Ukraine to receive 42 F-16 fighter jets

20 August, 2023 F-16AM (Block 20 MLU) of the Royal Netherlands Air Force. Photo from open sources The total confirmed number of F-16 multirole fighter jets for the Ukrainian Air Force has reached 42 aircraft.

President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky announced this. "Today we are taking another step to strengthen Ukraine's air defense. F-16.

Aircraft that we will use to keep Russian terrorists away from Ukrainian cities and villages," the President said. Zelensky added that Ukraine would receive the planes after training pilots and personnel is complete.

Volodymyr Zelensky and Mark Rutte with F-16 in the background. Photo credits: Volodymyr Zelensky

"Mark Rutte and I have agreed on the number of F-16s that will be provided to Ukraine after our pilots and engineers have been trained.

42 aircraft. And this is just the beginning," the President added. Rutte said that all 42 aircraft are located in the Netherlands.

This number of F-16s will be enough to create three squadrons of 14 aircraft each. It is not known how many aircraft will be provided by each country of the coalition of 11 nations.

The Fighter Jets Coalition is an informal intergovernmental organization created to facilitate cooperation between countries that donate fighter jets to Ukraine. Most likely, the largest number of aircraft will be transferred by the Netherlands and Denmark, which together have about 87 aircraft, including those in storage.

F-16AM (Block 20 MLU) of the Royal Netherlands Air Force. Photo from open sources

It is also unknown what version of the aircraft will be at the disposal of the Ukrainian Air Force.

For example, the Netherlands and Denmark have F-16AM (Block 20 MLU) fighter jets. This modernization is equivalent to Block 50/52. Modernization work was carried out on F-16A/B fighter aircraft to improve their specifications.

F-16AM (Block 20 MLU) fighter jets were able to use radar-guided air-to-air missiles and generally received improved specifications.

F-16AM (Block 20 MLU) of the Portuguese Air Force. Photo from open sources

In particular, the reliability, serviceability, and maintainability of the aircraft have been improved. The aircraft with this set of updates are designated F-16AM or F-16BM.

As previously reported, the Ukrainian pilots of the classes of 2023 and 2016 flew to the UK and Sweden.