strategy

S-400 Triumf or F-35 Lightning II?

Recently, in March 2023, it was announced in the press by our defense industry officials that we no longer needed the S-400 air defense system due to our national defense technology capabilities.

Our country, which has made strategic decisions to have the S-400 Triumf air missile defense system and the F-35 Lightning II or JSF, which are two weapon systems that are superior in their field and contain the most sought-after critical technologies in our age, has unfortunately not been successful in accessing both systems in the same process.

Our need for the S-400 air missile defense system has emerged due to the need to develop urgent measures against the threats posed by some ballistic long-range weapons that have shown the capacity to reach our capital city, especially in the context of the crises with some peripheral countries. At the point when the crisis turned into a serious threat, NATO deployed some of its air and missile defense systems to the relevant regions, but after a certain period of time, it assessed that the threat had lost its seriousness and withdrew its forces and support. Our belief and assessments are that this threat continues to exist in our geography and that it may pose a problem for the survival of our country at any time at the point of becoming a serious factor again.

In the world, North Korea, in particular, threatens many regions near and outside its geography with its persistent work on long-range ballistic nuclear systems. This situation is tried to be suppressed and kept in political balance with heavy embargoes and deterrent measures against them. The term "Rogue Nation" used for North Korea, which has been isolated due to its behavior, is purely political and has been used historically for other countries due to the behavior of their leaders. Unfortunately, the politically motivated attribution of this term to countries that resist world, environmental or unity peace is quick to happen.

Recently, in March 2023, it was announced in the press by our defense industry officials that we no longer needed the S-400 air defense system due to our national defense technology capabilities. In a similar period, it was also stated that the National Fighter Aircraft program was being carried out successfully, but it was foreseen that the KAAN could be taken into inventory by 2034. In this case, naturally, even when looking at some examples of individual or collective production around the world (F-35: 1995-2021, EuroFighter: 1983-1999, Rafale: 1986-2001, SU-35: 1985-2009), for a single-source and fully indigenous production capacity, when all 5th generation critical technology elements are promised to be available, the completion of the program in 10 years can be considered as a very optimistic projection. Moreover, when the issue of readiness and the existence of pre-developed subsystems for a system that incorporates such critical technologies is examined, it can be well assessed by experts that it is not impossible, but that the research and development, testing and verification, and acceptance procedures based on many more years will be very demanding and difficult.

Although the inclusion of the S-400 air missile defense system in our inventory was justified by our urgent operational need to defend our survival, this situation was not respected by either NATO or Western countries. NATO, of which we are a member, has only declared that it is ready to support Turkey's defense under Article 5 whenever the need arises, and the authorities of our country have repeatedly reiterated to them that this is far from being a permanent solution. All eastern bloc systems, such as the S-400 air missile defense system, are weapon systems developed entirely against western and NATO systems, and their threat perceptions are designed accordingly. An inferior version in terms of capability and model is in the inventory of Greece, another NATO country, and is kept idle under some special measures.

An air missile defense system that we can replace the S-400 with our domestic and national capabilities today can make a lot of noise from the moment it is taken into inventory. For Turkey, which is the most extreme stronghold of NATO, it could also constitute a serious solution for the permanent self-defense needs of countries, especially those from the former eastern bloc that are now NATO members or those in the nearby geography that are exposed to the current destructive threat of Russia. The cost of Western air missile defense systems is very high and their exportability is very low. It is clear that advanced air defense systems to be produced by Turkey with a fully western defense doctrine will be accepted as a serious distinguishing feature and contribution to the capability packages for the west and NATO.

Due to its technological structure, the S-400 air missile defense system was perceived as a strategic move by Russia, which placed its weapons at the foot of the United States during the Cuban crisis, to identify the parameters that can be considered as the weaknesses of Western systems and especially the F-35 aircraft, which is NATO's sole 5th generation fighter jet, taking advantage of Turkey's urgent need for an operation and caused negative reactions.

