According to the diplomatic sources of the Politico publication, the discussion about providing Western fighter jets to Ukraine in the future has already begun.
This is stated in the material of Politico dated January 26.
Conversations with more than a dozen Western officials - diplomats and military - show that the internal discussion about planes for Ukraine has already begun; the issue is actively lobbied by Ukraine itself and the Baltic states. One of the interlocutors from the countries of Northern Europe also noted that fighters "would be a natural next step" after the Allies decided to provide tanks.
The debate is expected to be even more difficult than the one surrounding the tanks, due to fears of escalation.
According to one of the interlocutors, in Washington they say that fighter jets are currently "out of the question." "This is a red line. But last summer, the "red line" was HIMARS, but in the end it moved. Then it was tanks - and it moved," he noted.
Another interlocutor from Europe drew attention to the speed with which decisions regarding heavier weapons have recently begun to be made. In his opinion, although right now the idea of providing Ukraine with fighter jets seems impossible, after some time they can start talking about it quite seriously.
It is believed that aviation will be the focus of attention at the next meeting of the Contact Group on Defense of Ukraine (Ramstein format), which is scheduled for February. According to the interlocutors of the publication, it may be about some tentative plan in case Ukraine is in critical need of planes at a certain moment.
It will be recalled that the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, Wopke Hoekstra, said last week that the Netherlands "has no taboo" about discussing the request for the F-16, if it came from Ukraine, and the Slovak government directly talked about plans to give Soviet MiG-29s to Ukraine.
At the same time, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz categorically rules out the idea of providing Ukraine with military aircraft.
European capitals already believe that the war can last another 3-5 years or even longer, and that the West has almost reached the limit when it can provide Ukraine with some types of weapons without provoking Russia to a radical escalation. In addition, there are fears that in the event of this escalation, public support for aid to Ukraine within Western countries would be shaken.
According to one of the European diplomats, the newspaper writes, as early as 2022, the Western allies agreed to start giving Ukraine more serious support with weapons in stages and to assess the situation each time - otherwise they would "provoke a harsh reaction from Russia", up to the use of nuclear weapons. "You can call it a 'getting used to (Putin) process,'" the interlocutor notes. Therefore, a year after the first ATGMs, a decision has already been made about tanks. In his opinion, about fighters, "the only question is when."
Interlocutors of the publication in Europe agree that the West first wants to exhaust everything except fighter jets, types of assistance that have not yet been provided and will be useful - like strike drones and longer-range missiles.
But there are signs that the USA is already preparing to provide aircraft to Ukraine in the future - yes, in the summer the House of Representatives approved a $100 million project for the training of Ukrainian pilots, and in October a message was received from Ukraine that a group of pilots had already been selected to master Western fighter jets.
Mastering Western fighter jets will also be a challenge for Ukraine for logistical reasons, from technical features and maintenance to the fact that they require long runways, and it would be relatively easy for Russia to spot the deployment of adapted bases and strike them. Among the experts, there are opinions that Ukraine would be more suited to F-18 or Gripen - but there are quite a few of them.