US Boneyard F-16s Spotted in Quiet Transfer to Ukraine
The US Air Force has now confirmed raiding the boneyard to get Ukraine spare parts for their F-16s
Photos surfaced last week of disassembled F-16 Fighting Falcons, stripped of wings, engines, and radomes, being shrink-wrapped and loaded onto a Ukrainian An-124 cargo jet in Tucson, Arizona.
The Ukrainian cargo plane was identified as the 'Be Brave Like Kharkiv' UR-82027 (#508015).
Flight trackers confirmed the aircraft’s destination: Rzeszów, Poland, the logistical nerve center for Ukraine’s war effort. What looked like military surplus scrap turned out to be a lifeline.
In a statement to The War Zone, the US Air Force confirmed the data: these jets are heading to Ukraine, not to fly, but to be cannibalized for parts. The aircraft were sourced from Davis-Monthan Air Force Base’s famed “boneyard,” where hundreds of legacy aircraft bake in the Arizona sun under the stewardship of the 309th Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group.
While these old airframes are non-operational and missing major components like engines and radar, they contain an invaluable commodity: spare parts. And in wartime logistics, parts are as important as planes.
Why Ukraine Needs the Boneyard Now
Ukraine’s fleet of F-16s, donated by several European countries, is growing quickly. The numbers are substantial: 24 from the Netherlands, 19 from Denmark, 12 from Norway, and 30 expected from Belgium.
That brings the promised total to 85 airframes, although some are earmarked for training at the European F-16 Training Center in Romania.
But in war, downtime is death. And nowhere is that more true than in combat aviation, where the time between missions can decide whether a strike hits its target or a missile convoy slips away.
In the US Air Force, we had codes for this: FMC for fully-mission-capable, PMC for partially-mission-capable, and the dreaded NMC for non-mission-capable.
For Ukraine, flying the F-16 is not just about mastering a Western fighter jet; it is about keeping it FMC, day after day, in one of the most hostile air defense environments on the planet.
Unlike its older Soviet-era MiGs and Sukhois, which Ukraine has nursed along for years with domestic ingenuity and black-market parts, the F-16 is a Western thoroughbred. It requires Western maintenance procedures, Western diagnostic tools, and most critically, Western parts.
And parts, in wartime, do not grow on trees. They get hoarded, rationed, and fought over. Spare wings, actuators, cockpit electronics, and radome components each become a bottleneck in their own right.
That’s where the boneyard comes in.
The retired F-16s sitting in Arizona's Davis-Monthan Air Force Base may look like metallic fossils, but to Ukrainian mechanics, they represent operational gold. These aircraft, though unfit to fly, are fully compatible with the Ukrainian Viper fleet in terms of structure, wiring architecture, and non-expendable components.
Cannibalizing them allows Kyiv to create its own ad hoc spares supply chain, free from the long delays and export controls of new production lines.
There’s also another reason these husks matter: training. Before a wrench is turned on a live aircraft, maintainers need something to practice on.
These decommissioned jets serve as perfect ground instruction platforms for the growing cadre of Ukrainian technicians being fast-tracked through conversion courses. That means fewer errors when it matters most, and faster turnaround times at forward bases under threat.
And there’s a tactical logic at play, too. With the Russian military prioritizing HIMARS, SAMP/T, and now F-16s as high-value targets, Ukraine needs the ability to rotate damaged aircraft out of the fight quickly and plug gaps in the fleet with prepositioned parts.
The boneyard fleet makes this possible, acting as a buffer against battlefield attrition that, without support, could erode Ukraine’s airpower faster than it can be replenished.
In short, these airframes are not junk. They are insurance. Insurance against supply chain choke points, combat losses, and mechanical wear from a war that grinds every system it touches. For a nation fighting for its survival with borrowed aircraft and borrowed time, the boneyard is not just useful.
It is strategic.
The F-16 is a high-maintenance platform, and many of these jets are older Block 15 or Block 20 models. Some are even ex-Air National Guard aircraft.
European allies are struggling to deliver not just the jets, but the infrastructure to keep them flying. Belgium, for example, has already flagged spare parts shortages as a major delay factor.
The Strategic Value of Cannibalized Airframes
The United States has long used its boneyard aircraft for more than just scrap. Some get converted into QF-16 drones. Others are transferred to allies.
What’s new here is the direct role that these non-flyable aircraft are playing in sustaining a wartime air force.
According to The War Zone, at last count, the US had the following F-16s mothballed at Davis-Monthan:
150 F-16As
27 F-16Bs
143 F-16Cs
22 F-16Ds
But quantity does not always mean quality. Many of these aircraft are missing critical systems or have been stripped to the bone for other programs. Still, their internal wiring, hydraulics, structural components, landing gear, and avionics racks represent a goldmine for Ukrainian maintainers.
And while the Pentagon has not confirmed how many F-16s are being provided for parts, the fact that they are leaving Arizona shrink-wrapped in Ukrainian cargo planes tells us everything we need to know.
How are the Vipers Doing Over Ukraine
While Kyiv has kept operational details sparse, enough images have emerged to show the F-16s flying a wide range of missions.
In air-to-air roles, they are carrying AIM-120 AMRAAMs and AIM-9X Sidewinders, as well as older AIM-9L/M variants.
