41 Australian F 18 Hornets could be donated to Ukraine
Australia, the United States and Ukraine are discussing sending 41 Royal Australian Air Force F/A-18 Hornets to Kiev to meet part of President Volodymyr Zelensky's fighter jet request, instead of sending them for scrap as expected.
Sources told The Australian Financial Review that the United States, which recently gave permission to other Western allies to supply Ukraine with advanced fighter jets, including US-made F-16s, is open to the idea. to give F/A-18s to Ukraine..
Washington's approval is needed because it owns the intellectual property of the jets that have been retired from the RAAF and will be replaced by the F-35, of which Australia has ordered 72 examples.
The retired F/A-18s are in a hangar at RAAF Williamtown, just outside Newcastle, and if they are not sent to Ukraine, they will either be scrapped or sold to a private aviation company, RAVN Aerospace, for use in the United States as "enemies" against which to train military aviators.
Robert Potter, an Australian security expert advising the Ukrainian government, confirmed that negotiations are underway, but a specific deal has yet to be finalised. “However, the United States and Ukraine have an active and specific interest in procuring fourth-generation fighter jets for the Ukrainian Air Force,” he said.
“Australia has a large stockpile of retired aircraft that would otherwise be destined for destruction.
"There are several formal approvals needed to finalize the purchase of these planes, but it's probably an idea that came at the right time."
Another source close to the Canberra government agreed there was no point in destroying perfectly viable planes which he said could be operational within four months and used to help repel the Russian invasion.
While a handful of aircraft would only be useful for cannibalizing parts, most would require little labor to bring back to flying condition and still have a few years of useful life left. The Australian Hornets are in good condition because they have not operated at sea like those of the US Navy.
Obviously Ukrainian pilots and ground personnel would have to be trained on the new western fighter, which would take months.
The F/A 18s were designed in the 1970s as a side-by-side successor to the F 14 Tomcat, but starting from a much lighter platform. Reaches Mach 1.8. The range in combat situations is 740 km and 1,480 units were produced. They are still used by the US Marines, Spain and Finland, so there would be other trainers available as well.
We'll see if the discussion ends positively.
Thanks to our Telegram channel you can stay updated on the publication of new articles from Economic Scenarios.
Article 41 F 18 Australian Hornets could be donated to Ukraine comes from Scenarios Economics .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/41-f-18-hornet-australiani-potrebbero-essere-donati-allucraina/ on Tue, 06 Jun 2023 16:46:21 +0000.