MiG-29s are inferior to more sophisticated Russian aircraft and could be easy prey for Russian pilots and missiles. Send us planes."īut the handover of Poland's 28 Soviet-made MiG-29s would be unlikely to be a game-changer militarily. "We ask you again to decide as soon as possible. "When will there be a decision? Look, we're at war!" Zelensky said in a video on his Telegram channel. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called again on Wednesday for Western powers to urgently make a decision on the fighter jets. He added: "But it is also true that we have to consider very carefully what we do concretely, and definitely warplanes are not part of that."Ī spokesperson for the foreign ministry added that any decisions needed to be made with the goal of preventing the war in Ukraine from spilling over into NATO. German officials also said there were no plans for MiGs to be flying out of Ramstein Air Base.Ĭhancellor Olaf Scholz noted that Germany has given Ukraine financial and humanitarian aid, as well as some weapons. “To my knowledge, it wasn’t pre-consulted with us,” Nuland told senators. US Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland told lawmakers at a hearing on the Ukraine crisis Tuesday she learned of Poland's plans only while driving to the hearing. The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said White House officials did not think the proposal would easily solve the logistical challenges of providing aircraft to Ukraine. The proposal did not come up during talks with Secretary of State Antony Blinken when he was recently in Poland, according to a US official familiar with the talks. White House officials were blindsided by the Polish announcement on the MiGs. Russia has declared that supporting Ukraine’s air force would be tantamount to joining the war, and could spur retaliation. But it also raises the risk of the war expanding beyond Ukraine. The proposed gift of more warplanes would be a morale booster for Ukrainians under pounding Russian assault for nearly two weeks. The Pentagon went further late on Wednesday, saying it would oppose any plan for NATO nations to provide fighter jets to Ukraine, calling it "high-risk". “We will continue to consult with Poland and our other NATO allies about this issue and the difficult logistical challenges it presents, but we do not believe Poland’s proposal is a tenable one,” Kirby said in a statement. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said Poland's declaration that it intended to deliver the 28 jets to the US Ramstein Air Base in Germany raised the concerning prospect of warplanes departing from a US and NATO base to fly into airspace contested with Russia in the Ukraine conflict. The Pentagon on Tuesday rejected Poland's surprise announcement that it would give the United States its MiG-29 fighter jets for use by Ukraine, describing the offer as untenable.
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