Guest article written by Dimitris Aristopoulos
At the time of the second flight of Turkey’s under-development KAAN fighter jet, TAI (Turkish Aerospace Industries) General Manager Temel Kotil stated that the company estimates to deliver 20 KAANS to the Turkish Air Force by 2028. The first flight of the KAAN aircraft took place last February.
“This aircraft is better than the F-35,” Kotil claimed during an event in Ankara. “The F-35 carries six tons; this one carries 10 tons of ammunition. It has two engines compared to the F-35’s single engine. Having two engines means more energy and radars illuminating a greater distance.”
The TAI TF KAAN is designed to be a fifth-generation fighter jet and is being produced to rival the F-35 Lightning II. Developed by Lockheed Martin, F-35 Lightning II is a single-engine, all-weather stealth multirole combat aircraft, designed for air-to-ground strike missions and air superiority.
Why is Turkey producing its own fighter jet to compete with the F-35?
Being part of the Joint Strike Fighter program, its development took place in cooperation with international partnerships. Turkey joined the developer countries in 1995 alongside the US, the UK, Italy, the Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, Canada, Israel, and Australia.
As part of the program, Turkey was scheduled to receive the first set of F-35 jets in 2023, however, it was ejected from the program in July 2019 after purchasing the S-400 missile defense system from Russia. Turkey’s ejection from the program limited its ability to procure a capability that would give it air superiority over Greece.
Turkey also had a problem with its outdated F-16 system, especially after Greece secured a contract to upgrade eighty-four F-16C/D Block 52+ and Block 52+ Advanced (Block 52M) to the latest F-16C/D Block 70/72 (F-16V Viper) standard in 2018, while, at the same time, purchased its first set of Dassault Rafale (a French-made Fourth-generation jet fighter) combat aircraft in 2021.
Many USA congressmen and members of the Senate, the most prominent of them being Bob Menedez (before the Senate called for his resignation over his bribery indictment) considered Turkey unreliable, an actual threat to other NATO allies (specifically Greece) and have been blocking any purchase deal of F-16 Vipers with Turkey.
In January 2024, Turkey managed to make a deal for the purchase of the F-16 Viper, with President Erdogan pressuring the USA threatening to veto Sweden’s accession to NATO. In the meantime, however, Greece made a deal in January 2024 for the purchase of 40 F-35 jets and is expected to receive the first set in 2028. This poses a danger to the Turkish Air Force because, not only has the country been banned from the program, but its rival, Greece, will receive fifth-generation stealth jets before Turkey does. Since Turkey is incapable of purchasing F-35 at the moment, it has no choice but to invest in domestic production.
Domestic production of the TAI TF KAAN
Given the situation, the Turkish Aerospace Industries intend to bring up the TAI TF KAAN fighter jets as a life raft for the Turkish Air Force and supply the Turkish military with jets capable of countering the Greek F-35 jets. However, the question of how much the TAI is capable of achieving such results with a successful outcome remains, and skeptics point out the great challenges they may face in their attempt to do so.
The most important argument of the skeptics is that TAI will certainly face a great challenge in developing a domestically built engine, as the Turkish Air Force has always depended on American-made engines, while the capability of Turkish engineers to ensure a functional outcome is uncertain. Others point out that the KAAN jets, being a totally new project in development, cannot be as reliable as the F-35 system, which has been on the market for decades.
Regarding the engine, Temel Kotil said that TAI is developing a domestic engine for the aircraft and he estimates the KAAN with a Turkish engine will make its first flight in 2028 or 2029. Meanwhile, Turkish analysts have argued that the Greek air force will also face challenges with the F-35 jets. The greatest obstacle of the Greek air force shall be its lack of new air-to-ground missiles, which are essential for supporting an attack jet such as the F-35, especially since the HAF has always supported a defensive strategy rather than open aggression.
It remains to be seen if the KAAN jets can feasibly stand as a true rival to the F-35 or if they are simply a part of Turkey’s attempt to maintain its prestige through propaganda.