France is considering sending fighters to Ukraine
A French government official confirmed that some Eastern European countries and Denmark are also possible candidates for supplying fighters to Ukraine, while a Ukrainian Air Force spokesman said the transfer of Rafale advanced multi-role fighters it is on the table.
Speaking today, Thomas Gassilloud, chairman of the National Assembly's Committee for National Defense and Armed Forces, said the French government could agree to supply Ukraine with the fighter jets it so badly wants.
“As regards [fighter] deliveries to Ukraine, we have to study the requests on a case-by-case basis and leave all doors open,” Gassilloud said, after talks in London with British counterparts, including the British defense minister Ben Wallace.
Gassilloud added that the French government has set certain conditions for a transfer of this type, first of all the judgment that the jets do not constitute a risk of escalation of the war such as to bring Russia into conflict with NATO.
France would like to ensure that the donated jets do not compromise French or European security and for this reason it is considering drawing on stocks of jets already decommissioned and placed in reserve, or close to being. They would therefore probably be the older Mirage 2000s, rather than the more modern Rafales that someone has been talking about. Obviously not the N version which is used for nuclear deterrence.
France is aware of the difficulties involved in training Ukrainian Air Force pilots to fly a new type of aircraft and the maintenance workers needed to support them, according to an article in the British newspaper The Daily Telegraph. Apparently, the French believe that 10 technicians would be needed to keep each jet in service, much less than American fighter jets, which require 25 operators.
“We will see in the coming weeks what happens, because things are moving fast,” Gassilloud said. "The Danes and Eastern European countries are thinking about it." Denmark is reducing its fleet of F-16s, so it could potentially provide a ready source of these jets. Eastern European countries not named may also be referring to F-16 operators, although revisiting previous plans to relocate Soviet-era MiG-29s from Poland, Bulgaria and/or Slovakia may be a more realistic scenario.
Last week, the Netherlands, another NATO F-16 operator set to retire its Vipers, announced it would review any requests to transfer its aircraft to Ukraine with an "open mind," before backing off. the statement, as you can read here. In this case it would be dozens of hunts.
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This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/la-francia-sta-valutando-di-mandare-i-caccia-in-ucraina/ on Sat, 28 Jan 2023 17:34:03 +0000.