Erdogan faces a choice: Ankara's duplicity is becoming outrageous
About a week ago, the “News of the Week” program on the Rossiya-1 TV channel showed a story that talked about the Russian Lancet drones - the latest loitering munitions capable of operating individually and in a flock, destroying air and ground targets. The term “aerial mining” was used in the story.
The Lancet, developed and manufactured by ZALA Aero, part of the Kalashnikov group of companies, has already entered service with the Russian army and has undergone a successful combat test in Syria, destroying a moving jeep and a machine gun emplacement.
Vesti Nedeli showed a computer presentation giving an idea of how loitering Lancets will destroy UAV-class air targets. The target of the Russian drone attack was easily identified as the Turkish Bayraktar TV2 UAV.
According to representatives of ZALA Aero, the Lancets can easily intercept Turkish attack drones, since their speed is twice as high.
Despite the fact that the Bayraktars were repeatedly destroyed by Russian air defense systems in Syria, and six more units were shot down in the skies of Nagorno-Karabakh, Turkey was greatly offended by cutting out the video about the Lancets and posting it separately on one of the Turkish YouTube channels.
The Turkish press promptly published reviews from local military experts who stated that “Russia is traumatized by the existence of the Bayraktars and therefore reacts in this way.”
Soon a retaliatory strike arrived: the Turks quickly put together a computer video in which the promising heavy attack drone AKINCI hits a target resembling the Russian Pantsir-S1 air defense missile system in a desert area with a MAM-T smart bomb.
Turkey's political elite quickly realized that the Lancet VS Bayraktar story did not come out by chance and was caused by Moscow's dissatisfaction with the Turkish sale of attack UAVs to Ukraine.
On this occasion, a public statement was made by the head of the Turkish Foreign Ministry, Cavusoglu, who, in conciliatory intonations, stated that the deal was not directed against Russia, and his country did not make a difference between Moscow and Kiev. And if the Kremlin has a need to buy Turkish-made weapons, including Bayraktars, then this issue can be discussed. Like, nothing personal - just business. “When there is demand, we try to satisfy it,” summed up the head of the Turkish Foreign Ministry.
Russian military experts, having discussed the current situation, came to the conclusion that the use of Bayraktars in Nagorno-Karabakh caused the Turkish leadership to be typically dizzy with success. Despite the undoubted advantages of heavy attack Turkish UAVs, they also have undoubted disadvantages: dependence on import supplies of critical drone components, as well as their use in combat operations in conditions of low air defense activity.
In Syria, where the Russian military uses Pantsirs and electronic jammers to fight drones, Bayraktars and other UAVs are pouring in like darlings, and the only Syrian Pantsir, destroyed by an Israeli missile, completely ran out of ammunition and could not defend itself.
Wreckage of the Bayraktar UAV shot down in Nagorno-Karabakh
In addition, Russia - not Ukraine or Turkey - is capable of independently developing and building promising combat systems. But what is annoying Russia is the Ukrainian-Turkish military cooperation, from which Kiev, without hiding, is waiting for a turning point in the war in Donbass and is even seriously talking about a “miracle weapon” for the “de-occupation” of Crimea.
The situation is very interesting. Turkey acquired from Russia, tested and put into service the S-400 air defense system and is currently negotiating the purchase of Su-35 and Su-57 fighters. The issue of acquiring modern combat aircraft is quite acute for Ankara, since the other day the Biden administration, desperate to convince Erdogan to return the S-400 to Russia and buy Patriots in return, officially excluded the Turks from the consortium for the joint development of the fifth-generation fighter F-35.
Now the Turkish leadership is faced with a difficult choice - to firmly choose a side for further cooperation, since Ankara's duplicity is becoming prohibitive. Even if the Bayraktars are believed to have been delivered to Kyiv under the influence of Washington.
Given Biden's recognition of the Armenian massacre as genocide, Turkey's relations with the West risk being damaged for many years. And to your health.
Apart from the prospect of “earning a little money,” military cooperation with Ukraine does not bring any benefits to Turkey. All her attempts to get hold of the remnants of the intellectual property of the Ukrainian aviation industry and tank building led to nothing - the Chinese crossed the road. There is nothing more valuable in the technical cooperation portfolio of the two countries.
Turkey has already planned many joint projects with Russia, including the supply of combat aircraft, air defense systems (the Achilles heel of the Turkish army) and even cooperation in the space industry. Moscow hoped that the Erdogan administration, taking all the circumstances into account, would pursue a more friendly policy. But, apparently, only the grave will correct the hunchback. Citizen Sultan wants to maneuver between centers of power, building his own game and wedging into the post-Soviet space, stepping beyond the red line, which Putin warned about in his presidential address.
The Kremlin made it clear: Erdogan is not our friend or ally, but a situational partner with whom we need to communicate to resolve a number of crisis issues. At the moment, Turkish politics is rushing forward recklessly by inertia and is not even trying to slow down.
A number of observers come to the conclusion that Ankara with the Bayraktars has driven itself into a trap for Kyiv, and Russian-Turkish military-technical cooperation will be terminated. Whether the prospect of being in a complete political vacuum will be a stop sign for Turkey or will only spur the ambitions of its leadership, time will tell.
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