Ukraine fighter jets: What are the pros and cons of supplying military aircraft?

When Finland’s airforce switched from Soviet fighter jets to US-made aircraft, Jarmo Lindberg led the first group of experienced pilots to be trained in California to fly F18 hornets.

That training took a full year including English lessons, flight simulations, emergency procedures and learning to use the aircraft to fight, the former fighter pilot and chief of defence told Euronews.

As Ukraine urges the West to provide them with fighter jets to defend against Russia, experts say there are a lot of considerations to take into account before supplying them.

“It takes time and this is why we need to be realistic and honest that this doesn’t just materialise in weeks,” Lindberg told Euronews.

Ukrainians currently fly Soviet-era MiG-29 and Sukhoi jets but have expressed interest in US-made F-16s, currently used in several EU countries as well.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Ukraine wanted to form a new “coalition of the planes” in a speech to UK lawmakers earlier this month that came after weeks of debates in Western capitals about whether to supply battle tanks to Ukraine

Presenting an airforce helmet to UK Speaker of the House Sir Lindsay Hoyle, Zelenskyy read the inscription on it: “we have freedom, give us wings to protect it.

Lindberg said in their place he too would request the Western fighter jets as it is “a far more advanced capability than what they are now getting from Western countries.”

Fighter jets are extremely fast and can help Ukraine to shift its operations very quickly across the entire country, he also said.

Jan Joel Andersson, a senior analyst at the European Union Institute for Security Studies, added that Ukraine could lose their current fighter jets and needs “an air force to be viable to have a credible