PREFLIGHT PREPS US F-16 fighter jets, with a navy chopper within the foreground, await orders to take off at Clark Air Base in Pampanga on Could 9, 2023 in reference to the revived “Cope Thunder” workouts between US and Philippine air forces. Being held this month and once more in July, the drills will contain round 160 American and 400 Filipino servicemen. —NIÑO JESUS ORBETA
MANILA, Philippines — The F-16 fighter jets that Manila plans to purchase from Washington could also be “out there for supply” in 2026 or 2027, Philippine Ambassador to america Jose Manuel “Babe” Romualdez stated Sunday.
His comment got here after america introduced that it has accredited the sale of F-16 fighter jets to the Philippines for $5.5 billion amid the rising tensions between the Philippines and China.
READ: US approves $5.58-B sale of 20 F-16 fighters to PH
READ: AFP welcomes doable F-16 sale to PH; knowledgeable sees simple US Congress nod
“Our associates right here in America have studied that FA-16 is absolutely proper for our Air Drive, for the way lengthy will it have the ability to keep within the air and have the ability to defend our shores,” Romualdez stated in Filipino at an interview over dzBB.
“That is all new. This block has been provided to us for a very long time, this will probably be out there for supply someday subsequent yr or 2027 and the succeeding ones,” he added.
The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) has welcomed the doable sale.
“Something that may modernize and propel us to better heights with our property, we gratefully welcome that for the Armed Forces,” AFP spokesperson Col. Francel Margareth Padilla stated final week.
Earlier, the US Protection Safety Cooperation Company stated the F-16 sale would assist the Philippine Air Drive enhance its “capability to conduct maritime area consciousness” and “improve its suppression of enemy air defenses.”
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