lost one F-16 along with its pilot end of august.
Aviation experts told BI it is not clear what happened and that it could have been the result of pilot error, fire from the crew or a Russian missile.
They said that the loss of aircraft was to be expected and that there was no reason to panic.
Barros was referring to the Battle of Britain during World War II, which left a large number of pilots and aircraft dead.
He said: “If you point to a bunch of destroyed Ukrainian planes and lost pilots and say, ‘Oh, hell, we can’t do this,’ it’s like Americans looking at what happened in World War II during the Battle of Britain and saying, ‘Oh man, the British are losing a lot of Spitfires, why are we still sending raw materials and weapons to the UK?'”
Aerial warfare experts said they did not expect the F-16s to revolutionize Ukraine, largely because of their small initial numbers.
However, they also said the fighter jets would help Ukraine defend itself, including by protecting cities from Russian drone and missile attacks.
Zelensky said This month it was announced that there are plans to increase the number of fighter jets and trained pilots in Ukraine.
Ukraine’s F-16s could also be made more powerful: the US is reportedly debating whether Ukraine should be equipped with US long-range cruise missiles.
“We are far from reaching the full potential of what the Ukrainian Air Force can achieve with the F-16, especially as they further develop the capability,” Barros said.
However, it would be of great importance that Ukraine be allowed to effectively attack inside Russia.
Read the original article at Company Insider
