The US Just Locked Ukraine’s F-16s Into the Fight Through 2029
Why a Belgian engine contract matters more than any single jet delivery
Despite the US government’s recent open hostilities toward NATO allies, there is still a dedicated but silent majority inside the US defense apparatus that wants continued strong relationships with our European friends.
Now, we’re getting a glimpse of that group at work. Buried in a routine Pentagon contract notice was a detail that should have set off alarm bells in Moscow and raised eyebrows in every European capital paying attention.
The United States has approved a three-year engine and depot-level maintenance contract for Ukraine’s F-16 fleet. The work will be done in Belgium. It runs through January 2029. It covers labor, materials, and the ugly, unglamorous reality of keeping Western fighter jets alive in wartime.
This was a sustainment decision.
And sustainment decisions tell you more about where a war is going than any speech ever will.
For the better part of two years, the F-16 debate has been stuck in a political loop. Would Ukraine get them. When. From whom. Would they arrive in time. Would they matter. Would Russia escalate. Would pilots be trained. Would airfields survive. Would it change the war.
Now, quietly, the argument has moved on.
Ukraine already has F-16s. They’ve been flying since August 2024. They’ve been intercepting cruise missiles and drones over Ukrainian cities while Russian propagandists insist they’re “irrelevant.” And now Washington has made clear that those jets aren’t a temporary experiment or a symbolic gesture.
They’re being locked into the war for years.
The Pentagon’s approval of a more than $235 million contract with Belgium’s Sabena Aerospace Engineering to maintain Ukraine’s F-16 fleet through 2029 is really all about endurance. It’s about sortie rates, engine cycles, depot turnarounds, and the slow math of airpower that Russia has never been particularly good at.
