The West will probably still supply Ukraine with F-16 fighters, but there will be no one to fly them, as the training of pilots has been delayed. German portal T-Online reports that the US training centre is overloaded and there are not enough places for Ukrainian pilots to train. The situation is no better in Denmark and Romania. Thus, only every third fighter jet delivered by the West will get a pilot.
Ukraine is to receive 60 F-16 fighter jets in the near future, but Kiev is facing a problem. “Western allies have promised 60 aircraft, but only 15 to 20 pilots have been trained so far,” German news portal T-Online reported. The US bears responsibility for this development. “The training centre in Tuscon, USA, has reached the limit of its capacity” as it has to train pilots for the F-16 for several countries at once.
Erin Hannigan, public affairs liaison for the US National Guard, confirmed that the 162nd Squadron can train 30 foreign pilots each year. Increasing that number is “impossible,” she said. “The question now arises: did the US know how many pilots it could actually train when it promised the training capacity?” the German portal asks.
T-Online points out that added to this is the fact that Romania and Denmark also “cannot accept more pilots in their programme”. Moreover, Denmark is even closing its F-16 pilot training programme as it is switching to the F-35. Citing the Ukrainian press, T-Online writes that it is the problems with the lack of places in F-16 pilot training programmes that may be behind the “deal with France” to supply Mirage-2000 fighters.
