Video: Russia claims Ukraine’s F-16s will carry nukes

With the arrival of the summer, the fighting in Ukraine is heating up. Both sides are committing forces into war to gain an advantage and achieve an operational breakthrough on the ground.

But in the air, things are looking bright for the Ukrainian Air Force as it will soon add F-16 Fighting Falcon fighter jets into its arsenal.

Russia has been claiming that the U.S.-made F-16s will carry nuclear weapons, and thus their delivery amounts to an escalation. But how accurate are those claims?

“The truth is that this entire argument is not based in reality and is rather predicated on the general public’s lack of understanding about nuclear warfare doctrine, tactical aircraft, and nuclear weapons in general,” Alex Hollings, Sandboxx News’ Editor-in-Chief and host of Airpower on YouTube, said.

Russian officials at the highest levels, including Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, began the narrative of Ukrainian F-16s carrying nuclear weapons as an attempt to block the transfer of the fighter jet to Kyiv.

To begin with, any aircraft can drop nuclear weapons. The F-16s Ukraine will be getting are equally capable of launching nukes as Kyiv’s existing fighter jet fleet. In addition, Ukraine doesn’t have any nuclear weapons. Although it did have a robust nuclear arsenal up until 1994 – an unexpected “gift” from the dissolution of the Soviet Union – Kyiv agreed to transfer all nuclear weapons to Russia after a trilateral agreement between Ukraine, Russia, and the United States in exchange from assurances that Moscow wouldn’t invade it.

You can watch Alex’s full video about the Russian claims above.