Russia-Ukraine War (Threadbanned in op)

The F-16 is over 50 years old.

I think people need to calm the expectations.

Ukraine gets 50 year old equipment, when they deserve and need modern day equipment.

Are they getting 50 year old with 50 year old weapons and sensors?

Or more modern versions of an airfrane that first went into service 50 years ago?

It is in use by many air forces around the world. It is modern.

It is not latest / cutting edge but it is not obsolete either.

The basic design may be fifty years old, but the sensor suites and electronics on these aircraft aren’t. All of the Dutch, Norwegian and Danish aircraft were upgraded in the early 2000s to bring them up to the same standard as the new build F-16s rolling off the assembly line at the time. This means upgraded engines, a vastly upgraded cockpit, new onboard computers, a vastly superior radar, compatibility with weapons such as the AIM-120 AMRAAM as well as the latest generation of AIM-9 Sidewinder, data link capability, and so on. Make no mistake, these aircraft are very potent weapons systems,

Besides, the F-16 has something that the ex-soviet aircraft currently in use by Ukraine don’t: A well-established logistics supply chain. Over 4500 aircraft of the type were built, and around 2100 of those are still in service. And the aircraft is still in production. Not bad for a fifty year old design!

The Falcon is still being improved on as is the B-52(1952). Air frames like the F-16 are perfect for the Ukraine theatre because the russians are using cold war materiel. The people will be clapping their hands soon skin.

It is known

D these Russian soldiers not see Russian bodies strewn on the ground as they approach the front lines;, vehicles bombed /burned; injured / the dead being returned from the front lines. So they MUST HAVE SOME IDEA AS TO WHATS IN STORE FOR THEM

Whilst I agree with you on the fact that it won't be a wonder weapon, these aircraft will provide quite a bit of additional capability to the UkrAF, rather than just plugging gaps in their current inventory. The F-16 is a true multirole aircraft and while, as has been mentioned before in this thread and its predecessor, the first operational missions will be flying CAP and intercept missions, I firmly expect the mission envelope to expand quite considerably once Ukraine have two or three squadrons worth of aircraft at their disposal.

I'm also not quite sure whether Russia will be able to respond quite as easily to this new capability as they would to changes on the ground. Russia has shown considerable reluctance when it comes to using air power in this war, mostly lobbing air-launched ballistic and cruise missiles at Ukraine from launch positions that aren't even in the same time zone. Their tactical aviation units seem to be limited to flying extremely close air support, even with air superiority aircraft like the Flanker series, and as far as I know, Russia never revived the USSR's DACT (Dissimilar Air Combat Training) program.

Nice,

Just read this … then go over your statement again

https://www.csis.org/analysis/f-16s-unleashed-how-they-will-impact-ukraines-war

50 years is 1970's. ruSSia is fighting with tech from late 1940's

Interesting social media post I came across purportedly from New Zealander living in Russia - in response to Putin having to double the bonus for new volunteers (up to 400,000 rub)

"I've been posting this a lot lately, but here's some of my thoughts about this as a Russian from Petersburg.

Firstly, it's a common meme that they don't actually pay these bonuses at all, but probably this is being confused with the death bonus to families. It's true that they routinely evade this death payment by simply not marking the soldier as dead but "missing". However, from what I've heard and can understand, there's no reason to think that these sign-up bonuses don't get paid. At least I've heard various stories about these payments being used to buy whole apartments in poorer regions, and I know one family whose son signed up and they got the full payment pretty quickly. Also, there are many reasons why people don't want to sign up (which I'll get into shortly), but if they were refusing to pay after signing, I would expect everyone to know about it and spread the word. I haven't seen any such complaints though.

The thing is - they are desperate. They want people to know that these guys actually get paid the bonus, because they absolutely need as many as possible. You walk down the street here and every second billboard is an advertisement for the contract, or what other "benefits" you get from signing up. Now you can even earn a hundred thousand roubles if you successfully persuade someone to sign a contract. And yet, every night there are young uneducated and poor guys in the streets, drinking alcohol and asking for money for beer or cigarettes. There are still tons of young military age guys working for atrocious pay at McDonald's or cleaning streets. None of them want to go, even with this life-changing money, because everyone knows now that Ukraine is hell, and people don't last long enough to enjoy it. And not like their political views changed.

You don't even see Z-patriots or Z flags any more. The people who talked enthusiastically about the war two years ago are silent, and if it comes up in conversation, they dismiss it and move on. Of course, being Petersburg, there was never much Z-patriotism here like there was elsewhere. Still, it's clear that popular support for the war has plummeted, and now people are just burying their heads six feet in the sand and hoping the storm will pass without raining on them.

Another thing I've seen people talking more and more about is the fear that, because the carrot isn't working, Putin is going to start using the stick, and specifically there is increasing annoyance that all these Rosgvardiya, OMON, police, FSO, FSB, etc (all millions of them) are still sitting on their asses in the city centre, smoking and laughing with each other. There will be such a huge backlash if they start conscription massive amounts of regular people while these goons and cosmonauts get to be layabouts. Not that I'm saying this backlash will amount to any sort of popular uprising of course, but there are other ways this kind of sentiment can have consequences for Putin, and you can see this in how hard the Kremlin has worked to isolate regular people from the negative effects of the war, and tried to make everything seem normal.

But if Harris wins in November, Putin is going to face a grim dilemma. We're only two years into this and Russia has lost half a million working age men. If this rate keeps up, we're looking at 1.5m by the end of Harris's term in 2028, and if she wins, it's not unlikely she'll get a second term either. If she wins in November, I think Putin will have no choice but to do a full general mobilization including Moscow and Petersburg and try to go all in, because he won't be able to outlast her to 2028. He will have to go big, or go to the dacha.

Just my two kopecks. There are so many variables that it's very hard to make serious predictions about what will happen. There are a lot of warning signs on the horizon for Russia though, and things aren't going to get better."

I’m happy reading that and admitting I’m very wrong.

We'll not know for sure until the war is over but wouldn't it be fantastic if Ukraine aren't actually losing many soldiers, Russia eventually get worn down and Ukraine go on the attack. Could take 2 years to reach this point. I've no doubt if Ukraine can stop the aerial glide bombs Russia are fucked in terms of damaging the Ukrainians. They are currently a huge asset and most of Ukrainians losses are probably to these.

Slightly off topic but very well said.

The ukrainians were brought up in the Russian military. They know the strengths and weaknesses of the Russian army. They know how to defeat the Russian army. They wouldn't have fought back if they didn't think they had them. It was the hesitancy of supply of arms to Ukraine that slowed progress/defence and or maybe the US used some stone cold Artificial Intelligence and asked what strategy would be best to bring regime change to Russia and get Ukraine their country back without fsb going allah akbar around the world in terrorist attacks.

On the drones. It's a new age of warfare. Facial recognition, heat infrared camera technology, number plate ID, autonomous flying and positioning and targeting. And now drone manufacturing getting cheaper all the time.