France has promised an unspecified number of Mirage 2000-5s during the first quarter of 2025. Thursday in Oslo, the Minister of the Armed Forces, Sébastien Lecornu, assured that “the calendar, such as[il l’avait] noted, [était] held ». However, he did not want to comment on information from specialist sites according to which three devices should be supplied before January 20. “The delivery of fighter planes to a country at war, by definition, is something sensitive (…). What was promised will be delivered”he clarified.
Norway, for its part, promised six F-16s, delivery spread over 2024 and 2025. While confirming that“a first batch” of F-16 had already been delivered, his Norwegian counterpart, Bjorn Arild Gram, refused to enter “in operational details”. “But we are on schedule”he also assured. Denmark had announced that the next delivery of F-16 fighter planes to Ukraine would take place before the end of the year. At the beginning of August, the Danish defense minister confirmed that Ukraine had received the first plane.
The Ukrainian president announced at the beginning of August that his country had received its first F-16 fighter planes, while emphasizing that their number was “insufficient”. A total of 95 aircraft have been promised to kyiv by its allies by 2028: 30 from Belgium, 24 from the Netherlands, 22 from Norway and 19 from Denmark. Sweden also committed, at the end of May, to sending an Awacs-type aircraft, essential for the acquisition of intelligence and the coordination of possible operations with F-16s.
According to Jean-Christophe Noël, associate researcher at the French Institute of International Relations and former fighter pilot, American-made F-16s could allow Ukraine to“attack the Russian fortress”.
