- Ukraine said one of its pilots downed a record-breaking six cruise missiles in a single mission.
- The pilot said he downed two of them with his gun, something experts said took great skill and risk.
- Getting close enough to shoot down missiles requires skill to avoid getting hit with dangerous debris.
The Ukrainian F-16 pilot said to have shot down half a dozen Russian cruise missiles in a single mission showed remarkable skill, particularly during a risky gun battle, a former US Air Force pilot told Business Insider.
Ukraine’s air force command said that an F-16 pilot took out six Russian cruise missiles during a single flight in December, calling it a first for the jet. It said that during the historic engagement, the pilot shot down two missiles with the F-16’s M61A1 six-barrel 20 mm cannon.
Ret. Col. John Venable, a 25-year veteran of the US Air Force and a former F-16 pilot, told BI that the pilot’s ability to gun down the Russian missiles without putting his own aircraft at risk required a lot of skill.
He said “the fact that he did that without fragging himself” says “a lot about his skill set.”
Switching to guns raises risks
Ukraine’s F-16s have been repeatedly seen flying with an air-defense loadout of two AIM-9 Sidewinders and two AIM-120 Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missiles. The country’s air force said the pilot had used up all of his missiles and was low on fuel after destroying four Russian missiles, but he then saw another Russian missile going toward Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital.
He moved to intercept it, firing his gun at the missile that was traveling over 400 miles an hour, the air force said. There was more than one explosion, and the pilot realized that he had actually eliminated two Russian missiles.
The Ukrainian F-16 pilot, per a translation by RBC-Ukraine, said that there was a danger in doing that because “shooting down cruise missiles with a cannon is very risky because of the high speed of the target and the danger of detonation. But I did what the instructors in the US taught me, and I managed to hit it.”
Venable said the risk of debris makes this kind of engagement more dangerous for the pilot. He said that pilots must get close to missiles to get a good shot.
He said that if the intercepting aircraft is behind the target and it explodes when hit, “you’re going to be what we call fragged,” meaning that the aircraft absorbs some of the explosive debris. Pilots have to come in at an angle. Venable said that there being two missiles meant the situation required greater skill.
Tim Robinson, a military aviation specialist at the UK’s Royal Aeronautical Society, likewise said that fighter pilots using guns must get “pretty close” to their target. That brings danger, with cruise missiles “packed with explosives.”
“If you’re firing at something and it’s at close range and that thing goes off — you’ve got to be pretty aggressive and pretty brave to be doing that,” he said.
It takes skill to fly this mission
Retired US Army Maj. Gen. Gordon “Skip” Davis, the former deputy assistant secretary-general for NATO’s defense-investment division, told BI “shooting two cruise missiles with aircraft guns is quite impressive.”
Venable said that pilots who are shooting at a missile but want to protect their aircraft must approach the missile like they are coming onto a highway from an off-ramp, “where you’re at 90 degrees out, and then you start to actually align your car with the highway as that on-ramp turns onto the road.”
“That’s where you want to take the shot, not when you are right behind the aircraft.” And doing that “takes skill,” he said.
Ukraine has not commented on the aircraft’s state but said the pilot landed at an airfield, indicating it was intact.
Ukraine’s air force command said pilots learned to shoot missiles with aircraft cannons in US simulators but never tried it before in combat, the Kyiv Post reported.
Peter Layton, a fellow at the Griffith Asia Institute and a former Royal Australian Air Force officer, told BI the gun kill was “good flying.”
He said that it’s “easier now with modern radars in fighters than in World War II, but the fighter still needs to close with the cruise missile and fire very accurately.”
The jets are likely to continue to fight as missile shields
Battling Russian aircraft would be the better test because they shoot back, but Venable said the reported achievement, which he said was “more than plausible,” says a lot “about how far Ukraine’s air force has come” and the Ukrainian air force’s capabilities.
Kyiv’s new F-16s provide added air defense as Russia batters Ukraine with barrages of missiles, hitting major cities and energy infrastructure and killing civilians. The jets support already-strained ground-based air defenses.
This mission carries risks, and Ukraine has already lost at least one of its F-16s and one of its trained pilots.
Mark Cancian, a senior adviser on the International Security Program at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, told BI that Ukraine is facing threats Western pilots haven’t.
“None have faced the numbers of simultaneous incoming missiles that the Ukrainians have,” he said. “US and Western pilots have faced one or two incoming missiles at a time.”
Ukraine has a limited F-16 fleet that arrived later than desired. Partner nations have pledged more than 85, far fewer than what the Ukrainians likely need. Many of the jets, older versions of what Western nations fly, still haven’t been delivered.
Ukraine probably won’t receive enough fighters to use them the way the West does, but it can use them to strengthen its air defenses.
Venable said Ukraine does not have enough aircraft, stealth platforms, and other assets to be able to really use its jets to press against Russia. He said partners had to be conscious of leaving enough jets in their own fleets.
Col. Yuriy Ihnat, the head of the Ukrainian air force command’s public relations service, said Ukraine wants more powerful modifications and missiles for its F-16s to compete with Russia, but said the headline-making intercept showed the skill of Ukrainian pilots and how formidable Ukraine’s air force could be with more powerful jets.
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