Ukraine Receives F-16 Fighter Jet

President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said on Sunday that his military had received a first batch of F-16 fighter jets.

The long-awaited arrival of the Western-supplied jets should bolster the country’s defenses, although Kyiv appears to have received too few of them so far to have an immediate impact on the battlefield.

“F-16s are in Ukraine. We did it,” Mr. Zelensky said in a video posted on social media networks showing him at an air base addressing and meeting Ukrainian pilots. He was standing in front of two F-16s, and two more flew overhead as he spoke.

At the very least, the arrival of the jets will bolster Ukrainians’ morale, which has been dampened by months of slow, but steady Russian advances on the battlefield and devastating attacks on the country’s power grid.

Mr. Zelensky said Ukrainian pilots “have already started using them for our country,” but he did not say whether they had already flown combat missions in Ukraine.

Nor did he say how many jets had arrived in the country.