Ukraine

the knock against the legacy Hornet is that it is a short ranged aircraft. The landing gear weight is really not an issue for the F16. That can be mitigated by controlling the sink rate. Norwegian F16s sometimes operate from highways.
You can’t simply give the Ukrainians western aircraft. They are much different from their Soviet designed counterparts. Cockpit ergonomics are different and avionics will be much different. They will have to learn completely different tactics.

Last time this was seriously talked about, I remember hearing it takes a year to train a pilot to fly combat missions on a F16?

I assume a volunteer force of retired NATO "instructors" will be assembled, and magically Ukraine will have competent F16 pilots.

Russia can whine about it, but they did the same exact thing in Korea, and Vietnam.