Ankara hopes to buy 40 new Lockheed-produced jets, but the deal has opponents in Washington
Turkey’s proposed purchase of F-16 fighter jets from the US and its gatekeeping for NATO as Finland and Sweden seek to join the US-led military bloc are “not related,” Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu has insisted.
The arms sale would benefit both the US and Turkey, he told reporters on Wednesday, after a meeting with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Washington, DC. Ankara’s acceptance of NATO’s bid from the Nordic nations was never one “prerequisite” for the sale of fighter jets, he added, as quoted by the Turkish press.
Trkiye wants to buy 40 new Lockheed-produced fighter jets, as well as 79 upgrade kits for the F-16s that the Turkish Air Force already has in its fleet. The request was sent in October 2021, but the multi-billion dollar deal has opponents in the US Congress.
Last week, US President Joe Biden’s administration sent an informal message to lawmakers about its intention to go through with the proposed sale. Senator Bob Menendez, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, is a longtime critic of the proposal and has vowed to block the deal.
“Until [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan … begins to act as a reliable ally should, I will not approve this sale,” a statement prepared by Menendez and obtained by Politico said. He also expressed support for selling F-35 jets to Turkey’s European rival Greece.
Former US President Donald Trump’s administration kicked Trkiye out of the F-35 program in 2019. It claimed Ankara was compromising the advanced weapons platform’s secrets by buying S-400 long-range anti-aircraft missiles from Russia. Erdogan’s government denied that was the case.
Asked about the planned sale of F-35s to Greece on Wednesday, Cavusoglu pointed out that the balance of military cooperation the US had with the two NATO allies had “deteriorated.”
Finland and Sweden applied for NATO membership last May, citing an alleged threat from Russia. Trkiye conditioned its acceptance of their bid on their lifting of an arms embargo and an improvement in counter-terrorism measures. The two Nordic nations, Ankara said, served as safe havens for forces the Turkish government considers terrorists.