The United States has changed its program to train Ukrainian pilots to fly F-16 fighter jets, adding "younger cadets" with no prior flight experience, the Wall Street Journal has cited unnamed officials as saying.
"It is a mix. Some have been experienced pilots, and we still are receiving more experienced pilots. But there’s also those that do not have that kind of pilot training and experience," one of the officials said
The decision to refocus the training on the cadets rather than experienced air force members may extend the timeline in when the Kiev regime could start to operate a full squadron of F-16s on the battlefield "by many months," according to the sources.
They argued that even before the decision was taken, Ukraine would hardly have 20 F-16s and 40 pilots to operate them until spring or summer next year at the earliest.
The insiders also said that the move to change the training program is the result of a lack of experienced Ukrainian pilots "with requisite English-language abilities who can be spared from the battlefield."
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov earlier warned the United States and its NATO allies that Moscow perceives the presence of nuclear-capable F-16s in Ukraine as a nuclear threat.
Russia's President Vladimir Putin in turn emphasized that Ukraine's Western-supplied F-16 jets would not have the power to alter the situation on the battlefield. He warned that if these fighter jets are deployed from the territory of third countries, they will be considered legitimate targets for Russian forces. The president further stated that the F-16s, just like other Western equipment delivered to Kiev, would be destroyed.