The United States has strongly opposed Turkey’s hope to rejoin the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, primarily over Ankara’s acquisition of the Russian S-400 air-defense system and Ankara’s adoption of the Huawei 5G network.
Various proposals Ankara made, selling or deactivating S-400s, were unlikely to alleviate Washington’s urgent security concerns.
The city has tried everything, selling the units to India or Pakistan or even giving them to Ukraine.
But the new proposal sounds like keeping the S-400s inoperable and letting the U.S. inspect them.
That won’t fly in Washington either. According to Forbes, Turkey has shown the S-400 radars to date and even tested a test launch, but it still hasn’t integrated the system into its entire air defenses.
The United States has faced similar problems in the past, most notably with Pakistan and the F-16 Fighting Falcon.
Washington obtained an arrangement with Islamabad that included unprecedented safeguards over the technology.
A similar deal for Turkey might be looked at, though Bloomberg reported Ankara appears to be intent on holding onto its S-400s while working on its fifth-generation stealth fighter.
Other concerns are that the S-400 is part of Huawei’s installation of 5G in Turkey.
Huwaei has been a security concern for the United States for decades, and its potential links with espionage led to assassinated sales of the F-35 with the United Arab Emirates, among others.
Further complicating matters is Turkey’s relationship with Russia and its tensions with NATO member Greece.
For the Kremlin, it may also have little motive to allow Ankara to sell the S-400, since this issue has already sown discord within NATO.
Given these issues, along with geopolitics, it seems nearly impossible that Turkish pilots will ever sit in the cockpit of an F-35.
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