11 NATO member states will be involved in training Ukrainian pilots on F-16 aircraft. Training will begin in August in Denmark, while a training center will be established in Romania, Alliance officials said.
Denmark and the Netherlands/Netherlands will be the NATO countries that will play the main role in training Ukrainian pilots and technical personnel who will deal with the maintenance of these aircraft before Ukraine is supplied with these fighter jets in the war with Russia. “We hope to see the first results early next year,” said the Danish defense minister. The Dutch Minister of Defense announced that her country and Denmark will deliver the F-16 planes that the Ukrainians will actually train on.
According to Kyiv Independent, the 11 countries involved in training Ukrainian pilots are: Denmark, Holland, Belgium, Canada, Luxembourg, Norway, Poland, Romania, Sweden and Great Britain. To date, no NATO country has publicly announced the delivery of F-16s to Ukraine. Poland and Slovakia alone have delivered 27 Mig-29s to date.
Romanian President Klaus Iohannis said on Tuesday, during a press conference in Vilnius, that Romania has submitted to the Allies the proposal to become a training center for the F-16 and that there is support from NATO leaders.
“There are plans for the base, interested allies and I’m quite confident that things will continue,” says the Romanian President, adding that for security reasons he cannot say publicly where the base will be.
Klaus Iohannis stated that there are plans for a training base in Romania for NATO F-16 pilots, stating that there are interested allies. He points out that they are not yet ready to say where this training base will be.
“These regional plans are intervention plans, they are strictly secret plans, but they do not provide for endowments or acquisitions, the endowment, the acquisition of armaments, of endowments, is done by each nation and we deal with this matter, that is why we have allocated money many, 2.5% of GDP for Defense. On the other hand, it is important to see that not only the armament solves the situation, but also the training of the military, the special trainings”, said President Klaus Iohannis in Vilnius, when asked if these regional defense plans entail the purchase of additional equipment and if that pilot training center will open in Borcea or in another place in our country and if there will be other similar places where allied military forces will be deployed.
Early this month, Romania announced a a pilot training facility for the pilots who operate F-16 aircraft will be set up in Romania. Romanian pilots who operate F-16 aircraft will be trained in this centre, with the facility being later available also to to pilots from allied and NATO partner states, including Ukraine, according to the quoted statement.
Spanish PM: Spain will send more soldiers to Romania
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez announced on Tuesday that Spain will deploy military forces in Slovakia and supplement those in Romania to strengthen NATO’s eastern flank, EFE reports.
Sanchez talked about this intention in statements to mass media upon arrival at the summit in Vilnius, where he will officially communicate this new Spanish contribution to the other leaders of the NATO states.
Spain will also send soldiers to Slovakia, as a first, while it will supplement those from Romania with an as yet unspecified number, notes the EFE agency.
Spain has deployed in Romania a radar of the Mobile Air Control Group (GRUMOCA), with about 40 soldiers in charge of operating this equipment.