The War in the Ukraine

FairAndUnbiased said:

so they got all their Migs shot down already? I'm surprised they're willing to put F-16's reputation on the line. Looks like Ukraine is more important to them than they let on.

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With the European countries starting to switch to F-35 there are going be hundreds and thousands of F-16 that could be taken off service. No problem for the US to gather a dozen of F-16 from each of its puppets to give to Ukraine

Given past Russia's inaction, more Russian red lines will be crossed

Overbom said:

With the European countries starting to switch to F-35 there are going be hundreds and thousands of F-16 that could be taken off service. No problem for the US to gather a dozen of F-16 from each of its puppets to give to Ukraine

Given the past Russia's inaction, more Russian red lines will be crossed

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how is it a red line when we'll get to see the burning wreckage and it loses its reputation as an 'invincible' fighter in 3rd world countries?

FairAndUnbiased said:

how is it a red line when we'll get to see the burning wreckage of F-16s and it loses its reputation as an 'invincible' fighter in 3rd world countries?

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I see you have high confidence in the Russian airforce. What exactly gives you this feeling when you look back at what happened the last year?

Don't forget, what kind of A2A weaponry will be provided, and most importantly, F-16 will be linked directly with NATO assets to have complete battlespace awareness.
Their datalink with NATO assets shouldn't be underestimated at all unless you somehow think Russia is more capable in this domain than the West.

To summarise, Ukrainian F-16 by themselves are not that much of a trouble. Ukrainian F-16 linked with NATO supporting elements are very much a huge danger for Russia

Overbom said:

With the European countries starting to switch to F-35 there are going be hundreds and thousands of F-16 that could be taken off service. No problem for the US to gather a dozen of F-16 from each of its puppets to give to Ukraine

Given past Russia's inaction, more Russian red lines will be crossed

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Source on which Russian authority said that was a red line?

Tldr: Nato racking up those spiritual victories by crossing red lines they invented themselves.

Overbom said:

I see you have high confidence in the Russian airforce. What exactly gives you this feeling when you look back at what happened the last year?

Don't forget, what kind of A2A weaponry will be provided, and most importantly, F-16 will be linked directly with NATO assets to have complete battlespace awareness.
Their datalink with NATO assets shouldn't be underestimated at all unless you somehow think Russia is more capable in this domain than the West.

To summarise, Ukrainian F-16 by themselves are not that much of a trouble. Ukrainian F-16 linked with NATO supporting elements are very much a huge danger for Russia

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you tell me, what happened in the last year in air to air? , they're , and I don't think there's evidence for even a single Ukrainian air to air victory, only SAM shootdowns.

Biscuits said:

Source on which Russian authority said that was a red line?

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Nobody said anything. Actions speak louder than words. If not for something they were afraid off, the West would have sent tanks and aircrafts to Ukraine from day 1 of the war but instead they sat it out for a whole year

Unless you think that the US for that whole year was a friend of Russia, the logical answer is that something was holding them off for last year.

Biscuits said:

Tldr: Nato racking up those spiritual victories by crossing red lines they invented themselves.

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Nothing spiritual if/when F-16 arrive at the battlefield. Tanks and IFV are already on the way in a few months

FairAndUnbiased said:

you tell me, what happened in the last year in air to air?

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, they're

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, and I don't think there's evidence for even a single Ukrainian air to air victory, only SAM shootdowns.

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Ok but why you compare Ukrainian MIGs with F-16? I am sure you are aware that these 2 are different aircrafts, right?

Don't tell me you don't think that F-16 won't do sizeable damage to Russia? I wouldnt underestimate Western equipment on their most focused battle domain

In any case, this is going to be a long process. The West is clearly prepping the ground to send fighter jets, but its going to take some time for all of the preparations to be completed

Overbom said:

Ok but why you compare Ukrainian MIGs with F-16? I am sure you are aware that these 2 are different aircrafts, right?

Don't tell me you don't think that F-16 won't do sizeable damage to Russia? I wouldnt underestimate Western equipment on their most focused battle domain

In any case, this is going to be a long process. The West is clearly prepping the ground to send fighter jets, but its going to take some time for all of the preparations to be completed

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I think the short legged F-16 would be unable to do significant damage if used offensively. In addition, NATO AWACs are still flying outside Ukrainian airspace, so cannot enable them to offensively project power into Russia itself. NATO AWACs also are unlikely to be bale to pinpoint the location of Russian mobile SAMs like Buk/Tor/Pantsir that can hide in the forest and move around. If they could, those targets would be eliminated by existing Ukrainian munitions already.

It will be able to shoot down cruise missiles. That's what the US said is the intended role. That is much safer for the F-16's reputation than trying to go on the offensive against Russia.

FairAndUnbiased said:

In addition, NATO AWACs are still flying outside Ukrainian airspace, so cannot enable them to offensively project power into Russia itself.

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My point is about striking Russian-held Ukrainian territory.

And NATO AWACs flying outside Ukrainian airspace is just another of those red lines. Given the way the US operates I wouldn't be that certain that this would held true one year from now

FairAndUnbiased said:

NATO AWACs also are unlikely to be bale to pinpoint the location of Russian mobile SAMs like Buk/Tor/Pantsir that can hide in the forest and move around

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Thats ok. Just denying air superiority for Russia is good enough for NATO. Now if Russia is determined to use its SAMs then no problemo, for close range, F-16 can do it alone, for larger range, the AWACS can detect the missile launch, and then cue the data to the F-16 to take them out

There is no invincible weapon, and SAMs definitely have a lot of weaknesses which can be exploited if you have the right equipment

Overbom said:

Ok but why you compare Ukrainian MIGs with F-16? I am sure you are aware that these 2 are different aircrafts, right?

Don't tell me you don't think that F-16 won't do sizeable damage to Russia? I wouldnt underestimate Western equipment on their most focused battle domain

In any case, this is going to be a long process. The West is clearly prepping the ground to send fighter jets, but its going to take some time for all of the preparations to be completed

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To this day you have very outdated Ukrainian Migs and SU's conducting sorties over Bakhmut at low altitude lacking SA, EW and modern RWR now imagine Ukraine F-16's with HARM receiving pod, AN/ALQ-131(v) EW pod and HARM's.

Air to air/CAP F-16's is not what Ukraine is looking for since Ukraine airspace is a no go for Russian fighters that will only become even more of a no go for Russian fighters when Patriot batteries and more NASAM batteries and IRS-T's batteries arrive. What Ukraine wants is fighters capable of flying close to frontlines at mid altitude dropping JDAMS, GBU's, Mavericks and whatever the F-16 is capable of dropping at standoff-ish ranges. They will be absolute beast in SEAD missions being able to locate the exact GPS coordinates of a Russian SAM radar the moment it paints the F-16 through its HARM receiving pod. Even if that SAM turns off its radar those HARMS will use GPS navigation to hit that radar which that F-16 through link-16 will be able to share with other flights of F-16's that aren't getting painted.