Russia Will Treat F-16s in Ukraine as Nuclear-Capable Aircraft

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - Russia will treat F-16 multi-role fighter jets operated by Ukraine as nuclear-capable assets, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Monday.

"We cannot ignore the fact that these planes are dual-purpose platforms that can be used both for nuclear and non-nuclear tasks … No matter what modification of the aircraft will be supplied [to Ukraine] we will treat them as nuclear-capable and we will consider this step of the United States and NATO as a purposeful provocation," the ministry said in a statement.

The ministry further warned the regime in Kiev and its Western donors that their reckless behavior was driving the conflict in Ukraine to the point of no return.

"The regime in Kiev and its Western sponsors should realize that their reckless steps are bringing the situation closer to the point where it will attain ‘critical mass’ and explode," the ministry said.

The ministry also said that some NATO member states were purposefully dragging the alliance into a direct armed conflict with Russia.

The ministry pointed to French President Emmanuel Macron who had suggested at several occasions that French and other NATO forces should be deployed to Ukraine to fight against Russian troops.

"These and some other actions of NATO member states indicate that they are deliberately trying to turn the Ukrainian crisis into an open military clash between NATO countries and Russia in order to inflict a ‘strategic defeat’ on our country," it said.

In this regard, the ministry pointed out that upcoming military drills aimed at increasing the readiness of non-strategic nuclear forces should be perceived in the context of recent warlike statements made by Western officials and destabilizing actions of NATO.

F-16 is no more “nuclear-capable” than existing Ukrainian aircraft or artillery (actually - the artillery actually IS capable - just need the munitions).

Not true at all. Aircraft such as the F16, F15, F18, F35, F117, F22 that drop tactical weapons are dual purpose when they have the encryption key panel installed. This enables command control authority starting with the Commander In Chief down to the military command authority down to the squadron CO down to the the pilot for all nuclear weapons including gravity dropped tactical weapons. The correct code must be entered or the weapon will not arm. Too many incorrect code entry attempts and weapon disables itself. Not all all fighter squadrons and or aircraft even have the key encryption panels installed. Plus these aircraft have the targeting computers for an over the shoulder release of the weapon starting at low level from the IP or high level drop with time for the aircraft to safely bugout, so not all aircraft even have correct avionic configurations. I doubt the Ukrainian aircraft have any of this capability at all and should not our would not to start with.

Russia is correct to be concerned that a nuclear capable delivery system is minutes from their border and would take actions to remove them just like we threatened to do to Cuba in 1962. Regardless that we have stealth bombers and tactical stealth fighters that can already penetrate their airspace undetected. But, to Russia this is an existential threat out in the open and we are idiots for not listening to their red line. Sempre Fi.

“when they have the encryption key panel installed”...

I think you are forgetting (ignoring) where these aircraft are coming from - countries that have no nuclear arsenal - and thus are extremely unlikely to have such control panels installed (I don’t think the export version of the F-16 included that anyway).

And again - basically artillery itself is “nuclear capable” for tactical weapons -

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