Even though Australia has more than 40 decommissioned F/A-18 Hornet multirole fighters, there are obvious obstacles to transferring these aircraft to Ukraine. The Australian Minister of Defence, Richard Marles, was recently interviewed by ABC Radio National, during which he referred to the handover of these aircraft as a complex issue. He confirmed that the negotiations about the aircraft are still ongoing; nevertheless, the procedure is far more involved than other types of military support.
Midway through July, the multirole fighter aircraft transfer of the F/A-18 Hornet had yet to progress beyond the discussion stage.
It is a fact that switching over to multirole fighter aircraft is a substantially more complicated process than switching over to armoured vehicles, and this fact needs to be acknowledged. Training pilots and technicians to operate a specific type of aircraft is necessary. And this procedure appears to have been more complex than the quest for F-16s for Ukraine, as indicated by the fact that eleven countries have already established what is being called the “F-16 coalition.”
Because the Ukrainian Air Force cannot remove all its personnel and cease ground services simultaneously to carry out its training programmes, the country is also at risk of being adversely affected by the issues surrounding this situation. Because of this, it is necessary to divide up the pool of available professionals in a manner that considers the length of the training period and the number and kind of aircraft that are to be transferred.
Australia is a consistent supplier of guns to Ukraine. Along with the United States, it has begun transferring M777 howitzers, delivering armoured vehicles (more than a hundred Bushmaster MRAPs), an unknown number of M113 armoured personnel carriers, and other armaments.
At the NATO summit in Vilnius, Australia presented a new assistance package to the alliance, which included the donation of 30 extra Bushmaster armoured vehicles.
