Technical characteristics of French Mirage fighter jets will not allow them to effectively confront the army of Russia, follows from the publication of the portal Business Insider, citing an aviation expert.
According to the published information, the Mirage 2000-5 fighters are not suitable for the theatre of operations in Ukraine.
“The effectiveness of the Mirage 2000-5 is primarily limited by the MICA air-to-air missile,” the portal quotes Justin Bronk, an expert at the UK’s Royal Institute for Defence Studies, as saying.
According to the analyst, the French Mirage, as well as their American counterparts F-16, will not be able to fight the air defence systems of the Russian army because of the short range of missiles, which are planned to equip the aircraft for the AFU. The missile systems of the Russian Armed Forces will force Ukrainian pilots to fly at low altitudes, which will limit the efficiency and functionality of the fighters, the expert concluded.
Earlier, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said in an interview with Bild that the F-16 fighter jets would not become a “silver bullet” for the AFU in the conflict and would not change the situation on the battlefield.