Triple fuel tanks are a common sight, revealing the lack of air-to-air refueling capacity in Ukraine’s Air Force.
On strike missions, they are loaded with GBU-39/B Small Diameter Bombs mounted on BRU-61 racks, allowing each aircraft to carry up to eight precision-guided munitions. These are ideal for hitting supply depots, artillery nests, and mobile command posts.
To survive in Russia’s heavily contested airspace, Ukrainian Vipers are equipped with AN/ALQ-131 ECM pods and internal electronic warfare suites that integrate with advanced pylons.
These give the jets a fighting chance against Russian radar-guided missiles and electronic warfare threats.
Ukraine has confirmed the loss of at least two F-16s on combat missions since they began flying in the country. One loss was confirmed in August 2024 and another in April 2025.
But by and large, Ukraine’s F-16s have been extremely successful over Ukraine.
In fact, I just wrote about Ukraine’s staggering success over the past two weeks using F-16s on strike missions. It is an exclusive article for paid subscribers, so if you want to help fund independent journalism and read about the Ukrainian top guns bringing the pain to the Russians, consider upgrading!
A Stopgap or the Start of Something Bigger?
At first glance, shipping stripped-down, engine-less F-16s from the Arizona desert to a warzone sounds like a desperate patch job. A kind of Frankenstein logistics solution cobbled together with duct tape and political patience.
But scratch beneath the surface, and it starts to look a lot more like a quiet shift in strategy, one that could redefine how Western airpower gets distributed in future proxy conflicts.
The delivery of boneyard jets to Ukraine is not just about spare parts. It’s about establishing precedent. This is the first time the United States has tapped into its deep aircraft reserve not for training or drone conversion, but to directly support an ally at war with a peer adversary.
That’s new territory. It suggests Washington is willing to turn the Air Force’s cold-storage stockpile into a functional strategic reserve, much like it has done with aging Army equipment like Bradleys – not just for America’s own use, but for its partners.
It also lays the groundwork for a more modular model of military aid. Instead of delivering full squadrons, future aid packages could mix flyable jets with stripped airframes, spare kits, and diagnostic tools tailored to each partner’s needs and maintenance infrastructure.
In Ukraine’s case, it offers a realistic roadmap to building long-term airpower without waiting for Lockheed Martin’s production lines to catch up with geopolitical demand.
This approach also quietly decouples Western airpower from traditional procurement constraints. With newer F-16s being retained for US aggressor squadrons and export deals, Washington needed a way to support Ukraine’s rapid expansion without handing over its frontline assets. The boneyard solution does that. And if it works, and early signs suggest it will, it may become the template for how aging US airframes are repurposed for frontline use in contested regions.
There is also a political calculus. Sending fully operational jets to Ukraine has always been a red line for some policymakers wary of escalating with Moscow. But sending them in boxes, minus the engines and radars?
That is easier to defend. It is plausible deniability by design, quiet help without the flashpoint headlines. Yet the operational impact is still real. These parts will keep jets flying, and those jets will keep Russian generals sleeping a little less soundly.
If you’re like me, you may be thinking, “Wait, I thought the US was turning hostile toward Ukraine – or at least, the Trump administration doesn’t seem to be very inclined to continue military aid at the same volume level as its predecessor.”
And while that is absolutely true, military aid from the US to Ukraine still flows. Here’s why:
Much of the military aid to Ukraine is appropriated and authorized by Congress, sometimes years in advance. Even if the executive branch is less enthusiastic, it may be legally obligated to carry out aid packages that have already been passed.
Rolling back appropriations isn’t simple, especially if both parties still support some level of aid.
Also, military logistics don’t turn on a dime. Once a support program begins, it's difficult to unwind without major intervention. If the USAF was already coordinating transfers of F-16 parts or prepping retired aircraft for shipment, stopping that train mid-route requires active pushback from senior civilian leadership, and that’s not always a priority, especially early in a new administration.
Even if the US president is skeptical of aid to Ukraine, NATO allies (like the Netherlands, Denmark, or Norway) are all-in on Ukraine’s F-16 program.
Supplying parts from the boneyard may be framed as a support role for allies rather than for Ukraine directly. It keeps NATO united while technically sidestepping unilateral weapons deliveries.
Finally, military aid isn’t just geopolitics, it’s business. Defense contractors and their congressional champions often have significant influence over what’s built, shipped, or sold. There may be quiet pressure from the military-industrial complex to keep Ukraine’s F-16s healthy and keep parts and systems flowing.
It could also be something as simple as this: Putin has been jerking Trump around lately with regards to negotiating a ceasefire. Trump, in his petty, transactional way, could have just said, “Fine, send Ukraine some spare parts.”
So yes, the F-16 boneyard effort began as a stopgap. But it may end up as something bigger. A shadow supply chain. A test run for scalable airpower logistics. A way for the West to project capability without triggering the same political backlash as full-up arms transfers.
And if Ukraine proves that a Frankenstein fleet can not only fly but fight and win, expect others to take note.
In an era defined by drone swarms, contested skies, and stretched industrial bases, the line between surplus and strategic asset just got a little blurrier.
Слава Україні. Crimea is Ukraine!
I've always wanted to poke around the Davis-Monthan boneyard! Also, great to see these assets put to *very* good use by the Ukrainians.
This is good news