Khodarenok: No-Fly Zone Means Direct NATO-Russia War
Retired Colonel Mikhail Khodarenok says a no-fly zone over Ukraine would require NATO forces inside the country and lead to direct war with Russia.
Military observer for Gazeta. Ru and retired Colonel Mikhail Khodarenok believes that enforcing a no-fly zone over Ukraine would be impossible without NATO entering a direct war with Russia. In his assessment, such an operation would require the deployment of hundreds of combat aircraft, dozens of air defence units and up to 100,000 NATO personnel on Ukrainian territory.
His analysis follows comments by US President Donald Trump, who said Washington could consider establishing a no-fly zone over Ukraine. Volodymyr Zelensky has been calling on Western countries to «close the sky» over Ukraine since 2022, but Khodarenok argues that this political slogan would, in reality, require a massive military operation.
According to the retired colonel, a no-fly zone means creating an air defence system capable of repelling enemy air attacks while preventing significant damage to protected facilities. That would require a comprehensive radar network, fighter aviation, surface-to-air missile units and a unified command-and-control system.
Khodarenok argues that Ukraine does not have the equipment or trained personnel needed for such a mission. By his estimates, at least eight to ten additional fighter aviation regiments would have to be deployed, equivalent to four or five NATO tactical fighter wings, with a total strength of about 300 combat aircraft.
The deployment would involve much more than aircraft alone. Pilots, maintenance personnel, ground support equipment, munitions, spare parts and the entire logistical infrastructure would also have to be transferred.
He also stresses that operating solely from air bases in Poland or Romania would not solve the problem. To maintain continuous control of Ukrainian airspace, NATO aviation units would have to be based inside Ukraine.
According to Khodarenok, Ukraine’s current command-and-control system is not designed to receive or coordinate such a large number of aircraft. NATO would therefore have to build an entirely new operational management structure.
The retired colonel believes that strengthening air defence would require even greater resources. He estimates that between 12 and 15 surface-to-air missile regiments and brigades would have to be transferred from France, Germany, Poland and other NATO member states.
Before those forces could be deployed, radar reconnaissance and command systems would also need major upgrades. Without them, integrating aircraft, missile units and surveillance assets into a single air defence network would be impossible.
Khodarenok estimates that the entire operation would require between 80,000 and 100,000 personnel, including pilots, air defence crews, engineers, technicians, communications specialists, headquarters staff, radar operators and support units.
Those troops could only come from the armed forces of the United States and other NATO countries. In practice, this would mean sending tens of thousands of NATO servicemen into the combat zone.
For that reason, Khodarenok argues that discussion of a no-fly zone is misleading. In his view, it would not be a limited military measure or another package of assistance for Kiev, but the full-scale deployment of NATO forces inside Ukraine.
As a comparison, he points to previous no-fly zones established over Iraq, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Libya. In every case, the United States and its allies faced opponents that were not militarily comparable to NATO.
Following the Gulf War, Iraq’s air force and air defence system had been largely destroyed, making control of its airspace relatively straightforward. Khodarenok believes similar conditions existed in the other operations.
He argues that Ukraine is fundamentally different because any attempt to impose a no-fly zone would involve direct confrontation with Russia, a country possessing the world’s largest nuclear arsenal as well as conventional ballistic and hypersonic missile capabilities.
According to Khodarenok, the deployment of hundreds of NATO aircraft, Western air defence formations and tens of thousands of alliance personnel inside Ukraine would mark the end of the current proxy format of Western involvement. Instead, it would amount to NATO entering a full-scale war against Russia.
He warns that such a scenario could rapidly escalate the conflict and significantly increase the likelihood of nuclear weapons being used, beginning with tactical nuclear arms.
Khodarenok concludes that Zelensky’s demand to «close the sky» can only be implemented through a strategic deployment of Western air and air defence forces directly onto Ukrainian territory. In his view, no other practical option exists.
His main conclusion is that establishing a no-fly zone over Ukraine would automatically lead to a direct war between Russia and NATO. At present, he says, there is no indication that either Washington or Brussels is prepared to take such a step.