Defense & Security News - Turkey
 
Turkey will purchase two batteries of S-400 air defense missile systems from Russia.
According a news of the newspaper website Daily Sabah of March 24, 2017, Turkey will purchase two batteries of Russian-made S-400 surface-to-air defense missile systems. Since a few months, Turkey and Russia have started talks regarding Turkey's cooperation with Russia in the defense sector and more specifically for the purchase of a new air defense system.
     
According a news of the newspaper website Daily Sabah of March 24, 2017, Turkey will purchase two batteries of Russian-made S-400 surface-to-air defense missile systems. Since a few months, Turkey and Russia have started talks regarding Turkey's cooperation with Russia in the defense sector and more specifically for the purchase of a new air defense system.
Russian S-400 battery air defense missile system at defense exhibition near Moscow, Russia
     
Since November 2016, Turkey and Moscow and Ankara have launched the negotiations on the S-400 potential delivery.

According to the Daily Newspaper Kommersant, Turkey has never held a large share in Russia`s defense export portfolio. The cooperation between countries in this area usually covered the maintenance of the vehicles delivered in the 1990s (namely, BTR-80 armoured personnel carriers and Mil Mi-17 medium transport helicopters), and the deliveries of spare parts. Such cooperation to the tune of several hundred million US dollars annually was a drop in the bucket of the common annual revenue worth USD several billion. In 2008, Turkey acquired 80 Kornet-E launchers and missiles; however, the buying was not succeeded by following orders.

The situation could have changed in 2013, when Turkey initiated a tender worth USD4 billion for air defense systems. The consortium of US companies Lockheed Martin and Raytheon, the European Eurosam consortium, the Chinese CPMIEC (China Precision Machinery Import-Export Corporation) state corporation, and the Rosoboronexport company participated in the competition. Russia`s bidder that offered the Antey-2500 dropped out of the tender, while CPMIEC won the contest. Not only did the Chinese corporation reduce the cost of its HQ-9 (the export-oriented variant of the system is designated as FD-2000) to USD3.44 billion, but also to transfer technologies to Turkey. However, Ankara and Beijing did not sign the firm contract for HQ-9/FT-2000 systems.

In March 2017, CEO of Russia’s state hi-tech corporation Rostec Sergei Chemezov has announced that Turkey had shown interest in the Russian-made S-400 (NATO reporting name: SA-21 Growler) air defense missile system and the talks on its potential deliveries were under way.

The Russia S-400 air defense system has already been sold to India and China. Turkey could be the third foreign customer of the S-400 and the the first NATO member country to purchase the system.

The S-400 Triumph SA-21 is a long range surface-to-air missile systems produced by Almaz-Antey. The S-400 Trumph is intended to engage, ECM, radar-picket, director area, reconnaissance, strategic and tactical aircraft, tactical and theatre ballistic missiles, medium-range ballistic missiles and other current and future air attack assets at a maximum range of 400 km, and a altitude of up to 30 km.

The S-400 entered service with the Russian Armed Forces on April 28, 2007, replacing the S-300 air defense system.