- France is going to send Ukraine Mirage fighter jets, the second Western jet type it will receive.
- The jets can carry Storm Shadow/SCALP missiles, and Ukraine’s jets will reportedly have them.
- The missiles have frustrated Russia’s military.
The new Mirage fighter jets France promised to Ukraine will give it another combat platform able to launch the Western Storm Shadow missiles it has been using to frustrate Russia.
Ukraine has long been using the Storm Shadow/SCALP missiles given to it by the UK and France to fight back against Russia’s invasion, hitting a range of targets, including Russian factories and, it seems, a navy warship, as well as fuel and ammo depots.
Ukraine’s recently acquired American-made F-16s aren’t configured to fire Storm Shadows, leaving it reliant on its Soviet-designed Su-24 aircraft to launch them. The delivery of the French Mirage 2000s would give it another aircraft able to employ these weapons.
France’s armed forces minister, Sébastien Lecornuhas, said earlier this month that his country aimed to send French-made Mirage 2000 jets, manufactured by Dassault Aviation, in the first half of 2025, and the French newspaper La Tribune reported that those jets will be armed with Storm Shadow/SCALP missiles.
Tim Robinson, a military aviation specialist at the UK’s Royal Aeronautical Society, told BI it is beneficial for Ukraine to get more aircraft that can launch the missiles.
“Obviously, you want to get the Storm Shadow, but you need an air platform to launch it from,” he said, adding that the ability to launch it from a higher altitude offers greater range.
Capable cruise missiles
Retired US Army Maj. Gen. Gordon “Skip” Davis, who served as NATO’s deputy assistant secretary-general for its defense-investment division, told BI that “it’s a good thing, the fact that the jets will be capable of launching the SCALP cruise missiles.”
“That’s a big deal,” he said, explaining that the “biggest thing” with the Mirages pledged to Ukraine is that they’ll already be able to launch the Storm Shadow/SCALP missiles the UK and France have been providing.
The stealthy air-launched cruise missiles were developed jointly by the UK and France and manufactured by the multinational European defense outfit MBDA. While the UK calls them Storm Shadows, France calls the weapons SCALP missiles.
The long-range missiles can hit targets up to 155 miles from where they are launched. Each missile costs almost $1 million, according to the BBC.
The UK was the first country to give Kyiv the weapon, with the first deliveries of Storm Shadows/SCALPs taking place in May 2023. France announced deliveries two months later in July. Since the first deliveries, the missiles have become a key weapon in Ukraine’s arsenal.
New fighter jets
The La Tribune report said that France will deliver the first three Mirage jets to Ukraine in the first quarter of next year. France has not said how many it will send.
It is unclear how many Storm Shadow/SCALP missiles France may commit as part of the effort. It also not clear how many of the missiles Ukraine currently has. Ukraine often ends up running low on key types of weaponry before allies decide to replenish its stocks.
But even if it does get more to go with its new jets, the impact of the weapon could be blunted unless allies change their long-standing stance on Ukraine not being allowed to use the long-range weapons they send to strike Russian territory.
Ukraine has long been seeking permission to use Storm Shadows/SCALPs to hit military targets in Russia, with many warfare experts arguing that the restrictions hand Russia a huge advantage because Ukraine has to stop attacks after they are launched instead of destroying the attacks at the source.
Politico reported in August that a Biden administration national security official said Russia’s forces had moved some of their military assets out of range of Ukraine’s Western-provided Storm Shadow/SCALP and ATACMS missiles.
The UK indicated in September that talks with the US over whether to give permission for Ukraine to use Storm Shadows/SCALPS to hit Ukraine were underway.
As for why the US is involved, the US needs to give permission because the Storm Shadows have an American system on board to frustrate Russia’s jamming efforts.
France has said that Ukraine should be allowed to hit military targets inside Russia with its long-range weaponry, but it hasn’t indicated that it will try to bypass US restrictions.
Regardless, the Mirage will be “added value” for Ukraine, Gordon said.
He was critical of how long the decision to send them has taken but said they will still help Ukraine. “It would’ve been nice if they had thought of this maybe a year and a half ago, so they’d be flying right now, but they provide some key advantages,” he said.
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