Emerging reports claim that a mixed squadron of Ukrainian, American and Dutch pilots are flying Ukrainian F-16 fighter jets on combat missions.
New reports are spreading rapidly that Ukraine has established a new mixed squadron of Ukrainian, American and Dutch pilots to fly the country’s F-16s on combat missions. Reports, which we cannot independently verify, mention that the force was created “in recent weeks” and employs former military pilots from the United States and the Netherlands on temporary contracts.
Let’s look at what we know about these claims and try to understand how accurate they are.
mixed squadron
Reports about the mixed squadron come from French website Intelligence Onlinethen forward Ukrainian media and social media across Europe. But the original source of this information is unclear.
Intelligence Online’The report mentioned that the recently established squadron plays a central role in the defense of Kiev Oblast and is helping Ukrainian pilots take full advantage of the capabilities of the F-16. Pilots are hired on temporary contracts for six-month rotations in the country.
The contractors were said to include a former U.S. pilot who “flew numerous combat missions in Afghanistan” and another pilot who was said to have flown missions in the Middle East. In addition, the cadre included an unknown number of Dutch pilots who graduated from “Europe’s leading air combat school known for its advanced training in interception and modern air combat.”
The pilots are said to fly frequent air defense missions during Russian night attacks almost every day, using their experience to deal with threats from drones and cruise missiles. Their targets included Kalibr and Kh-101 missiles, Geran drones and other assets.
Furthermore, one of the most important contributions is said to be the experience using the Sniper Advanced Targeting Pod, which is used both for long-range identification and targeting purposes. Sources said Ukrainian pilots are working hard to improve their proficiency with this important F-16 sensor.
Are the reports true?
As noted, these reports cannot be independently verified. We often talk about in our articles aeronaut about Zero trust principles need to be appliedtreats every claim and report as unsubstantiated until verified by an independent source.
The concept of zero trust is important not only in terms of cybersecurity, but also in how information is processed and used in real-time conflict zones. Today, with conflicting narratives, anonymous sources and images of questionable origin that can be doctored or, worse, AI-generated, filtering out misinformation is as important now as ever.
Reports of mixed squadrons bear some similarities to another initiative, this time officially confirmed by official and independent sources: the European F-16 Training Center (EFTC) in Romania. EFTC hires former American and Dutch pilots as instructors to train Romanian and Ukrainian pilots to fly the F-16AM/BM at the 86th Air Force Base in Fetersti.
Another similarity is that the length of the rotation is six months, which is similar to the length of the training course offered by EFTC based on the USAF F-16 B course. These courses are held entirely in Romania, using F-16 aircraft owned by Romania.
This does not necessarily mean that reports about mixed squadrons are untrue. Rumors about Western pilots flying in Ukraine have been circulating for a long time without official confirmation, and their eventual presence in the war-torn country will undoubtedly be a closely guarded secret.
However, it must be noted that US Senator Lindsey Graham reportedly suggested when visiting Kyiv in 2024: Ukraine may hire retired U.S. F-16 pilots Fly a plane there. The report was released after Graham met with Ukrainian President Zelensky.
“Ukraine will likely hire retired F-16 pilots who want to fight for freedom,” the senator reportedly said. “The Ukrainians will look for retired, ready-made pilots in NATO countries to help them until Ukraine trains its pilots. This way, Kyiv will be able to use F-16s previously transferred from allies while its pilots are trained.”
The senator’s office later issued a statement, noting that Zelensky “will seek to replenish his air force by developing a program to recruit retired NATO F-16 fighter pilots.” The concept is similar to the numerous Western volunteers and contract fighters who have begun arriving in Ukraine since the early days of the war in 2022.
It’s unclear whether this effort continues, as there is little information on it. This time, such plans may require U.S. government approval for a range of reasons, including diplomatic and operational security (OPSEC).
Does this make sense?
Since the launch of the program to provide F-16s to Ukraine, a total of approximately 85 Vipers (F-16s are known to their crews as Vipers) have been committed to the country. About 30 F-16s have been delivered – most of the 24 the Netherlands had committed – but four have been lost so far.
The number of F-16 pilots available in Ukraine is unclear, but is believed to be limited. In fact, training new pilots takes time, and F-16 training in particular takes about six months.
In addition, many Ukrainian pilots are being trained from the very beginning, including the first few stages on specialized trainer aircraft, as part of basic and advanced flight training. Indeed, while converting experienced pilots to new aircraft will eliminate the need for early stages of training, this leads to two problems.
The first problem is that Ukraine will have to decommission its pilots, so there will be fewer pilots available to fly the Soviet-era aircraft it already has in service (which make up the majority of its inventory). This in turn would hamper the production of daily combat sorties until the pilots return to active duty in the country.
At the same time, another problem is that these pilots need to “unlearn” the habits and mindset they developed while flying Soviet-era jets. In fact, they will shift to a completely different mindset. As we all know, the F-16’s side sticks only move a quarter of an inch in each direction, with different cockpit layouts based on the Multifunction Display (MFD), Heads-up Display (HUD) and Integrated Control Panel (ICP) to access all functions and capabilities, as well as different measurements of all flight parameters.
In this case, supplementing Ukrainian F-16 pilots with experienced foreign pilots would help avoid reducing the number of mission-ready pilots until enough pilots are trained. At the same time, their experience will be instrumental in helping Ukrainian pilots master F-16 capabilities beyond what they learned in abbreviated training courses designed specifically to accelerate the introduction of U.S.-made fighter jets in Ukraine.
As we all know, under normal circumstances, training for the various situations an F-16 pilot may encounter during his or her career takes time. As we highlighted in a previous article about USAF F-16 training, the Standard B course typically takes about nine months to graduate a pilot, but it doesn’t end there.
In fact, pilots continue training to achieve combat readiness after being assigned to a combat unit. During this period (usually several months), pilots expand their mission sets and introduce new weapons, sensors and qualifications in more challenging scenarios, culminating in Red Flag, the premier air combat exercise.
The entire F-16 training from basic flight training to combat readiness takes two to three years, depending on the length of each training phase and the downtime between each phase. Obviously this timeline may have been shortened to help Ukraine meet its needs more quickly, but it’s easy to understand that it’s still a long time and would explain why the country would consider replenishing its ranks with foreign pilots.