As of February 29, the Ukrainian Air Force (UkrAF) has claimed to have shot down a total of 13 Russian military fixed-wing aircraft since January 30, marking the highest number of Russian military jet losses in a single month and the greatest increase in results for Ukraine’s anti-air operations since October 2022.
These losses – all of which were operated by the Russian Aerospace Forces (RuAF) – include ten Su-34 Fullback fighter-bombers, two Su-35S Flanker-E multi-role fighters and one A-50U Mainstay airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) aircraft. As has been the norm so far, there has been no official confirmation from the Russian Ministry of Defence (MOD), but Russian social media channels have confirmed some of them, including the second loss of a Russian A-50U this year (see ‘Ukrainian missiles take out Russian C2 aircraft’, AFM March 2024, p8).
