WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 19th May, 2023) It could take the United States substantially less time to train Ukrainian pilots to operate American-made fighter jets than previously thought, Yahoo reported on Thursday, citing US Air Force documents.
The documents contain detailed assessments from February and March of this year at an Air Force base in Tucson, Arizona, where Ukrainian pilots with experience flying Su-27s and MiG-29s but not any experience with F16s were tested in simulators and assessed by qualified Air Force instructors. said the report.
With only a brief familiarization and no formal training, the two Ukrainian pilots were able to execute complex maneuvers in their simulated environments over the course of the assessment, the report said. Some of these maneuvers required very technical skills, including landing the aircraft after simulated engine loss and executing mock attacks.
"Given the current skill set demonstrated by the Ukrainian Air Force pilot ... four months is a realistic training timeline," the documents were quoted as saying in the report.
This represents a big shift from the 18 months that Colin Kahl, the former undersecretary of defense for policy, claimed it would take to train Ukrainian pilots to fly F-16s in front of a congressional committee in February, the report added.
One of the largest hurdles the Ukrainian pilots faced was the fact that F-16s displayed information in English, though the pilots exhibited progress in aptitude over the course of the assessment period, said the report.�
