Two Ukrainian pilots arrive in US to train on F-16 fighter jet simulators

This was reported by NBC, citing two members of Congress and a senior US official.

Two Ukrainian pilots are currently in the United States to assess their skills: American colleagues are trying to determine how long it might take to teach them to fly attack aircraft, including F-16 fighters.

According to officials, the Ukrainians' skills are being evaluated on simulators at a US military base in Tucson, Arizona, and 10 more colleagues may soon join them this month. They also said that the program is twofold: to improve the pilots' skills and to assess how long a proper training program might take.

“The program is about assessing their abilities as pilots so we can better advise them on how to use the capabilities they have and we have given them,” an administration official said. Journalists also claimed that such training marks the first such case.

Two administration officials emphasized that this was not a training program and said that Ukrainians would not be flying aircraft while in the United States.

Spokesman Colin Kahl told the House Armed Services Committee that the United States has not made a decision to provide F-16s.

He also said that the United States has not started training on the F-16 and that the timeline for delivery is essentially the same as the training schedule, about 18 months.

“So you don’t actually save yourself time by starting the training early in our assessment,” said Kahl, who is the under secretary of defense for policy. “And since we haven’t made the decision to provide F-16’s and neither have our allies and partners, it doesn’t make sense to start to train them on a system they may never get.” 

Other US defense officials have said that training could be reduced to six to nine months, depending on the pilots' prior training and knowledge of the fighter jets.

• Amid new appeals to Western countries to provide fighter jets, Slovakia is considering providing Ukraine with 10 of its 11 MiG-29 aircraft.

• On March 3, Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov said that partner countries would provide Ukraine with several types of fighter jets: one of them will be the main aircraft of the Ukrainian Armed Forces.