For security reasons, the US administration has decided not to send civilian specialists to Ukraine to service F-16 fighters and other US military equipment, The Wall Street Journal reports, citing US officials, UNN reports.
According to the newspaper, the debate over whether to send American civilians to Ukraine to help maintain Western equipment has been going on since the first days of the war, but it has become even more acute recently with the long-awaited arrival of F-16s in Ukraine. The first six of the promised 80 F-16s arrived in Ukraine in late July.
The US National Security Council considered a proposal to send civilian contractors to Ukraine to maintain F-16 fighter jets and other military weapons, but the intelligence community and other experts deemed it too risky, according to officials familiar with the discussions.
Instead, there is hope that European countries will assume more - and perhaps all - responsibility for F-16 maintenance.
The intelligence community has expressed concern over the prospect that Russia could target U.S. contractors in Ukraine
The Biden administration does not rule out the possibility of sending American contractors to Ukraine in the future, but it is not expected in the near future, The Wall Street Journal writes .
"We are reviewing this issue, but we have not made any decisions," said National Security Council spokesman Sean Savett in a statement regarding the proposal to send American contractors to Ukraine.
While the Pentagon has stated that it hopes Ukrainians will be able to maintain the F-16, all countries, including the United States, rely to some extent on private companies and their personnel to maintain the sophisticated jet fighters.
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According to the publication, some officials in the US Department of Defense have expressed support for sending American contractors to perform maintenance, but President Biden, led by his national security adviser Jake Sullivan, has expressed concern that the Defense Department does not have adequate response plans in place if these people are targeted.
"We have not made any decisions and we have made it clear that we are not going to send American troops to Ukraine, but there are no Defense Department contractors in Ukraine doing the work," said the Pentagon spokesman.
Ukraine is expected to receive several used and modernized F-16s from the Netherlands, Norway, Denmark and Belgium.
A senior Dutch military official confirms that the Netherlands will pay for a private contract between a civilian maintenance company and the Ukrainian Air Force to support the F-16.
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