Russian experts reassure: “NATO fighters will not arrive soon. They are of little use to the Armed Forces of Ukraine.”
At the moment, NATO countries are considering sending fighter jets to Ukraine more as a long-term goal.
According to a PolitNavigator correspondent , industry experts have come to this conclusion .
According to analyst, Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC), military observer Alexander Ermakov.
“In fact, the primary goal of discussions around fighter jets is to achieve an informational result among our own and the international Twitter public.” And she is not interested in the continuation of supplies of ammunition and artillery systems (the supply of which is being depleted), which is more useful for the Armed Forces of Ukraine, or at least armored vehicles, but in the so-called new levels of assistance,” the expert told Izvestia.
He believes that such activity includes the British initiative to begin training Ukrainian pilots.
“Many people praise the British for leading this trend. However, in reality, they are preparing Ukrainian pilots for the future, for the time after the conflict,” Ermakov added.
Vasily Klimov, a junior researcher at the Center for International Security at IMEMO RAS, agrees with this opinion.
“If the supply of combat aircraft to Ukraine is discussed, it will be in limited quantities and rather as a long-term goal in case of aggravation at the front,” says the expert.
He predicts that in this case there will be an escalation and expansion of the geography of the conflict.
“At the same time, the North Atlantic Alliance is still not interested in direct confrontation with Russia, and the elaboration of various scenarios is standard actions for a structure of this kind,” Klimov believes.
At the same time, Ermakov reassures that the possible supply of fighters will not give the Ukrainian Armed Forces any special advantages.
“The main problem with aviation is that in addition to aircraft, it requires a large staff of trained ground personnel, spare parts, consumables, infrastructure and weapons. While the practical “exhaust” from this is small, the RIAC analyst added.
According to him, a small number of aircraft will not be useful due to the high saturation of the theater of military operations with air defense systems.
“Decisive action requires a large number of fighters and a readiness for large losses,” Ermakov concluded.
Note that previously many experts argued that the West would not supply Ukraine with MLRS. After the Armed Forces of Ukraine received the Highmars, they began to say that these systems did not pose a particular threat, but in reality they caused serious damage to the Russian Armed Forces.
In addition, many experts did not believe in the supply of Western tanks to Ukraine, a final decision on which had already been made.