G.I. Joe

The later generation AMRAAMs from my knowledge have a range measured in at least a hundred miles or so. Obviously effective range might be shorter but that should in theory place VKS glide bombing runs within a reasonable engagement window, granted at a potential risk.

My knowledge on BVR air combat is limited, but I understand that you have to fire high up in order to get the upper end of effective ranges on long range missiles. Which means F-16s flying high which will be a considerable risk. It is perhaps no coincidence that we are seeing a renewed Ukrainian focus on Russian AD, especially their high end search radars, A-50 control planes and of course S-400s. 

I would point out however that in theory the Russian jets are also pretty exposed on their glide bombing runs, for they also need to fly quite high in order to drop them at sufficient distance. I figured there is a reasonable chance that F-16s will be able to achieve intercepts without having to get suicidally close to the lines. (We should not underestimate Russian AD despite their proclivity to shoot their own planes down and be hilariously incompetent)

What might be more of a guarantee is that VKS pilots will have to bear in mind the threat potential of F-16s intercepting them, adding another layer of complication to their already considerable list of potentially potent Ukrainian AD and their own AD shooting them.  In theory, simply the presence of F-16 flying near the front might encourage a lot of cancelled bomb runs, which is something that will certainly have a tangible effect on the strike rate at the very least. 

This is sadly an inevitable potential outcome if AD is used against Russian aircraft, who seldom cross the lines to perform strikes. It should be viewed as an acceptable risk. 
This is honestly a very good point. Ukraine has had to go from an entirely soviet modelled force into something between that and NATO lines in the last ten years. Its not been easy and plenty of sources refer to the issue that the older generation of officers and certain elements of the force are still very much stuck in the soviet ethos of doing things. Even with the younger generation of officers thinking differently, these sorts of structural changes can take a long time to push through.

Reforming an army on such a scale is not easy in the slightest, especially when fighting a war of survival. Despite all this Ukraine has shown a truly flexible and innovative approach to in cooperating advanced NATO technology into their force.  We have already seen such craziness such as HARMs being launched from Mig-29s and BUKs carrying sparrows. There is clearly the skill and willingness for clever improvisation and I dont see going anywhere soon. 
BVR missiles are going to surely be the focus given the current nature of air combat over Ukraine. From what I remember reading up from Ukrainian pilot sources, Russian pilots learned very quickly not to get within short range missile range and instead stand off with their BVR capability advantage together with superior avionics. Stand off seems to be the current name of the game and its one where the VKS currently enjoys a major advantage. UA pilots cannot do much else than attempt to lure VKS pilots closer and otherwise fly low and cautiously. Its a testament to the skill and tenacity of the Ukrainians that they even have airframes flying at this point given the disparity. 

What they need more than anything is a capability equaliser on that front so presumably the best AMRAAMs possible will be desired. Its a shame that the Ukrainians are unlikely to get a platform that can launch Meteor though, for that would truly have the VKS soiling itself given its hilariously dangerous capabilities. Not to say the latest AMRAAMs are not dangerous of course.  They may not have the range of some Russian BVR missiles in service, but I suspect their lethality is significantly higher when packaged with something like F-16 with its fantastic avionics suite.

I think AIM-120s are practically a given, the big question is which version. The F-16s being supplied are all F-16A Block 15 MLU versions, roughly equivalent to a current U.S. Block 50/52 C/D model in capabilities and AMRAAM capable. AMRAAMs for Ukraine have also been confirmed:
Defense News: Ukraine to get AMRAAM weapons under $1 billion deal with RTX
Air and Space Forces Magazine: As Ukraine Prepares to Get F-16s, US Provides AMRAAM Missiles
Which version is unconfirmed, but the second article mentions hints from Ukrainian officials that the advanced AIM-120D variant with a 160 km or greater range may be in the works. Relatively few air forces (Canada among them) have received the D model to date, but I certainly wouldn't rule it out. Hopefully OPSEC will be good about the exact air to air weapons provided and the timing of the F-16s' arrival in country...let it be a surprise for the VKS.

https://www.regeringen.se/pressmeddelanden/2024/05/militart-stodpaket-16-till-ukraina--ny-formaga-som-starker-ukrainas-luftforsvar-och-stod-som-moter-ukrainas-prioriterade-behov/
 

My main hope for supplying western fighters is they'll give UKR the ability to deliver a plentiful and relatively cheap precision strike weapon.  At the same time, I hope they can chase the VVS out of the air, denying them this kind of strike.  I think glide bombs are a given but I do wonder what sort of other weapons are going to be supplied with the aircraft, hopefully AIM-120's
 

Never forget that one of the constraints on adoption of new equipment is the Ukrainian military itself.
It is undeniably true that deploying the full suite of goodies that marks out advanced Western militaries, from soup to nuts, logistics to BDA, would make the Ukrainian armed forces incomparably more fearsome than they already are.
It is ALSO undeniably true that wholesale adoption of the full suite of goodies that marks out advanced Western militaries etc etc in one fell swoop would utterly break the force, indeed any force, that tried it. It would break them if they tried it in peacetime, let alone attempting it in the middle of an existential war. It is mildly implausible that Putin would step back, saying "oh, fair play, we won't do anything for the next 18-24 months while you figure out how to use, employ, and maintain all this new stuff. Give us a call when you're ready to go again?"
Keep in mind that every time you argue for comprehensive and sudden re-equipping. Either you're arguing for a fantasy, or you're arguing for a Russian victory along the lines of Arthur C. Clarke's short story Superiority.
There is, of course, a middle path - upgrading as fast as practical whilst maintaining a credible and capable force. And there always is, and always will be, debate about whether the process is proceeding too quickly or to slowly. However the answer is never at either end of the spectrum.
 

