It is possible that Ukraine's own air defence mistakenly fired down Ukraine's recently acquired F-16 fighter plane in a case of accidental attack.
Kyiv confirmed on Thursday that an F-16 crashed on Monday while engaged in a mission to counter Russian missiles. This incident marks the first loss of a US-made fighter jet since Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky approved its acquisition by Ukraine. Lt. Col. Oleksii Mes, the pilot, died in the crash. An anonymous Ukrainian Air Force source stated that Ukraine is contemplating the potentiality that the F-16 crash was a result of an inadvertent attack from their own forces. The source added that an investigation into the incident was underway. Preliminary claims focused on pilot error rather than friendly fire.
Sabrina Singh, the deputy press secretary of the Pentagon, confirmed that there are allegations about friendly fire but refrained from accepting that as she cannot verify this information.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has dismissed the commander of the Ukrainian Air Force, Major General Mykola Oleshchuk, following the crash of an F-16 that crashed during a recent Russian missile and kamikaze drone attack. In a statement by the Ukrainian General Staff, it was announced that Lieutenant General Anatolii Kryvonozhko was appointed acting commander of the Ukrainian Air Force in place of Major General Mykola Oleshchuk.
While no explanation was given as to why Major General Mykola Oleshchuk was dismissed, it was claimed that the argument between Mariana Bezuhla, the deputy head of the Ukrainian parliamentary defence committee, and Major General Oleshchuk following the crash of the F-16 fighter jet could be one of the reasons for the dismissal. In a statement on her social media account, Mariana Bezuhla claimed that the F-16, in which one pilot lost his life, was shot down by a Patriot air defence system. Based on unnamed sources, Mariana Bezuhla demanded that those responsible for the mistake be punished.
Retired US Air Force officer Lieutenant Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski, in an interview with Sputnik, argued that a Ukrainian F-16 jet could be shot down due to unintegrated communications and control systems. Previously, the US said that the F-16 aircraft donated by Denmark and the Netherlands to Ukraine had previously received computer system upgrades that made the aircraft more sophisticated than similar generation aircraft that have been in use for approximately 30 years. Kwiatkowski noted that friendly fire is a major problem in all wars, as it was when Patriot systems shot down US and British aircraft in the 1991 Gulf War.
