The government of Poland is going to become the first allied country to cede fighters to Ukraine. This was confirmed this Thursday by the President of Poland, Andrzej Dudaduring a joint press appearance with his Czech counterpart, Petr Pavel, another of the toughest voices in Eastern Europe against the Russian invasion of Ukraine. A transfer that has been agreed and coordinated with the group of donors of the I’LL TAKE and other allied countries.
“In the next few days we will deliver four aircraft to Ukraine fully operational. The remaining aircraft are being repaired and prepared. Is about MiG-29, which are still active aircraft in the air defense of our country (…) We still have a dozen of them. We took them in the early 90s from the GDR (German Democratic Republic) Army. These are its last operational years according to its technical capabilities,” he added.
Without mentioning at any time the exact unit of fighters that will be sent to Ukraine, since the real figure would be close to double the pack bought from the GDR mentioned by Andrzej Duda, that is, something more than twentyaccording to the local newspaper Republichas stressed that the transfer of these aircraft occurs earlier than initially planned due to Ukrainian needs, since they have not yet received the purchased fighters that must replace them.
The President of Poland has explained that these twenty fighters ceded to Ukraine will be replaced in the coming months both by fighters United States F-35 -the most modern fifth-generation combat aircraft today- as per small fighters South Korean-made FA-50whose units will be the first to be received by the Polish Air Force.
The delivery of these Mig29 fighters to Poland is very important because could be used with good skill by Ukrainian pilots immediatelysince this type of fighters have been and are still in service with the Ukrainian Air Force. The Ukrainians have asked the West for F-16 fighters, much more modern than the Mig29, but which would require a retraining of their pilots for at least six months to be relatively usable.
The Polish decision to send fighters to Ukraine does not move, for the moment, one iota the refusal of USA to deliver F-16 fighters to the Government of Ukraine. This was confirmed by the spokesman for the National Security Council, John Kirby, when asked by American journalists upon learning of the Polish president’s announcement. “This does not change our decision regarding the F-16s.“, has said.
