Zelenskky to fly in for talks with G7 leaders after US approves sending F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine
The US and its allies are planning to provide Ukraine with F-16 fighter jets, the White House has said.
The timing for when Kyiv will receive the aircraft, how many will be delivered, and which countries will provide them remains unclear, but an official stressed they will not be used for an upcoming counteroffensive against Russia.
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President Joe Biden has also endorsed the training of Ukrainian pilots to fly F-16s, the White House said.
Until now, he had refused his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy‘s requests for the jets.
But speaking on the fringes of the G7 summit in Japan, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Western assistance to Ukraine needed to change as the conflict changed.
“As the training unfolds in the coming months, we will work with our allies to determine when planes will be delivered, who will be delivering them, and how many,” he added.
Mr Zelenskyy and Mr Biden are now set to hold face-to-face talks over the weekend, with the Ukrainian president confirmed to be jetting into Hiroshima for the G7 summit.
Japan’s foreign ministry announced he would arrive on Sunday to meet with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, and America’s national security chief said a Zelenskyy-Biden summit was also a “safe bet”.
Sir Lindsay Hoyle was presented with the helmet of one of the most successful Ukrainian pilots
The provision of F-16s is a long-awaited win for Mr Zelenskyy, who has regularly called on Western allies to provide powerful aircraft to his troops.
On a visit to London, he even presented Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle with a Ukrainian air force helmet to reinforce his point.
Western leaders have argued that training on the aircraft would take too long. It would also be some of the most sophisticated hardware provided for Ukraine, raising the stakes between Russia and the West.
It is understood the F-16s may not necessarily come from the US, but the move is part of a long-term effort to strengthen Ukraine’s security, a White House official said.
“Discussions about improving the Ukrainian Air Force reflect our long-term commitment to Ukraine’s self-defence,” the senior Biden administration official added.
Mr Biden said in an interview with ABC News in February that US military advice showed Ukraine did not need F-16s at the time.
“I’m ruling it out for now,” he said.
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Efforts to train Ukrainian pilots on the jets could start at sites in Europe in the coming weeks, and will take months.
Colin Kahl, the Pentagon’s top policy official, previously told Congress that training Ukrainian pilots on F-16s could take “about 18 months”.
Other US defence officials have said the training could be shortened to only six to nine months, based on pilots’ previous training and knowledge of fighter aircraft.
Mr Kahl has previously said that it could cost up to $11bn (£9bn) to revitalise Ukraine’s military with F-16 jets.
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G7 leaders have not announced who would pay to provide Ukraine with the planes.
In March, NBC News reported that two Ukrainian pilots were in the US undergoing an assessment to determine how long it could take to train them to fly attack aircraft, including F-16s.
Washington had also approved bringing up to 10 more Ukrainian pilots to the US for further assessment.
Elon Musk could be on track for a $1trn pay packet.
Tesla shareholders have approved the whopping financial package for the CEO – who’s already worth an estimated $491bn – if he hits a series of ambitious targets over the next 10 years.
But that $1trn figure (or £761,910,000,000) – which is both one thousand billion and one million million – is almost impossible to imagine for most people.
Even so, we have drilled down into the numbers and examined what you can do with a trillion US dollars – and it turns out, quite a lot.
Show me the money
Laid end to end, a trillion one-dollar bills would cover a distance of approximately 156 billion metres.
That could wrap around the equator 3,890 times, easily reach the sun from Earth (around 149.6 million km) or loop from Earth to the moon 405 times.
That many one-dollar notes could cover a massive area (roughly 10,339 km squared), meaning you could blanket nearly all of Lebanon or Jamaica in bills.
Spend it on sport
You could splash out on virtually all of the world’s major sporting leagues.
The clubs which make up the Premier League are relatively cheap ($30bn), and even when snapping up the UEFA Champions League clubs and the big five top divisions of Spain, Italy, Germany, and France, there’s still $858bn left in the kitty.
The four major US sports leagues for ice hockey, baseball, basketball, and American football (NFL, NBA, MLB and NHL) have a rough valuation of $544bn, according to Sportico.
But then add the IPL cricket league ($120bn) and F1 ($23.1bn) and Musk still has change from an estimated total spend of $829.7bn.
Elon Musk is in the money if he hits targets set by Tesla’s shareholders. File pic: AP
Take over Tesla’s rivals
He could buy up the top 15 largest publicly traded automakers (excluding Tesla) by market capitalisation.
They would include firms like Japan’s Toyota ($275bn), Chinese automaker BYD ($120bn), and luxury brands like Ferrari ($81bn) and Mercedes-Benz ($62bn), as well as BMW ($52bn), Volkswagen ($50bn) and Ford ($48bn).
But there would still be a little change left over; the total bill would be an eye-watering $992bn.
Buy up San Diego
He could buy up every single residential property in San Diego County – valued at a total of $1trn. Seattle is just slightly out of reach at $1.1trn, according to recent data from real estate firm Zillow.
But if he wanted to buy big – there is always Tennessee. The total value of homes in the US state is estimated at $957bn. Or there is Maryland, which at $1.01trn could be bought if he can find a little more cash behind the sofa.
Sadly, he would struggle to scoop up London’s entire housing stock, which in February was valued at just under £2trn ($2.53trn), according to agents Savills.
Cities like New York ($4.6trn) and Los Angeles ($3.9trn) are also not within his budget, hosting America’s most expensive residential markets.
Do something charitable?
There is always the possibility Musk could follow in the footsteps of Microsoft founder Bill Gates, who intends to give away 99% of his vast fortune over the next 20 years.
He could give every single man, woman, and child in the US a share of his cash pile. They would receive approximately $2,917.32 (£2,223.29), based on a population estimate of 342.7 million.
Although it would be roughly $14,348.79 (£10,935.20) for every person (roughly 69.6 million) in the UK.
If he wanted to give the entire globe an early Christmas present, then based on the rough world population estimate of 8.2 billion, everyone would receive $121.80 (£92.87).
Pay off the credit card
With $1trn, he could instantly rewrite history and erase debt interest payments and the government debt from dozens of the world’s sovereign nations.
Or Musk could wipe out the debts of Singapore ($1trn) or South Korea ($0.99trn) in one go, according to figures from the International Monetary Fund’s latest World Economic Outlook (Oct 2025).
But when it comes to the biggest debt-laden countries, $1trn would not even touch the sides.
The US has $38.3trn of government debt (just over one third of the total global debt pile) while the UK has a modest $4.1trn.
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