As Turkey pushes ahead with its ambitious Steel Dome national integrated air defense system, it is looking westward to its traditional NATO partners for strategic systems. Ankara is presently considering acquiring the American MIM-104 Patriot or the Franco-Italian SAMP/T. Whichever it ultimately decides on, these developments are yet another reminder that the Russian S-400 missile systems Turkey acquired seven years ago this month still have no present nor future role in the country’s evolving air defense architecture.
Ahead of the NATO summit Turkey is hosting on Tuesday and Wednesday, Turkish Defense Minister Yasar Guler declared that Ankara was exploring “all options” to meet its air defense requirements, including the Patriot and SAMP/T.
“Our core approach on this issue is clear: we are open to all cooperation that meets our country’s security needs, that includes technology-sharing and joint production, and that is sustainable and in line with the spirit of the alliance,” Guler told Reuters in late June.
While he said Turkey was exploring “all options,” these two options are obviously Western systems. And given how Ankara’s ill-fated foray into acquiring non-Western equivalents yielded little tangible benefit and negative backlash from its NATO allies, that’s hardly surprising.
Turkey has long sought solutions to plug the anti-ballistic missile gap in its air defense system, which rendered it vulnerable to Iraqi and Syrian Scud missiles in the past. The Iran war earlier this year again exposed this vulnerability,and Ankara’s dependency on its NATO allies to provide anti-missile protection, which they did with Patriots deployed in Turkey and SM-3 interceptors fired from warships in the Eastern Mediterranean. In June, NATO also deployed a SAMP/T system to central Turkey’s Konya, with Turkish media noting that the deployment brought the total number of NATO defense systems deployed in the country to four.
As part of its multi-billion-dollar missile defense tender, Ankara sought technology transfer and other co-production arrangements to enhance its domestic arms industry. In 2013, Turkey signaled to its European allies that it would turn to China for its FD-2000, the export version of the HQ-9 system, if American and European defense contractors Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, and Eurosam didn’t offer terms Ankara deemed agreeable. These companies responded by warning Turkey that any FD-2000 acquisition could negatively impact their partnership. By the end of 2015, Turkey had canceled the $3.4 billion deal.
In less than two years, Turkey, having subsequently experienced an attempted coup in July 2016, entered talks with Russia for strategic S-400 missile defense systems. The U.S. and its NATO allies repeatedly warned Ankara of the consequences of going through with that deal. Turkey remained adamant and pushed ahead, acquiring two S-400 systems in 2019 along with 120 interceptor missiles. Until deliveries went ahead that summer, the U.S. had offered an alternative Patriot sale if Turkey terminated the deal. Ankara declined and that potential Patriot deal expired once the S-400s touched down on Turkish soil.
It’s worth remembering that the Russian deal did not include any technology transfers or co-production opportunities. It was merely an off-the-shelf sale with training of the kind Turkey could have gotten from the U.S. at any time with the Patriot. Instead, Turkey acquired Russian systems it never put into active service and got itself banned from acquiring any fifth-generation Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II stealth strike fighters for its air force. Even though the S-400s are the only systems in Turkey’s possession with a nominal anti-ballistic capability, none had the opportunity to shine during the Iran war since they remained inactive and in storage.
The history suggests that these systems are little more than a white elephant. One theory as to why Turkey bought these standalone systems, which are incompatible with Western equivalents by design, was to serve as a defense against its own American-equipped air force in the event of another military coup attempt. The July 2016 coup saw Turkish F-16s execute bombing runs against Ankara. The S-400 was designed for shooting down fighter jets like Turkey and its NATO allies’ F-16s, and non-integrated, standalone Turkish S-400s could theoretically do so easily.
Defense Minister Guler suggested as recently as this March that Turkey is still considering using the S-400 in a non-integrated standalone configuration. However, it seems unlikely that the U.S. would accept such an arrangement as a prerequisite for lifting the F-35 ban. Washington has repeatedly insisted that the system and all its components must first be removed from Turkish soil, or at least disassembled and put under close American inspection if they remain. Therefore, any scenario involving active and operational S-400s in Turkey seems a nonstarter for Washington, unless President Donald Trump soon decides to attempt a policy reversal.
From the get-go, Turkey decided not to include the S-400 in its Steel Dome. Instead, it’s developing a more advanced variant of its indigenous Siper missile, the Siper Block-III, for countering ballistic missiles. The Siper Block-III seems set to become Turkey’s first domestically-produced anti-ballistic missile interceptor. Parallel acquisitions of Patriots or SAMP/Ts will finally help Turkey overcome its lack of any independent anti-ballistic missile defense and reduce present dependencies on its NATO allies to provide these critical capabilities during crises like the Iran war.
While the U.S. had previously been willing to sell Turkey Patriots without any technology transfer, Ankara has since 2017 explored joint production of an advanced SAMP/T for anti-ballistic missile defense. The S-400 acquisition and disagreements with France disrupted this process for almost a decade. That, too, now looks set to change as Reuters reported Monday that France may now be open to a sale after years of opposing it. Whether any eventual deal will include co-production and technology transfer, as Guler says Turkey seeks, is unclear, but it would undoubtedly mark a major breakthrough if it does and further negate any need Turkey has for those S-400s.
Last December, Bloomberg reported that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan asked his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, to take back the systems, clearly hoping that doing so could remove the F-35 ban. Ankara is currently negotiating a deal to procure F110 engines to power the initial batch of its upcoming domestically-built TF Kaan stealth fighter. However, that deal doesn’t indicate any headway is being made on lifting Turkey’s F-35 ban. Interestingly, Erdogan previously suggested Turkey might work with Russia to develop engines for the Kaan, but that never amounted to anything.
It appears that, rather than watch its S-400s collect more dust for another seven years, Ankara sees far greater opportunities in dealing with its Western partners despite past disagreements and disputes. Doing so could enable it to realize the full potential of its domestic Steel Dome and Kaan projects, and even give it a second chance to acquire F-35s, ensuring its air force retains a competitive technological edge over rivals. Accomplishing any one of these is much more valuable than clinging to those Russian systems. Potentially accomplishing all three makes dispensing with them altogether a no-brainer.
