Ukraine Air Force - 2014-2021
In 2014, aviation was used from the first days of the anti-terrorist operation. However, at first it was a transport aircraft that performed the functions of transporting personnel and cargo, as well as reconnaissance flights. Permission to use the weapon was granted to the Air Force only after the first aircraft, the An-30B photo reconnaissance aircraft, was shot down.
The modern development of the Air Force was carried out taking into account the challenges of today's threats, which appeared before the state since 2014. In accordance with the State Program for the Development of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the organizational structures of the Air Force have been brought into line with the structures of NATO member states.
At the beginning of 2014, the Air Force began implementing the measures of the State Comprehensive Program of Reform and Development of the Armed Forces of Ukraine for the period until 2017. At the same time, the confrontation in the center of the state and regions, the occupation of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea by the Russian Federation, the terrorist activities of subversive groups and radical separatists in the East of the country made it necessary to define new priorities for military construction.
In the military administration bodies and military units of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, a number of specified measures were carried out to restore and increase combat capability. The President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyi, congratulated the Air Force of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. He said that the country is proud of them.
"There have already been more than 14,000 sorties of our aviation during the war. Everyone is heroism. Everyone is a result for Ukraine. Everyone is the approach of our victory. I thank all the soldiers of the Ukrainian Air Force - all the soldiers-aviators, our anti-aircraft guns, specialists of the radio engineering troops! Kudos to you! Glory to Ukraine!", said Zelensky.
The experience of using the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine during a special period in the first half of 2014 became the basis for further reforming of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The leadership of the Armed Forces of Ukraine has fully agreed to the proposals of the Air Force Command regarding the implementation of priority measures to increase the combat capability of the Armed Forces.
Among the main tasks that are implemented in the Air Force taking into account the experience of conducting anti-terrorist operations, first of all, there is the restoration of the infrastructure and the review of the places of permanent deployment of military units of the Air Force taking into account the modern security environment, the implementation of the gradual transition of the management bodies of the Air Force to a new organizational and staffing structure, adopted in NATO member countries, increasing the combat readiness and ability of units and units of the Air Force to perform tasks as assigned, intensification of training of the Air Force to perform tasks as assigned, procurement, restoration and modernization of weapons and military equipment.
Several mothballed Mikoyan Mig-29 Fulcrum fourth-generation fighter jets were returned to combat service in western Ukraine, the country's Defense Ministry said on 04 April 2014. "Specialists of our team have already returned several planes to service," the ministry quoted an unnamed commander of an Air Force unit near Ivano-Frankivsk as saying. "We are now conducting test flights. Soon, more mothballed fighter jets will take off again."
The state of Ukraine's armed forces came under close scrutiny when the new government took office in late February 2014, after months of violent uprising. Kiev launched extensive combat readiness checks of its armed forces in early March, following Crimea's announcement that it was ready to secede from Ukraine and join Russia. Defense Minister Ihor Tenyukh said in his report to the president that the checks revealed "unsatisfactory" condition of the armed forces. He said that out of 507 combat planes and 121 attack helicopters, only 15 percent were serviceable. Air Force crews lack proper training and only 10 percent of them were capable of performing combat tasks.
Since September 2014, in accordance with the Minsk agreements, combat aviation is not used in the conduct of the Anti-Terrorist Operation/Joint Forces Operation. Therefore, the main tasks implemented in the military aviation of the Air Force consisted, first of all, in ensuring the necessary level of combat readiness of aviation military units, preparing the flight crew to perform tasks as assigned day and night, in simple and difficult weather conditions, ensuring the forces involved in anti-terrorist operations: air support, air transportation of troops and cargo.
During 2015, the Air Force received positive experience from the leading countries of Europe and the world regarding the reform, development, and transformation of the Air Force, taking into account the experience of combat operations in the East of Ukraine and organizational activities taking place in the Armed Forces of Ukraine. We improved the interaction of air defense forces on duty during the execution of combat duty tasks, in particular during the preparation and conduct of the Ukrainian-Polish tactical training of aviation units "Safe Sky - 2015".
The main efforts of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in 2016, which was declared the year of the Air Force, were focused on the execution of air defense tasks of the groups of troops (forces) participating in the anti-terrorist operation on the territory of Donetsk and Luhansk regions, air transportation and aeromedical evacuation of the wounded and sick, restoring the serviceability of weapons and military equipment, increasing the level of air training of the flight crew and the training of the personnel of the military branches.
The training of military units and units of the Air Force was carried out during operational (combat) training by conducting command-staff, flight-tactical, tactical, tactical-special exercises, and field trips.
In order to increase the combat capability of military units and units of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine during 2014–2020, a number of trainings and exercises were conducted with the practical implementation of assigned tasks both at points of permanent deployment, in designated areas, and at military training grounds of the Armed Forces of Ukraine under the leadership of commander of the Air Force, commanders of air commands and military units. Also, military units and units of the species took part in strategic measures of training of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and in many international exercises with the participation of partner countries.
In total, dozens of military exercises of various levels were held. The main ones: Spring Thunder 2016, Summer Thunder 2016, South Wind 2016, Heavenly Shield 2016, Rubizh 2016, Blue Trident 2017, Blue Trident 2017 "Unshakable stability - 2017", SN with combat shootings in the Republic of Bulgaria "Shabla - 2017", KSHN "Maroon beret - 2018", SKSHN "Cossack Volya" (2018, 2019), SKSHN "Storm - 2018", SKSHN "Ob' joint efforts - 2020", "Common Challenge - 2015", multinational NATO exercises "Trident Junction" in 2015-2016..., "Trident Jupiter - 2019", "Clear Sky - 2018", "Sea Breeze", "Rapid Trident" (every year) and others.
For more than 10 years (until 2020), the Ukrainian-Danish operation "Northern Falcon" for the transportation of fuel and other cargo on the island of Greenland lasted. Since 2019, the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine has been training personnel within the framework of the British operation "ORBITAL".
In 2021, the age of the "youngest" tactical aviation aircraft, which are part of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, reached the 30th anniversary of the start of operation. During the years of Ukraine's independence, not a single new or at least used tactical aviation unit was purchased and entered into combat for the Air Force. Although repairs and modernization of such aircraft are carried out regularly by Ukrainian enterprises.
Four types of combat aircraft came to Ukraine from the Soviet past. These are various modifications of the MiG-29, Su-27 multi-role fighters, the Su-24M front-line bomber and the Su-25 attack aircraft. In order to stop the moral and physical aging of the Ukrainian military aviation, to prevent the degradation of this high-tech type of the Armed Forces, there has long been an urgent issue of radical rearmament of the tactical aviation of the Air Force with new generation aircraft - 4++ (based on real capabilities) and 5th (based on ambitious plans for the future of 15-20 years).
Ukraine, as an aviation country and one of the world leaders in passenger, transport and military transport aircraft construction, never specialized in the creation and production of fighter, bomber and assault aircraft. Therefore, there was a question of geopolitical, strategic and military-technical choice of a foreign manufacturer and type of aircraft, as well as the allocation of large-scale state financing involving loans from foreign partners with government guarantees.
This is provided for in the Vision of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine - 2035, adopted in May 2020. The strategic document was developed on the basis of the Vision of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and aims to determine the rational ways of developing military aviation until 2035, forming the initial data for the State Program for the Development of the Armed Forces of Ukraine until 2025, the Air Force Development Program, other defense planning documents.
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