Providing F-16 Fighters to Ukraine Is Worth the Risk

The “Fighting Falcon” is the Swiss Army knife of the air. Russia has nothing to compete with it, and Putin has run out of ways to escalate in response.

By Fletcher Dean Emeritus James Stavridis, former supreme allied commander of NATO

Yielding to mounting bipartisan pressure domestically and considerable advocacy by European allies, President Joe Biden’s administration decided Friday to provide a path to full training and operation of US-made F-16 “Fighting Falcon” fighter aircraft. 

Coming on the heels of providing Patriot air-defense systems and Abrams M1A1 tanks, the F-16 announcement shows that the Biden team is willing to take a reasonable level of risk to provide the Ukrainians a full suite of tools to defend themselves from Russian aggression.

The F-16 has been in production since the 1980s. I can remember the announcement of its approval in 1976, the year I graduated from the United States Naval Academy. Throughout my career, I’ve seen this multi-role fighter deploy into combat from the wars in the Balkans through Desert Storm and on into the “forever wars” of Afghanistan and Iraq. 

The F-16s are rugged, relatively simple to maintain and operate (compared to more sophisticated jets like the F-15, F-22 and F-35), and can provide both air-to-air defense against Russian fighters and bombers and also conduct lethal air-to-ground strikes against enemy troops and machinery. Operated by more than two dozen nations globally (including many of the closest US allies), the jets have a very robust supply chain with close to 5,000 aircraft in operation.

Why did the administration shift position after months of opposing this move? And what is the plan for their use on the Ukrainian battlefield?

Any decision to provide advanced weapons systems to an ally are complicated risk-benefit calculations. The risks are clear. Even though the planes will technically be provided by European allies, Russia will clearly see it as direct American intervention. Thus there is a chance of escalation by Russia, possibly leading to the use of weapons of mass destruction. While President Vladimir Putin could certainly exercise such an option, he is highly unlikely to do so because of strident opposition from China, his main supporter, as well as India and the Global South. Using a nuclear weapon would cause the many fence-sitting nations in the conflict to turn against Russia.

There is also a risk that the complexity of training and maintaining the jets causes the Ukrainians to waste valuable combat resources and personnel to produce a less-than-robust new capability. I’m not a combat pilot, but many very experienced members of the fighter-jet community with whom I consult (and who have been flying the Falcon for decades) assure me the training risk is minimal. We are not trying to train up inexperienced “nugget” pilots, but rather transition experienced Ukrainian aviators from the Soviet-era MiGs in their current inventory. 

Given the motivations of defending home and hearth, these pilots will have an accelerated learning curve.

According to news reports this week, a confidential US Air Force assessment found that it would take only four months to train the Ukrainians on the F-16, far less time than previous estimates.

The training will probably be conducted by a coalition of US, British, Dutch, Belgian and Danish teams at Ramstein Air Base in Germany, a superb complex I commanded as supreme allied commander of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Ramstein is headquarters for all NATO air operations, and I’m confident things will move along briskly.

Maintenance is always a huge challenge with advanced weaponry. Fortunately, the F-16 has an excellent record of reliability. The need for parts and crews can largely be overcome by that global supply chain; repairs can be conducted both at allied bases near Ukraine, likely in Poland or Germany, as well as through virtual advisory work by the US Air Force.

The benefits of providing the aircraft, if used intelligently, are profound.

The single-seat, single-engine plane is the Swiss Army knife of the air battlefield. While not the fastest plane, it has tremendous range and maneuverability. It can operate virtually every missile and bomb in the allied inventory, including air-to-air Sidewinder and AMRAAM missiles; Maverick, HARM, JASSM and JSOW surface-to-air weapons; Harpoon and Penguin anti-ship missiles; and a dozen variants of precision bombs. It also has rockets and guns and could carry nuclear weapons, not that the latter is remotely under consideration.

The basic sketch of how to use an initial fleet of 20 to 40 Fighting Falcons is clear. Highest priority will be integrating them into the already robust air-defense system over Ukraine.

Putin still has a highly capable air force of nearly 1,000 attack aircraft. His generals are pushing him to undertake a “Syria-style air campaign” that goes beyond the current missile attacks on Ukraine: basically destroying whole cities, taking out critical infrastructure (electricity, natural gas, water), and attacking both civilian and military targets.

The F-16s could deploy at two or three bases around Ukraine and put on five-minute alert status (standard practice with fighters on the deck of a US aircraft carrier) and directed against incoming flights of Russian aircraft in air-to-air combat mode.

The jets could also be apportioned partly in aid of Ukrainian ground forces to apply highly directed weapons against Russian logistic centers behind enemy lines in support of the coming summer offensive. In addition to going after logistics (a strategy that has served the Ukrainians well thus far), the F-16s could be used against command-and-control nodes based in Crimea. The Black Sea fleet, which is operating well offshore and out of range of drones or land-based cruise missiles, would be a juicy target.

Certainly, there are challenges: quickly training pilots to get them comfortable in their new rides; integrating the jets seamlessly into existing air and ground operations to avoid striking fellow Ukrainians; and having a plan to operate them in the dangerous surface-to-air environment over Ukraine created by Russian S-400 missiles based across the border in Belarus and Russia itself. 

But the benefits will be significant: demoralizing Russian forces and providing long-term security for Ukraine. This is a smart decision by the West and will provide much-needed air support to Ukrainian forces while taking options off the table for Russia.

(This post is republished from Bloomberg Opinion.)