- Russia said on Monday that it would treat F-16s in Ukraine as an escalation because they are nuclear-capable.
- The Foreign Ministry said it considered the jet’s handover a “deliberate provocation.”
- Meanwhile, the fighter jets already in use by Ukraine are technically capable of deploying nuclear weapons.
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Russia on Monday warned against the expected arrival of F-16s in Ukraine, saying the US fighter jets would be treated as an escalation given their potential as nuclear weapons platforms.
“No matter what modifications are made to the aircraft, we treat them as nuclear-capable and consider this move by the United States and NATO to be a deliberate provocation,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement. . According to state media Sputnik.
The ministry accused the North Atlantic Treaty Organization of bringing the war in Ukraine closer to “the point of reaching ‘critical mass’ and exploding.”
Ukraine is expected to soon receive the first F-16s promised by the NATO member state. Belgium, Denmark, Norway and the Netherlands have committed to deploying dozens of F-16s to Kiev, and Ukrainian pilots are training to use the planes.
Meanwhile, Russia has argued for months that the delivery of the F-16s was a provocation from NATO because the F-16s can carry nuclear weapons.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov: “If they don’t understand this, they are worthless as military strategists and planners.” said in June.
However, some Soviet fighter jets used by Ukraine (such as the Su-24 and MiG-29) can already be modified to carry nuclear weapons, so only the F-16 is capable of carrying out a nuclear attack against Russia. It’s unclear whether it will make much of a difference.
The capabilities of the Su-24 in this regard were even cited by Russia’s ally Belarus. Announced in August 2022 The country’s military claimed it had tweaked the Su-24 to carry tactical nuclear weapons. The Minsk government said it was ready to deploy weapons to counter Western threats.
Although Soviet military aircraft such as the Su-24 were not theoretically designed to carry Western-supplied nuclear payloads, Kiev and its NATO allies have long been able to modify their fighters for Western weapons. did it.
Ukraine’s Su-24s can now fire Britain’s Stormshadow missiles, but it is not immediately clear whether this success can be replicated with nuclear weapons.
In any case, Ukraine abandoned its nuclear weapons upon independence in 1994 and does not possess any nuclear weapons. Subject to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.
Russia has regularly threatened to use tactical nuclear weapons if it feels the West has crossed certain red lines, but this has been criticized as a bluff.
The F-16s are being hailed as a significant upgrade to Kiev’s Soviet-era fleet, with longer range, better weapons performance and other improvements such as maneuverability. It is also more aligned with much of the U.S. equipment Ukraine has received, such as high-speed anti-radiation missiles aimed at ground targets.
But observers aren’t sure how much the F-16 will change the course of the conflict in a war where neither Kiev nor Moscow has achieved air superiority.
Russia has fielded advanced air defense systems like the S-400, some of which are more sophisticated and effective than the threats faced by the F-16 in previous war zones, Business Insider’s Jake Epstein says. Reported.
“There are countless ways to detect these F-16s,” Bryn Tannehill, a defense analyst and former U.S. naval aviator, told Epstein.