The Baltic countries and Poland responded positively to Ukraine’s request to send F-16s and other fighter jets. The attitude of the USA, Britain and Germany remains negative
By Athena Papakosta
Kyiv won the support of the Baltic states and Poland in its request to send F-16s and other fighter jets to Ukraine. But as far as the stronger United States, Britain and Germany are concerned, their negative attitude to this new Zelensky request has not changed.
US President Joe Biden, when asked whether the United States would send US F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine, answered categorically no but made sure to add that talks with Ukraine will continue. Later, the United Kingdom also pointed out that sending Western aircraft is not “practical”. A Downing Street spokesman stressed that “the UK’s fighter jets are extremely advanced and take months to learn how to fly”.
But in Kiev, for a year that the war has been going on, the West has learned to say no and then to… submit. After all, from Paris, the Minister of Defense of Ukraine, Oleksii Reznikov, characteristically said that “all types of aid were initially at the stage of no (…) The second stage is, ‘let’s talk and examine the technical possibilities’. The the third stage is, ‘let the training begin’ and the fourth is about transporting the equipment”.
For his part, Emmanuel Macron noted that “by definition, nothing is excluded” to list, then, a series of criteria and conditions that would give the “green light” for making such a decision. For example, one of the conditions of the French president is that there will be no further escalation and therefore no fighter aircraft will be used in a strike against Russian soil.
At the same time, Berlin is categorically opposed. A few 24 hours ago, the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, made it clear that there is no question of delivering fighter jets to Ukraine, while he warned of the risk of “permanent bidding” regarding weapons systems.
On the contrary, Poland favors or rather does not rule out the possibility of delivering fighter jets to Kyiv. Nevertheless, the Polish Prime Minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, when he mentioned the matter, made it clear that such a thing must be a NATO decision. Warsaw has proven to be a key ally for Ukraine as, in recent weeks, it has put significant pressure on Berlin to bolster the Ukrainian army with tanks.
At the moment, in the effort to deter the Russian invasion, Ukraine insists on strengthening its combat air power. A pressure campaign has already begun for the fighters manufactured by the American company Lockheed Martin, and in fact from the first moment that Washington and Berlin allowed the supply of Western tanks to Kiev. But Moscow has been clear in warning, consistently, of nuclear escalation.
The West, which is increasingly involved militarily in Ukraine, cannot ignore these warnings. For now, on the subject, she is divided. In this ongoing internal debate there are those who see the idea of ​​sending fighters as feasible and those who oppose it. But there are those who see that Western red lines are finally fading and warn that Moscow’s red lines remain visible, even 11 months after the Russian invasion of Ukraine began.
Zelensky – for now – will have to wait at least until the next Defense Ministers’ Summit of his allies, which is scheduled for February again in Ramstein, Germany. Until then, however, he will not waste any time and will try to gain ground with his allies in the Baltic countries, confirming in this way that securing the HIMARS and then the German Leopard 2 and the American Abrams was, for him, only the beginning.
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With a wealth of experience honed over 4+ years in journalism, I bring a seasoned voice to the world of news. Currently, I work as a freelance writer and editor, always seeking new opportunities to tell compelling stories in the field of world news.
