The FDP military expert Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann reacts skeptically to the Ukrainian government's demands to supply modern fighter jets after the Leopard tanks. "I don't see that with the planes, to say it directly," said Strack-Zimmermann - a vehement supporter of arms deliveries to Ukraine - on Wednesday in the RTL / ntv "Frühstart".

The handover of aircraft is associated with completely different challenges and risks than the delivery of tanks, she made clear. "If a tank isn't being served properly, it might stand still. If it's an airplane, it'll fall down. And getting air superiority is unlikely."

Previously, the former Ukrainian ambassador to Germany, Andriy Melnyk, had called for modern fighter jets to defend against the Russian war of aggression. The allies should set up a strong fighter jet coalition, with US F-16s and F-35s, Eurofighters and Tornados, French Rafales and Swedish Gripen jets. Melnyk is now deputy foreign minister.

In mid-January, the former NATO commander-in-chief James Stavridis, a former US admiral, also suggested supplying combat aircraft in addition to tanks. On the one hand he thinks of MiG-29 fighter jets of Soviet design from Poland, which the Ukrainians know how to operate and which could be delivered directly. They could then be supported by F-16s from the United States.

The AfD party and faction leader Alice Weidel warned of an escalation: "After the battle tanks, planes are required, after these then logistics troops so that more Ukrainians can come to the front, at some point combat troops," she told the t-online portal. "Nobody attacked Germany. Nobody attacked a NATO country."