A good point about the dissipation effect. Though I would also argue in turn that the gradual acquisition of NATO standard kit into the UA arsenal might produce a similar if less pronounced effect as the use of various kit culminates together in use. 

Think of what Ukraine had in 2022 vs what they have now. They have been provided capabilities in areas that simply did not exist or were extremely limited for them at the outbreak of war. This in effect has only made Russia's advantages more difficult to leverage, all while Russia suffers a steady and keen attrition of what makes its own strengths so potentially powerful.

As I mentioned before, the key is inflicting enough strain on pressure on key points of the Russian system that the whole apparatus begins to fail. Examples include wearing down Russian artillery which is a major strength and relied upon factor for Russia to leverage results with. 

Concur with this except that should Putin prevail in Ukraine, things won't get much better for Russia or his political prospects. Yes, for a year or two he will bask in triumphalism but the fundamental demographic and strategic weaknesses of Russia will not go away and Putin will have merely whetted the appetite of the extremists in his own camp. 
Attacking NATO would be suicidal...in fact, attacking Poland and Finland alone would be pretty suicidal...but that doesn't mean a sclerotic Putin attempting to retain a grip on power won't do it. This isn't the Cold War and to the Kremlin this isn't a cold war. Sober calculation doesn't rule.

I was thinking the F16s would help degrade RU AD so that drones & missiles would be ever more effective.  But we'll see I suppose.

BillBinDC talking sense, once again.  While I agree it's would be insane for Putin to attack NATO, anywhere, I am also the guy early in this thread who said things like "Putin won't attack, attacking would be insane".  
Lots of folks are saying how unprepared NATO is, but look at what we're facing!  A ground force that's closer to WW2 than to CMBS. Where is Putin gonna get a force to attack anybody right now?  If he pulls out enough forces to threaten the baltics then UKR would be in Mariupol pretty quickly.  

I think the main potential benefit is making the VKS have a much rougher time with their glide bombing operations, which seem to be a growing headache for the AFU as Russian artillery declines in both accuracy and lethality as older / reactivated systems replace more modern ones.

Ground based air defence is excellent, but well managed air interceptions offer critical mobility against striking craft on a large conflict front while making hostile strikes more complex to plan and execute. With F-16s unlocking a truly incredible suite of lethal and dangerous NATO air launched options (Will be curious to see what they are given) its certainly a far better deal than what the incredibly brave Ukrainian pilots have been dealing with so far flying old jets with old missiles. Not to mention a quite literally near bottomless supply of F-16 airframes for the future, at least compared to Mig-29 supplies. At the very least with some actual BVR capability the Ukrainians can at least sling missiles back at Russian craft who have until this point been largely standing off and taking potshots at Ukrainian craft. 

In short, it hopefully provides another pressure point which could help contribute to at the very least growing difficulties in the Russian military (VKS especially) if not outright act as a game changer. We can only hope. 

I think that's highly probable. But they can also contribute standoff PGM capabilities for CAS/BAI and deeper interdiction. And even if conventional notions of air superiority seen outmoded at this point, I definitely think there will be an important counter-air (to use the old Soviet term) role for the F-16s reducing the Russian glide bomb threat.

I think that's highly probable. But they can also contribute standoff PGM capabilities for CAS/BAI and deeper interdiction. And even if conventional notions of air superiority seen outmoded at this point, I definitely think there will be an important counter-air (to use the old Soviet term) role for the F-16s reducing the Russian glide bomb threat.

I'm inclined to think that as with the recent discussion of holding ground, air superiority is starting to look like a somewhat dated concept in the current environment. The shift to a denial paradigm seems to apply across the board (subsurface might not be going through as much of a paradigm shift, but submarines were a denial asset to begin with).

Every person fighting counts, and Western equipment by all accounts ensure more people survive than ex-Soviet equipment. If it's a war of attrition, Ukraine cannot afford to lose its personnel. 
Even if Tartus is not given, I think the allowance for the use of Western artillery in Russia would be useful. 
 

I don’t think this is really a thing anymore either.  Conventional aircraft are all standoff air interdiction or ground strike.  What will be important is how well these F16 can be integrated and what why will/can carry.  I am thinking more flying HIMARs and AD to reinforce denial. I have no idea what air superiority even looks like anymore.

