By: Logan M. Williams | Author’s Twitter
In another manifestation of the deterioration of Turkey’s relationship with the United States, NATO, and the West, Turkey’s indigenously designed and produced fifth-generation fighter jet, the Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) Kaan, took to the skies on February 21st.
Turkey was booted from the F-35 development program due to its purchase of the Russian S-400 air defense missile system, in a complete and contemptuous disregarding of Turkey’s responsibilities to the alliance, and an affront to its NATO allies.
The Turkish fifth-generation fighter design project began in 2010, and initially the fighter jet was intended to fly alongside the F-35, serving as a replacement for the F-16.
The Kaan has a wingspan of 46-feet and a length of 69-feet. The aircraft is presently powered by the General Electric F110 turbofan engine; this is notable because this is the same engine which powers the F-16, and older fighter jets such as the F-15 “Eagle,” and the F-14 “Tomcat.” The use of this engine is likely due to the lack of available, cutting-edge propulsion technology, manufactured by the United States’ and European defense companies, due to collapsing relations between Turkey and NATO, as well as United States’ sanctions upon Turkish entities.
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Turkey has pursued international partners to help mitigate the costs of indigenously designing and producing a fifth-generation fighter jet, and it has sought opportunities to sell this jets to foreign militaries — as of now, Pakistan and Azerbaijan seem to be the only takers. The fighter jet market has become increasingly crowded, and it is unclear what advantages the Turkish Kaan offers that other air-frames cannot, already.
Turkey is also attempting to develop an indigenous engine, to power the Kaan, which is expected to enable the fighter jet to fly at Mach 1.8 and at a service ceiling of 40,000 feet. If these specifications are met, those speeds would, indeed, be faster than the United States’ F-35 fifth-generation fighter, which can at a speed of Mach 1.6 and a maximum height of 50,000 feet. However, the Turkish Kaan’s expected peak performance is notably substandard compared to the F-22, which flies at Mach 2.25, with a service ceiling of 65,000 feet.
Additionally, the Kaan is outperformed by its European competitors, such as the French Dassault Rafale, which flies at speeds of Mach 1.8, at a maximum altitude of just over 50,000 feet; the Swedish Saab Gripen, which flies at speeds of Mach 2, at a maximum elevation of 50,000 feet, and the German Eurofighter Typhoon, which flies at a speed of Mach 2 with a maximum elevation of 65,000 feet.
More importantly, the Kaan, which Turkey hopes to market as a fifth-generation fighter, is outperformed by the United States legacy, fourth-generation fighters. The F/A-18E/F “Super Hornet” which flies at a speed of Mach 1.8, at a maximum elevation of 50,000 feet; and the F-16, the backbone of more nations’ air force fleets than any other aircraft platform in the world, flies at a speed of Mach 2.1, at a maximum elevation of 50,000 feet.
Furthermore, this inexhaustive list only mentions the most well-known Western fighter jets, without taking into consideration older platforms or Russian, Iranian, and Chinese produced platforms.
Importantly, the Kaan is estimated to have a per-tail “fly away” cost of over $100-million, at the lowest, which makes it more expensive than all of the Russian and Chinese aircraft, and most of the Western platforms — with this cost only exceeded by the Dassault Rafale, the Eurofighter Typhoon, and the F-22 “Raptor.”
More importantly, as an indigenously designed and produced fighter jet, siloed from the United States, as well as Russia and China, it is not feasible that the Turkish Kaan could possess any forms of the characteristic technology of a fifth-generation fighter – such as artificial intelligence integration or sensor fusion – of a quality which would render it able to compete with the United States’ or European aircraft platforms.
Turkey seems to believe that its fighter jet will be the choice for states who want to avoid entangling relations with the United States, Russia, or China. However, this is increasingly unlikely, as the world begins to divide between sides of a new, bipolar geopolitical paradigm, centered around the liberal West and its allies, or the axis of totalitarian states. It is easy to imagine how quickly the Kaan can transform from a nationalist project of a far-right government, into a financial travesty, if the fighter jet proves unable to find customers in the competitive international market.
One thing is for certain, this Turkish Kaan fighter is a harbinger of the cementing of sour relations between Turkey and the United States, as the Turkish Air Force looks to replace the F-16 fighter jet, and to wean the Kaan off of the General Electric engine. This decoupling indicates that neither Turkey nor the United States feels particularly comfortable relying upon one another in the near or distant future.
Logan Williams currently studies at the University of Connecticut. He is an International Affairs Researcher; Work Published in Newspapers, Magazines, and Journals, Such As: Geopolitics Magazine, Modern Diplomacy, Tufts University’s The Fletcher Forum of World Affairs, Democracy Paradox, Diario Las Américas, International Affairs Forum, Fair Observer, History Is Now Magazine, UNC at Chapel Hill’s American Diplomacy, The Center for Military Modernization’s Warrior Maven Magazine
