Majibu ya ongezeko la ndege vita ukreini
WHY THERE IS MORE UKRAINIAN AIR PLANES THAN LISTED
By @Rybar
The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation invented everything or the answer to the question "Why are there so many aircraft in the Ukrainian Air Force?"
In the feedback bot, we are often asked the question of where the Armed Forces of Ukraine got so many planes and helicopters. Out of habit, people climb into Wikipedia, check the data on the Ukrainian Air Force there, then look into the briefings of the Russian Ministry of Defense and shout “I don’t believe it!”.
The @rybar team decided to hold a small educational program and tell where the legs grow from.
🔻 At the time of the start of the NMD, the official number of aircraft in service was from 165 to 178 Su-24/25/27 and MiG-29 units. Plus 23 training and another 67 "mothballed", that is, withdrawn from combat, aircraft. In addition to tactical aviation, the Armed Forces of Ukraine had just over 200 Soviet-made helicopters.
Nevertheless, many of them (even those that were officially in service) were no longer used due to the development of a resource and poor-quality service by Ukrainian technicians - they were listed only in reports for debiting funds for repairs and money laundering.
However, with the start of a special military operation, it became necessary to restore the combat capability of the air forces. Through the efforts of specialists from the Ukrainian military-industrial complex and engineers from NATO countries (mainly from Eastern Europe), the process of returning decommissioned aircraft to service and repairing damaged ones was established.
In addition to the delivery of the aircraft and helicopters themselves, the states of Eastern Europe such as Slovakia, Bulgaria, Poland, Romania, were transferred parts, spare parts and assemblies for aviation equipment. Some secretly, some officially. The Polish leadership, for example, did not hide the fact that they had transferred all available spare parts for MiGs.
The process of repairing flight equipment is carried out at some airfields in Western Ukraine (Lutsk, Ozernoe, Uzhgorod). However, most of the restoration work is carried out by the same Eastern European countries as Poland, Slovakia and Romania. Slovak transport helicopters fly almost daily to Uzhgorod and back.
Another country helping the Ukrainian side unofficially is Moldova. The territory of this country not only acts as a transit hub for the transportation of goods for various purposes to Ukraine (from the Romanian Suceava through Ryshkany to Mogilev-Podolsky), but is also used to repair Ukrainian aircraft. In particular, the Moldovan authorities provided their Marculesti airfield for this purpose.
🔻 Despite almost daily losses in aviation equipment, the Armed Forces of Ukraine have already established and put on stream the process of repairing decommissioned aircraft and helicopters. Adding to this the supplied weapons from NATO countries, we get quite significant numbers in the amount of old, but still military equipment.
After restoration, the aircraft are promptly delivered from the territory of neighboring states through "neutral" countries to air bases in Western Ukraine, where the process of training flight crews takes place.
The administration of Maia Sandu, despite the declared neutrality in the issue of military-technical support to Ukraine, is increasingly drawing the country into indirect participation in the conflict, following the clear instructions of the Romanian government.
High resolution infographics
@russianhead
