American pro-Kremlin “expert” Scott Ritter, a former UN Armaments Inspector in Iraq, in an interview with journalist Garland Nixon, said that Russia’s high-tech air defense systems were able to completely destroy Ukrainian aviation. According to him, every time a Ukrainian plane, for example, a MiG-29, takes off, it is immediately shot down. Ritter also emphasized that the destruction of enemy aircraft gives the Russian army a great advantage. This is one of the important factors that makes a Russian military offensive possible.

Colleagues from the StopFake project began checking information about the “total liquidation” of Ukrainian aviation. When researching this topic, the fact-checkers referred to the Dutch independent project Oryx, which daily updates the loss of military equipment in Ukraine and Russia. According to it, as of October 27, Ukraine had lost 77 aircraft, while Russia had lost 93 aircraft during the war. For security reasons, Ukraine does not disclose information about the number of its combat aircraft, but at the end of March 2023, another propagandist Oleksandr Khramchykhin wrote that at that time Ukraine had about 350 combat aircraft remaining. Considering this, as well as the fact that Khramchykhin could very likely have underestimated the figures, it can be argued that Ukrainian aviation still did not suffer “crushing losses” on the battlefield during the war. In addition, in 2024, Ukraine's allies will begin delivering F-16 fighters to more effectively fight Russia.

Although Scott Ritter held high positions at the end of the 20th century, already in 2012 he was sent to prison on charges of pedophilia. In 2014 he was released. Since 2019, he has been collaborating with the Russian channel RT and has been making propaganda statements ever since. We previously wrote about how Ritter accused Ukraine of war crimes in Bucha.