How’s The Latest Wonder Weapon Doing in Ukraine? It Got Shot Down

The history of the War in Ukraine to date has been one long list of failed weapons systems that were supposed to turn the tide of battle. The description of “wonder weapon” attached to each system went from being a sign of hope for the Ukrainians to being a term of ridicule as the weapons failed one after the other.

HIMARS precision guided artillery was supposed to be a game changer until the Russians figured out how to jam the GPS signal so that the missiles went completely off-course. Leopard, Challenger and Abrams tanks were supposed to give Ukraine armored attack capability until they were left burning on the battlefield due to Russian mines, drones and artillery attacks.

The Patriot anti-missile systems were supposed to give air defense capability to Ukrainian cities until the Russians deployed hypersonic missiles. The Patriot system can shoot down normal cruise missiles (about 600 mph) but cannot hit hypersonic missiles (about 4,000 mph or faster). Now the Russian hypersonic missiles are systematically destroying the Patriot batteries, which cost about $1 billion each.

The UK Storm Shadow cruise missiles were supposed to give Ukraine the ability to attack deep inside Russia except that the Russians easily shot them down with S-400 anti-missile systems and drones. More recently, ATACMS supersonic ballistic missiles were provided to Ukraine with a range of 190 miles and intended to attack inside Russia. There were easily shot down by the Russians also.

The latest in this long line of failed wonder weapons is the F-16 fighter jet. The Ukrainian dictator Zelensky had demanded these from the U.S. and NATO allies for several years. Finally, six were recently delivered. These were obsolete models from the Netherlands.

(One of the dirty little secrets of the war is that the U.S. and allies deliver old weapons to Ukraine and use the money appropriated by Congress to build new weapons for us. This weapons building takes years and is of no use to the Ukrainians today).

Were the F-16s a game changer? Of course not.

Just days after being deployed, one of the Ukrainian F-16s was shot down. Ukraine’s top pilot, Oleksiy Mes, call sign “Moonfish,” was killed in the shoot down.

The ultimate irony? Moonfish and his F-16 were shot down by a Ukrainian Patriot missile battery. Apparently, there was no communication between the Air Force and Patriot missile operators. The war drags on now 30 months old with no end in sight. 500,000 Ukrainians have been killed in combat.

The bloodstained warmongers Biden, Harris, Lindsey Graham and dictator Zelensky say, “fight on.” Soon there will be little left of Ukraine and no one left to fight.

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