For the past month, the entire world has been watching the Ukrainian sky. And for good reason: Since World War II, air superiority has been the deciding factor in international conflicts.
Russian President Vladimir Putin is well aware that control of the sky is the key to victory in Ukraine. Air superiority would enable Russia to protect its ground forces and easily attack Ukraine’s troops from the air. This is why Ukraine’s air force was Russia’s initial target. On Feb. 24, the first day of the war, Russia struck airports and air defense bases, hitting 25 cities across the country.
In the face of this all-out assault, the Ukrainian air force’s primary mission is to prevent Russia from gaining air superiority.
In the face of this all-out assault, the Ukrainian air force’s primary mission is to prevent Russia from gaining air superiority. The difficulty of this task cannot be exaggerated: Our enemy possesses vastly superior capabilities, both in the sheer number of aircraft and surface-to-air defense systems, and in the level of their technologies.
Effective air defense requires a full arsenal of tools on the ground and in the sky, and Ukraine started the war with a tremendous disadvantage on both fronts. According to our internal data, Russia has six times as many planes and 10 times the combat power in the air as Ukraine. What’s more, the Russian jets are equipped with advanced “fire-and-forget” missiles. These missiles have their own radar systems, which do not require further guidance after they are launched. Ukrainian jets, in contrast, rely on semi-active missiles, which require continued guidance from the plane’s radar.
In practice, this means that Russian pilots can launch a missile and immediately retreat to safety; our pilots must fly alongside the missile to guide it to its target, exposing themselves to huge risk.
In early March, our allies floated the idea of transferring Polish MiG-29s to Ukraine to answer our call for fighter…