Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Sunday that the United States had proposed to sell his country F-16 fighter jets in exchange for its investment in the F-35 fighter jet program, from which Washington excluded Ankara after it purchased a missile defense system from Turkey. Russia.
Turkey was a partner in the US F-35 fighter program when it was launched, and it was supposed to get about 100 of them, but Washington excluded it from it in 2019 after buying the Russian S-400 air defense system (S-400).
Ankara has been demanding compensation for its exclusion from the US program, given it had already paid $1.4 billion.
"We raised this issue in our talks. We attach importance to dialogue to find a solution to this problem," Erdogan told reporters at an airport in Istanbul on Sunday before heading to a tour of Africa.
He added that Turkey's plan to buy F-16 planes is linked to the F-35 problem, explaining that the United States offered his country F-16 planes to modernize its air fleet.
Last month, the Turkish president signaled plans to acquire a second batch of Russia's S-400 missile defense system, prompting a fresh warning from Washington about the risks of a worsening bilateral relationship.
Reuters reported earlier this month that Turkey had submitted an order to the United States to purchase 40 F-16s produced by Lockheed Martin, and about 80 modernization equipment for its existing aircraft.
The aircraft order will likely struggle to get congressional approval, given the strained relations with Turkey over the past few years.
The decades-old partnership between the two NATO members has seen unprecedented tension over the past five years, due to differences over their respective Syria policy, Ankara's close ties with Moscow and its maritime ambitions in the eastern Mediterranean.