President Donald Trump faces some stiff bipartisan opposition in Congress if he intends to proceed with selling F-35 fighter jets to Turkey, as he suggested when he arrived in Ankara for the NATO summit on Tuesday.
Turkey was one of the NATO members involved in the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program from the beginning, 25 years ago, but it was kicked out of the program in July 2019, under the first Trump administration. Trump reluctantly banned F-35 sales to Turkey because it insisted on purchasing Russian S-400 surface-to-air missiles despite repeated pleas and warnings from the U.S. and other NATO countries. The S-400 purchase was problematic because Russian engineers might be able to study Turkey’s F-35s and improve their missiles and radar systems to become more effective against the world’s most advanced fighter jet.
“Turkey’s decision to purchase Russian S-400 air defense systems renders its continued involvement with the F-35 impossible. The F-35 cannot coexist with a Russian intelligence collection platform that will be used to learn about its advanced capabilities,” the White House said when announcing the ban in July 2019.
Turkey deeply resented getting kicked out of the program, especially since it had invested about $1.4 billion in F-35 development, but it stubbornly refused to cancel its S-400 order from Russia.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was optimistic that he would be able to change Trump’s mind about the fighter jets after the U.S. president returned to office in 2025. Trump has often said the door to the F-35 was not closed forever, although it became very difficult to see how the S-400 problem could be resolved after Turkey started taking delivery on the Russian missiles and their targeting systems.
A small glimmer of hope was offered by defense analysts who noted that Turkey has not done much with its S-400 missiles and they play no significant role in future air-defense strategies made public by the Turkish Defense Ministry.
Erdogan thought it was important to build closer relations with Moscow after the 2016 coup attempt against him, so he pushed doggedly ahead with the missile buy — and the Russians were indeed delighted — but now Turkey’s $2.5 billion inventory of some 120 Russian missiles is gathering dust.
None of the launch systems was ever fully integrated into Turkey’s air defense network and Turkish generals do not seem eager to rely on Russian hardware that has performed very poorly against American technology in recent conflicts. There was some discussion last year of Russia buying the missiles back from Turkey so it could use them against Ukraine.
After receiving a warm welcome from Erdogan in Ankara on Tuesday, Trump hinted that F-35 sales could be back on the table, in part because Trump saw Turkey as a more useful and loyal friend than many European members of the program. While he did not absolutely commit to the move, Trump said it would “make sense.”
“I can tell you many people, including the people sitting right here, think, ‘Why wouldn’t we do that?’ We have a better relationship with Turkey, and Turkey’s been, in many ways, much more loyal than other countries that we think would be loyal,” Trump said at a press conference with Erdogan.
Senior White House officials said on Tuesday that Trump is serious about finding a path for Turkey to get F-35s, but members of both parties in Congress are equally serious about stopping the prospective sale.
Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) cited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s staunch opposition to selling F-35s to Turkey in his own criticism of the idea on Tuesday, noting that Turkey has “become incredibly and intensely anti-Israel.”
“They actually, in the negotiations with Hezbollah, they claimed that they’re going to stand with Hezbollah, with their resistance,” Fetterman said of the Turks.
Netanyahu said in a CNN interview on Tuesday that Erdogan is “not exactly a model ally of the United States,” and giving him F-35s will not “make Turkey a friendly state to the United States,” much less Israel.
“He threatens to destroy my country, the one and only Jewish state,” Netanyahu said of Erdogan. “This is not a force for peace and stability. When you give them that power, you’re going to see aggression in its wake.”
Secretary of War Pete Hegseth reportedly canceled a Wednesday meeting with Netanyahu to discuss the F-35 sale after the Israeli prime minister made his opposition to the deal clear.
Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-NY), a member of the Conservative Party USA with Greek and Cuban heritage, cited Turkey’s hostility to Greece and territorial designs on Cyprus as some of her many reasons to oppose the F-35 sale.
“Erdogan has aligned himself with Iran and Russia, harbored Hamas, refused to sanction Russia, undermined American counter-ISIS operations, continues to illegally occupy part of Cyprus, and has repeatedly directed illegal military jet overflights above the Greek Islands, and called for the destruction of Israel,” she noted.
“Additionally, he continues to jail his political opponents and has denied dozens of journalists access to the NATO Summit,” she continued. “Providing Turkey with our most advanced fighter jet would jeopardize U.S. national security, risk sensitive technology falling into the wrong hands, and endanger our allies in the Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East.”
Rep. Chris Pappas (D-NH) said it was “outrageous for Trump to even consider readmitting Turkey to the F-35 program while Erdogan’s government continues to violate U.S. law and threaten our allies.”
“We cannot reward Erdogan’s aggressive and destabilizing activity across the region,” he said.
Rep. Dina Titus (D-NV) said that none of the reasons Congress banned F-35 sales to Turkey in the 2018 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), even before Ankara was formally expelled from the Joint Strike Fighter program, have been addressed.
“President Trump cannot just wave these actions away with a handshake in Ankara,” she said, urging House leaders from both parties to introduce a “Joint Resolution of Disapproval to prevent this Administration from illegally selling F-35s to Turkey.”
Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC) said on Tuesday that he thought Turkey, “a great ally and the only Muslim nation in NATO,” might find a path back into the F-35 program — but “there might be some pushback in Congress,” because “Turkey’s relations with Israel are not very helpful.”
However, Graham has been skeptical of selling the jets to Turkey in the past, and he told i24 News on Tuesday that “we will oppose the F-35 deal.”
Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) bluntly said he hoped reports of Trump selling F-35s to Turkey were “wrong,” and then quoted the text of the 2018 NDAA that banned such sales.
Trump’s first vice president, Mike Pence, pleaded with Trump on Tuesday not to lift sanctions on Turkey or let it back into the JSF program, saying it would be a “strategic mistake undermining the security of the United States, Israel, and NATO.”
“Mr. President, please don’t,” Pence said.
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