The ‘hunting coalition’ F-16 to help Ukraine stop Russian aggression take off with extreme caution in the European Union. During the G7 meeting held this weekend in Japan, the US president, Joe Bidengave the green light to a joint allied program to train Ukrainian pilots in handling these American-made fighter planes. However, the participating countries keep maximum discretion about figures or deadlines to complete the training or deliver the devices for fear of provoking a new escalation by the Kremlin.
Biden’s change of position marks a clear diplomatic victory for the Ukrainian president, Volodimir Zelensky, who has been asking the allies for months to send F-16 fighters and traveled in person to Japan. “I welcome the historic decision of the United States and its president to support an international coalition of fighter jets. That will greatly improve our army in the sky.Zelensky maintains.
The head of diplomacy of the European Union, Josep Borrell, argues that the ‘hunting coalition is a “good initiative.” “It’s a good thing that came out of the G7, that they finally decided prepare the ground for providing Ukraine with the fighter jets it needs. I think the training of the pilots has already started. This is the first thing to do and I hope that soon we will be able to provide Ukraine with these types of weapons,” Borrell said during the meeting of EU foreign ministers held this Monday in Brussels.
[El G7 redobla su apoyo a Ucrania y mantiene las advertencias que hizo sobre China en 2022]
The High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy has called for step up military support for Ukraine, in particular in ammunition and air defense systems. “Every day of delay in our shipments is measured in human lives. It is not a question of money but of dead and wounded people and soldiers. I call on all ministers to speed up deliveries and to participate in joint purchases of ammunition for Ukraine,” Borrell claims. The EU has completed its goal of training 15,000 Ukrainian soldiers and is committed to training another 15,000 by the end of the year.
At the meeting in Brussels, there was also talk of ending the war and the Twenty-seven reiterated their full support for Zelenski’s peace plan. “Everyone wants the war to end. The only one who seems willing to continue the war is Putin. No one wants peace more than Ukraine and that is why we support the president’s initiative for a just peace. Nobody who is really interested in peace can put the victim and the aggressor on the same level,” said the head of European diplomacy.
“France is ready, with other European partners and other allies, to participate in the training of Ukrainian pilots. That takes a certain number of months, so we must do things step by step. Right now, Ukraine’s needs are essentially ammunition needs, armored vehicles, tanks and maintenance, and we are supplying this,” says the French Foreign Minister, Catherine Colonna.
Does that mean that the delivery of F-16 fighters to Ukraine is a long-term plan? “In any case, it takes several months to train the pilots and then make decisions that have not been taken at this time. Nothing is excluded, there are no taboos, but we are in a phase of coordinated training between European partners and allies,” the head of French diplomacy replied.
[El plan (¿fallido?) de Berlín para desactivar el “chantaje” de Hungría en la guerra de Ucrania]
How many Ukrainian pilots will be trained? In which countries will the training take place? “Our intention is to do it sooner rather than later. But I am not going to go into the details or mention a specific number of days or weeks or months because I do not think it will help” in the internal discussion in the EU and in NATO, explained the Dutch Foreign Minister, Wopke Hoekstra.
“We have made the decision to train pilots so that if we decide to send combat aircraft, they are already prepared. But that is a separate decision that we are not discussing today,” he said. The training of pilots and the dispatch of fighters “it is certainly something that no country (and certainly not the Netherlands) can decide on its own“. “This requires coalitions, this requires taking into account the concerns for any aspect of all allies,” Hoekstra insisted.
For his part, the head of Spanish diplomacy, Jose Manuel Albares, maintains that the supply of ammunition and other war material is “fundamental for Ukraine to be able to defend its sovereignty, its territorial integrity, defenseless civilians.” “Everything the EU does has a single objective, which is for peace to return to Ukraine and therefore to Europe as soon as possible. Neither the EU, nor any EU country, nor of course the Government of Spain would have wanted to that this war began. And if it were up to us, it would end today,” he insisted.
The foreign ministers of the 27 have also discussed the eleventh package of sanctions against Russia, which focuses on measures to prevent circumvention; as well as the release of a new tranche of 500 million from the European Peace Support Fund to finance the delivery of arms to kyiv. But there has been no agreement on either of the two issues, mainly due to Hungary’s veto once again.
Your Foreign Minister, Peter Szijjárto, has reiterated that Budapest will oppose the new tranche of 500 million until the Hungarian bank OTP is removed from Ukraine’s list of sponsors of the war. Szijjártó has told his partners that he is against sanctioning Chinese companies that collaborate in the circumvention of sanctions against Moscow (as it appears in the Brussels proposal) and that he will not agree to penalize the Russian nuclear industry either (something that is not yet over). table). Borrell still hopes to be able to overcome the obstacles in Hungary through dialogue.