Washington gives green light to deliver F16s to Turkey
Turkey had been asking for these planes for months. The Pentagon finally gave the green light overnight from Friday to Saturday for the sale of 40 F-16 fighter jets and related equipment to Turkey in a transaction estimated at $23 billion. A decision which follows Turkey's ratification of Sweden's membership in NATO earlier this week.
American F16 aircraft during a demonstration at the Aero India fair in Bangalore, India, in 2019. AP - Aijaz Rahi
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The Turkish Parliament
approved
Sweden's membership of NATO on Tuesday, January 23, by an overwhelming majority. A “yes” to Sweden against 40 F-16 planes. This was the deal between Recep Tayyip Erdogan and US President Joe Biden. The United States refused to deliver a single one of these aircraft to Turkey, although it is an ally within NATO, if it did not lift its blockade on Stockholm's entry into the Atlantic Alliance. But in Ankara, we prefer to reverse the point of view: it is because Turkey negotiated hard, for a year and a half, its green light for Sweden that it is today winning this contract necessary for its armed forces, underlines our correspondent in Istanbul,
Anne Andluer.
Ankara's interest in these American fighters – and in 80 modernization kits for the more than 200 F-16s it already has – in fact predates Sweden's candidacy for NATO. It is linked to Turkey's exclusion from the F-35 fighter jet program due to its purchase of an air defense system from Russia in 2019. Furthermore, the Turkish fleet was also outclassed by the 24
Rafale
planes acquired by the Greek air force and soon by the F-35s which Athens also plans to acquire.
Read alsoTurkey: Erdogan conditions Sweden's membership in NATO on the acquisition of American F-16s
However, to acquire new F-16s in the absence of F-35s, Ankara needed the green light from the American Congress, notoriously hostile to President Erdogan. In exchange for Sweden's accession, Joe Biden therefore committed to removing the reluctance of Congress... Which has, in theory, a period of 15 days to object to the sale of these F-16s to Turkey. But in Ankara, we do not envisage such a scenario.
"I see no reason why, with the parliament having acted here, that Turkey would wait. So I would expect as soon as that is conveyed to Washington, then congressional notification of the F-16 sales will happen"
- US Ambassador Jeff Flakehttps: //t.co/GioNFp2Ae6
— Middle East Eye (@MiddleEastEye) January 27, 2024
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