The Pentagon Friday threatened “grave consequences” if NATO ally Turkey completes a deal to acquire Russian S-400 air defenses.
“I can tell you that if Turkey takes the S-400s there would be grave consequences in terms of our military relationship with them,” said Charles Summers, acting chief spokesman for the Pentagon.
As one of eight international partners who help build the F-35, Turkey has already taken ownership of two F-35s, but they remain at Luke Air Force Base in Arizona, where Turkish pilots have been training to fly the high-tech fighter jets.
The Pentagon has offered to sell the Patriot Missile system to augment Turkish air defenses in an effort to dissuade President Recep Tayyip Erdogan from buying the Russian air defense system, which is incompatible with NATO systems.
“If they take the S-400s, they would not get the F-35s and Patriots,” Summer told reporters at an informal Pentagon briefing.
The threat comes the same week NATO Supreme Allied Commander, Europe, Gen. Curtis Scaparrotti, told Congress he would advise against allowing Turkey to have F-35s, which he called “one of our most advanced technological capabilities,” if the country is using Russian systems designed to shoot them down.
“This is a huge decision for Turkey,” said Scaparrotti in Senate testimony Tuesday. “I’ve talked to them personally, as all of our leadership has.”
Turkey would be giving up not only access to the F-35 but the ability to be a partner building some parts of the plane, which would hurt Turkish aerospace companies, including Alp Aviation, AYESAS, Kale Aviation, Kale Pratt & Whitney, and Turkish Aerospace Industries.
“I would hope that they would reconsider this one decision on S-400, one system, but potentially forfeit many of the other systems and one of the most important systems that we can provide them,” Scaparrotti said.