While no magic bullet, 85 F-16s is actually of a lot of planes. Sweden for which it was said "they will greatly expand NATO air capabilities with their powerful air force" has 71 Gripen. My country has 12. Finland has 50 F-18s and Germany has 140 Eurofighters. Poland has 36 F-16s.
That makes me think 85 new planes can do a lot of work. Of course the other question is how many missiles and bombs do they come with.

I could care less what we call it.  It is more the recognition that Europe was largely a global backwater in the evolution of warfare during this period. The major global powers were in Asia and Persia. It wasn’t until Europe gained superiority in maritime power that things began to shift in and around the 15th century.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_medieval_great_powers#:~:text=The following is a list,%3B Timurids%2C 1400–1450)
The single largest military evolution (and operations) were within the Mongol Empire as they rose to be the largest empire in human history at that time (only surpassed by the British empire in the 19th and 20th centuries).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_empires
The Mongol conquests killed an estimated 10% of the total human population of that day.  For reference that would equal about 800,000-1B people today - or a thermonuclear exchange essentially. The Mongols were the nuclear war of their era.  So if we are going to say “Going Medieval” it should be in reference to them and not a freakin Month Python skit.

Reminds me of a computer RPG called Kingdom Come: Deliverance, set in the Kingdom of Bohemia in 1403.
Seriously the best computer RPG that I have ever played. The developers did a great job of conveying the feeling of living in Europe during the days of lords in castles and knights on horseback. Highly recommend it to fans of computer RPGs who like reading about this era.
A sequel is coming this year, really excited to play it. 🙂
Anyway, back on topic.
 

I wouldn't get yer hopes up too high.
They'll just 'sell' it off on paper to some shell that doesn't care about Ze Sanctions and then keep selling gear (for as long as Russia has cash). 
Export channel-stuffing of EVERYTHING is what's kept China's economy afloat since late 2021. Xi has no option not to keep that treadmill going, even if Putin wasn't obligingly mortgaging Asian Russia to the Throne of Heaven piece by piece (confounding 400 years of Russian imperial policy).
Meanwhile, Chinese mainlanders -- and I mean the patriotic PMC classes -- are acting like the PMC Indians have done (the other piece of the 'Pacific Century', which is now in its 4th decade) and trying to get their families to any place on earth that isn't China. They're showing up -- with money -- everywhere, I'd expect that includes the Russian metropoles.

Putin Dealt a Blow by Major Chinese Spy Cam Maker (msn.com)
Chinese surveillance industry giant Hikvision has suspended operations in Russia, joining the ranks of over 1,000 companies that have scaled back business in the country since Russian President Vladimir Putin's 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
Hikvision's Russian website is currently offline, a development flagged by Russian security systems adviser Videoglaz on the social media platform Telegram last week. The precise date operations ceased is unclear.
The Hangzhou-based manufacturer is subject to U.S. Treasury sanctions and is on the U.S. Commerce Department's Entity List, subjecting it to export controls and licensing restrictions over the company's involvement in human rights violations against China's Muslim minorities.
The move by Hikvision, which Ukraine last year labeled a "sponsor of war" over its continued sales in Russia, comes on the heels of U.S. secondary sanctions targeting international companies in sectors deemed to support Russia's military industrial base.
Hikvision, along with its budget brand HiWatch, comprised some 30 percent of Russia's surveillance camera market in 2021, according to Russian media agency RSpectr.
"The suspension or change of supply channels may in the near future cause a shortage of Hikvision products and a number of electronic components, which will lead to an increase in their price," Videoglaz wrote in its post, adding the future of the Chinese company's technical support and cloud services in Russia were also in doubt.

I also think that before Bucha many believed the Russians would act with some semblance of legal restraint.  The idea that they would line people up in the street and execute them, or that the level of war crimes would reach these heights was simply not believable.  It definitely is now, and we know from captured plans and documents that the Russian actually planned systematic torture and executions as a form of stabilization and control - likely thinking to get out ahead of an insurgency.
I also think most thought the most likely COA was a Russian land grab in the south as an extension of where things got left off in 2014.  A full country invasion was still an outside option.
I think it is fine to come here and criticize Ukraine when merited (I just did on the strikes on nuclear radars).  But then there is being completely upside down on the issues.  Russian occupation horrors are still to fully come to light.  We already know about children being forcibly deported and men pressed into service.  God knows what hellish stories are still out there.  For Ukraine this war is existential in just about every sense of the word.  Putin is a spiteful little dictator that was pre-planning brutality before this war.  How do people think he will react after getting pants by Ukraine and made to look the fool?  And how do people Russia is going to behave after losing 100k troops?  Ukraine cannot lose this war because what will come next will likely be medieval for them.
 

Thread with info re retro fitting US glide bombs on UKR Fulcrim/Flanker airframes.
https://twitter.com/Osinttechnical/status/1794353722895778097
Hopefully the UKR AF will be able to start lobbing these in large numbers soon.  As it says, these are a plentiful and relatively cheap weapon.
First tweet about it a few days ago
 
 

Similar to what I said back in August of '22

"So are we talking about an armored formation similar to a carrier task force with..."