Warsaw: ‘We Want to Give Our Old Fighter Jets to Ukraine, but NATO Won’t Protect Our Air Space”

Poland wants to hand over its aging MiG-29 fighter jets to Ukraine to help fight Russia, but other NATO states are unwilling to fill the gap that would be left in Polish air defenses, so the planes must stay Polish Air Force property, Pawel Wroński, spokesman for Poland’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said in a Thursday statement.

Speaking to Ukraine’s state-run Ukrinform news agency, Wroński said: “We realize that Ukraine, repelling Russia’s attack, is also protecting us. But the protection needs of Poland are at the forefront.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Thursday during a televised meeting with officials in west Ukraine complained that his administration is begging Poland to release slightly more than a dozen near-obsolescent fighter jets, but though Warsaw is in favor of the idea the Ukrainian Air Force is no closer to getting the planes it badly needs.

 “We really wanted to get MiGs from Poland, but they couldn’t give them to us because they didn’t have enough of their own,” Zelensky said.

Warsaw, in March 2023, began transferring part of its MiG-29 fighter fleet to Kyiv. At the time the Polish Air Force reportedly operated about 25 of the planes.

According to open-source aircraft tracking groups, Poland eventually handed over ten used MiGs. All were manufactured in the late Soviet era but had been refitted with NATO-standard electronics including a two-band radio, a GPS and mission computer, as well as digital screens and a HUD display in the cockpit.

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By the standards of the Russo-Ukrainian War, the Polish MiGs were somewhat better than the Soviet-era MiG-29s the Ukrainian Air Force already flew, but distinctly inferior to Su-30MK and Su-35 fighters operated by the Russian Air Force.

At issue now, are Poland’s remaining fourteen MiG-29 fighter jets – three of which are two-seat trainers – that are reportedly stationed and assigned to military flight operations at 22nd Tactical Aviation Base in Marbork, in northeast Poland.

Zelensky said his administration has been in talks with Warsaw and other NATO states to organize an “air policing operation” in sections of Poland’s air space – geographically probably in proximity to  Russia’s Kaliningrad region – to replace the air defense capacity the Marbork MiGs provide right now.

NATO headquarters in Brussels supports the idea of an allied “air policing operation” over portions of Poland similar to multinational NATO air patrols conducted for years over the Baltic region but, Zelensky said,  no NATO member with an Air Force suitable for the job has volunteered to help.

“We (Ukraine) agreed with NATO that they will assign them a police mission (in Poland), that is, like our Baltic friends, who do not have their own planes, but have such a mission. We agreed on this, but after that, did Poland hand over the planes to us? No. Did they find another reason (not to send the planes)? Yes.” Zelensky said.

The US is overwhelmingly NATO’s most powerful air war combatant, operating more than 13,000 military aircraft. The next five most numerous NATO air forces – Turkey, France, Italy, Britain and Greece – combined contain about 4,000 planes, many less advanced than the Americans’ and none superior. Zelensky did not name the NATO member state or states unwilling to participate in proposed air space policing operations over Poland.

Russia’s Air Force, although grossly inferior to NATO or even more, the US Air Force, is technologically superior to and heavily outnumbers its Ukrainian opponent, which must operate from airfields in range of Russian long-range missiles.

Ukraine’s allies have provided limited numbers of long-range missiles but, because of fears of escalation, the White House bans their use against targets like air bases deep inside Russia.

The number of flyable MiGs currently in the Ukrainian Air Force is a military secret. Analysts estimate there might be 20-40 planes available, among them MiGs donated in the past by Slovakia and Poland.

The Polish Air Force was moving to replace its near-obsolete MiG-29 jets with the US’ state-of-the-art F-35 fighter, a fifth-generation stealth plane, about two years before Russia invaded Ukraine.

In January 2020, Poland contracted to buy 32 F-35A aircraft from the US for $4.6 billion. In late August this year, the manufacturer, Lockheed Martin, announced Warsaw’s first F-35 had rolled off a Fort Worth assembly line.

Polish pilots will begin training on the plane in 2024 or 2025, and all being well, Poland’s Air Force will receive its first F-35s in 2026 with final delivery in 2030, the military aviation publication Defense News reported.

Were that timeline adhered to, the Polish MiG-29s Ukraine is hoping to get right now, might be available in 2026-27. Unfortunately for Kyiv, by that time, some of the airframes might be too metal- or mechanically-fatigued to operate in combat. 

In August, in a speech at Marbork air base, Stanisław Wziątek, Undersecretary of State at the Ministry of National Defense spelled out that Poland supports Ukraine, but, until it gets help, the Polish Air Force must put the protection of Polish skies first.

“A full-scale war is taking place right next to our country’s border. We are the ones who are observing, but we are also supporting our Ukrainian brothers, not only with equipment transferred for over 12 billion zlotys. We are also training them, giving them a chance and support that will allow them to resist the enemy. But we know that we also have equipment that we cannot transfer, which we still need,” Wziątek said.

Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski reiterated Warsaw’s position on Thursday in comments reported by Polsat.news: “Among the countries that help Ukraine, if we take into account military, financial, economic, humanitarian [assistance], and the assistance for Ukrainian refugees, Poland has done more for Ukraine in terms of GDP than any other nation.”

“We’re trying to help, but we’re also a frontline country. Russia also threatens us, and not everything (like giving Ukraine Poland’s last MiG-29s) is possible,” Sikorski said.

Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Poland has donated more than 300 main battle tanks, more than two dozen combat aircraft including the MiG-29s, armored personnel carriers, artillery pieces, ammunition and other military hardware worth more than $4 billion.

Poland simultaneously has embarked on possibly the most ambitious military build-up by any European state since the Second World War. Aside from orders like the F-35 fighter to US manufacturers, Poland has, since February 2022, contracted to buy 1,000 modern tanks, 600 self-propelled artillery pieces, 300 rocket artillery launchers and 48 light fighter jets from South Korea, in deals potentially worth $44.2 billion.

Polish 2024 defense budgeting was more than 4 percent of GDP, the highest of any NATO member state including the US. Warsaw in 2025 plans to spend the equivalent of $48.7 billion into national defense, an increase over 2024, Prime Minister Donald Tusk said in an August speech on national security.