Frank A St. John, the Chief Operating Officer of Lockheed Martin, said that his company could potentially provide maintenance services for the F-16 fighter aircraft that are being delivered to Ukraine in Poland. This information was disclosed in an interview with Defense One.
He said the company is interested in establishing a regional maintenance center in Poland, and Ukraine is included in this region.
St. John clarified that the center was built to eliminate the necessity of transporting fighter aircraft used in Europe to the United States for maintenance. Kyiv and Washington have to make the decision regarding the maintenance of F-16s delivered to Ukraine in Poland, according to the Lockheed Martin executive.
St. John acknowledged that negotiations regarding this matter are currently underway; however, “no contracts have been signed.” He further said that Lockheed Martin is in the process of expanding its global presence and intends to build maintenance centers in Western Europe and East Asia in the near future.
The executive of the company expressed a desire to implement a comparable model to the one in Poland in the future, as Ukraine develops its own defense industrial base and its requirements expand. St. John clarified that Lockheed Martin does not have any specific intentions in this regard at this time.
Previously, reports from the underground suggested that a Russian strike on a facility in Ivano-Frankivsk involved two F-16s.