Today, F-35I aircraft are operating in Israel in close proximity to the S-400 air missile defense systems deployed in Syria, but it is believed that Israel, which is not a member of NATO, may have developed some measures for its own modified F-35 aircraft and may have needed to carry out some special studies with the United States in this context. If Turkey had been able to acquire the F-35, it is likely that similar measures would have been in place for Turkish F-35s.

Russia naturally perceives the F-35 as a threat to itself and its allies due to the technology's low-visibility features, its superior success in controlling the electromagnetic spectrum, and the existing and newly designed long-range air-to-air and strategic long-range strike weapons in its inventory. In this context, the ongoing technology wars and some western states or private organizations that support this race have shared with open sources that the S-400 air defense system cannot be effective at the desired level against the 5th generation aircraft of the west with the special simulation software they have developed, and Russia, which better understands this with the data it has been able to collect so far, has felt the need to develop the S-500 air missile defense system without delay.

On the other hand, Greece, which we are constantly confronted with in the struggle for supremacy and international law in the Aegean and whose potential to create sudden crises is well known, has decided to purchase 24 Rafale aircraft of the 4.5 generation, equipped with SPECTRA electronic systems and STORM SHADOW long-range strategic strike weapons, which it thinks it can easily access with a sudden decision after Turkey's S-400 purchase, especially against advanced air defense systems such as the S-400. It also announced that it would purchase F-35s, as if to create a more overwhelming and destructive superiority, taking advantage of Turkey's exclusion from the F-35 program. The exact contents of the package, which is estimated to consist of about 20 F-35 aircraft and some special weapons, are not yet known. In the meantime, the new air-to-air weapon AIM-260 new generation AMRAAM, designed for 5th generation fighters such as the F-35 and F-16V aircraft, and the long-range strategic strike weapons AGM-158 JASSM (Joint Air to Surface Stand Off Missile) and LRASM (Long Range Anti-Ship Missile) are expected to make a serious difference in the struggle for supremacy in the skies.

Although the conditions for Turkey, which is closely following all these developments, seem to be moving in a positive direction due to our rapid investments and efforts in domestic and national technological capabilities, it has been stated by experts in open sources that we will experience a serious gap and weakness in the 5th generation aircraft capability that we aim to reach at least 10 years later. Lockheed Martin, which produces the F-35 aircraft, has also been the manufacturer of the F-22 and F-16 aircraft for many years, to which it has managed to retroactively transfer all of its technological achievements. The F-16 Viper (Block 70) aircraft, for which we are a suitor, does not have the features of a fifth-generation aircraft, but it is still in production in order to gain markets in countries that do not need or cannot afford the use of fifth-generation aircraft and that are capable of partially incorporating some of the critical sub-technology components of the fifth-generation, referred to as the F-35 DNA. The question naturally arises: "Will the United States, which cannot tolerate even the presence of the S-400 system and 5th generation technology (the aircraft itself is a tool here, and the real problem is the technology itself) in the same geography and displays an extremely sharp attitude, allow the use of similar technological structures on a different platform in the same environment?"

Conclusion

As a result, thanks to our defense industry, which considers itself capable of replacing an air missile defense system at an equal or even better level with today's domestic and national technology, on top of the survival and protection advantages it has brought us so far due to its acquisition; in order to regain our aircraft, which were not given to us with the unfair practice in the F-35 program; With the understanding that "countries do not have friends, they have interests", without creating a gap in regional strategic air superiority in the coming period, without creating weakness, without losing our long-standing ties and integration with the West and NATO, at the point of a brief strategic and technological analysis of which of the systems I have tried to express can be a more effective force multiplier today, I believe that if we take a new strategic decision and steps on the S-400 systems as a "revision of our national interests", our decision-makers can more accurately assess the possibility of a serious "comeback" in regional superiority against those who take a hostile stance against us, and a "reassurance" against our allies.