Ukrainian MoD plans to modernize its air force include acquiring a new model fighter jet with which to replace its outdated Soviet-era fleet. The Vision 2035 document, which was just published by the Air Force Command, and which Infodefensa.com echoed a week ago, foresees an expense of 200,000 million hryvnias (6,800 million euros) in the purchase of new fighters, within a modernization target estimated at 370,000 million (12,600 million euros in exchange).
The project cites the acquisition of fourth-generation devices, making the most likely candidates the F-16 Block 70/72 by the American manufacturer Lockheed Martin; the F / A-18E / F Super Hornet Block III of the also North American Boeing, the JAS-39E / F Gripen of the Swedish Saab, and the Eurofighter Typhoon, developed by the European Airbus, BAE Systems.
One of these apparatuses will be the one that is likely to replace several models with which Ukraine continues to operate and which were developed by the Soviet Union at the time: MiG-29, Su-27, Su-25, Su-24M and Su- 24MR.
First batch of 12 aircraftAlthough the forecast is that in the long term Kiev will acquire more than a hundred fighters, at the moment the planned plan of 12.6 billion for the renewal of the Air Force is not enough to complete that ambitious objective, since it also includes the purchase of medium transport aircraft, training aircraft and medium-range surface-to-air missiles, among others.