Russia has made similar claims against Ukrainian F-16s in the past. Most have turned out to be false, and neither Ukraine nor NATO has confirmed the most recent one.
The Russian military claimed earlier this week that one of its S-300 air defense units successfully shot down a Ukrainian F-16 Fighting Falcon. The battery’s commander, who was identified by his callsign “Sever,” said that two missiles were fired, with the first one damaging the F-16 and then the second one “finish[ing] off” the American-made multirole fighter.
Posts on social media attempted to support the claims, but third-party observers haven’t independently confirmed the downing of an F-16. Kyiv disputed that any Fighting Falcon was lost this year.
The F-16 Fighting Falcon’s Specifications
- Year Introduced: 1978
- Number Built: ~4,600+
- Length: 49 ft 5 in (15.06 m)
- Wingspan: 32 ft 8 in (9.96 m)
- Weight (MTOW): ~42,300 lb. (19,187 kg)
- Engines: One GE F100 or F110 turbofan (23,770–29,000 lbf thrust)
- Top Speed: ~1,500 mph (2,400 km/h) / Mach 2.0
- Combat Radius: ~340–500 mi (550–800 km)
- Service Ceiling: ~50,000 ft (15,200 m)
- Loadout: 9 hardpoints; ~17,000 lb. payload
- Aircrew: 1 (or 2 for B/D variants)
Russia Has Made Unproven F-16 Kill Claims Before
Since almost immediately after the first F-16s arrived in Ukraine in August 2024, the Kremlin and its mouthpieces have claimed—often with no evidence—that it had succeeded in downing the Western-supplied Fighting Falcon.
What makes this latest allegation of the successful downing of an F-16 seem all the more dubious is that it came just over a year after a similar claim was made that Russian air defenses scored a victory. It was also around the same time that a Russian blogger released a propaganda video that showed Santa Claus being shot down over Moscow with assistance from Ded Moroz—the Slavic version of Saint Nicholas or Father Christmas. The video ends with Ded Morz telling a Russian serviceman, “We don’t need anything foreign in our skies. Happy New Year!”
In an odd twist, pro-Kremlin military bloggers (milbloggers) have also acknowledged the F-16’s aerial victories—notably in October 2024, when a Fighting Falcon downed a Russian Su-34 (NATO reporting name “Fullback”).
The first actual loss of a Ukrainian F-16 to enemy fire took place in April 2025, which Kyiv did acknowledge.
Why Is Russia Claiming a New Kill Now?
The timing of these new claims that an S-300 scored such a feat may be due to how poorly the Russian-made and supplied air defense system performed earlier this year during the US mission that saw the capture of President Nicolás Maduro. According to a report from The New York Times on Monday, Venezuela’s S-300VMs were largely non-operational. They failed to stop the large-scale US airstrikes that preceded the Special Forces operations on the ground.
The Latin American nation has operated the S-300 and Buk-M2E platforms since 2009, and each was seen as a capable weapon that would pose a danger to US aircraft. That certainly wasn’t the case earlier this month, though, when US special forces troops breezed into Venezuela, abducted dictator Nicolas Maduro, and left without the country’s air defenses firing a shot. One factor may have been that the air defense batteries weren’t networked, if they were even operational at all!
“The Venezuelan armed forces were practically unprepared for the US attack,” Yaser Trujillo, a military analyst in Venezuela, told The New York Times. “Their troops were not dispersed, the detection radar was not activated, deployed, or operational. It was a chain of errors that allowed the United States to operate with ease, facing a very low threat from the Venezuelan air defense system.”
There has also been speculation that the Kremlin may have allowed the S-300 units to “deteriorate” to ensure that it wasn’t dragged into a conflict with the United States.
Yet, regardless of why the S-300 failed to perform its role, the fact remains that it failed to stop any US aircraft. Russia has continued to tout its capabilities, so, to paraphrase US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, “It is a bad look.” One of the most capable anti-aircraft systems did little if anything, and to change the narrative, the Russian military claimed it succeeded in downing an F-16.
The problem with such a claim is that it has been made before, and multiple times, it has been proven that Russia was crying wolf. This time, apart from some pro-Russian Indian news outlets, the foreign media largely didn’t buy the story.
About the Author: Peter Suciu
Peter Suciu has contributed over 3,200 published pieces to more than four dozen magazines and websites over a 30-year career in journalism. He regularly writes about military hardware, firearms history, cybersecurity, politics, and international affairs. Peter is also a contributing writer for Forbes and Clearance Jobs. He is based in Michigan. You can follow him on Twitter: @PeterSuciu. You can email the author: [email protected].
Image: Shutterstock / mustafaolgun.
