Türkiye’s defense industries have rolled out and exported impressive platforms in recent years. Its famed drones such as the Baykar TB-2 and TAI Anka have become force multipliers for the Turkish Armed Forces while turning the tide for allies in Azerbaijan, Libya, Somalia, Syria, and Ukraine.[1] Meanwhile, TAI’s T-129 attack helicopters, jointly developed with Italy’s AgustaWestland, have enabled the Turkish military to establish dominance against militants in southeastern Türkiye and northeastern Iraq while also entering service with the armed forces of Nigeria and the Philippines. Similarly, the new-generation Ada-class corvettes and I-class frigates that use indigenous designs and components under the “national ship” (MILGEM) project are not only becoming the mainstay of Türkiye’s increasingly powerful navy but are also finding their way to buyers in Asia.[2]
The Turkish defense ecosystem leverages several advantages other than battlefield wins, industrial prowess, and commercial success to expand its global profile. One may not think of defense fairs as a “fun activity” or the source of “soft” or “hard power” for a country, but Türkiye actively uses defense fairs and civilian technology festivals at home and abroad to market products and services, coupling them with a robust public diplomacy and social-media engagement strategy. Especially IDEF, SAHA EXPO, and Teknofest fairs stand out, bolstering the regional and international standing of Turkish defense firms as well as Türkiye’s geopolitical weight.
How and why Türkiye became a global defense and aerospace player
In a world where national defense expenditures have reached nearly US$2.5 trillion and global defense trade nearly US$140 billion, Türkiye’s defense exports of US$7 billion in 2024 might not look like much.[3] But Turkish military goods and services exports have grown from US$1.1 billion in 2011, suggesting a respectable increase of 16-17% per annum. If these trends continue, the next milestone of US$10 billion will be reached by the year 2030.[4]
Five factors explain Türkiye’s rise as a major global arms manufacturer and exporter. First, Türkiye has sought this sort of prestige before. Upon the foundation of the republic in 1923, the Turkish state and private enterprises worked to indigenize defense and aviation production. It should come as no surprise that the country’s Defense Industries Directorate (SSB) and leading defense firms such as Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI), ASELSAN, ROKETSAN, and Baykar often invoke the names of Turkish aviation pioneers of the 1920s and 1930s such as Nuri Demirağ and Vecihi Hürkuş (the latter’s surname, meaning “free bird,” lives on TAI’s turboprop basic trainer). Likewise, the country’s belated main battle tank, Altay, is named after the legendary cavalry commander Fahrettin Altay Paşa, who fought in the country’s war of independence (1919-1922).
But the global arms race and technological breakthroughs during and after World War II, along with membership in NATO during the Cold War, meant that resource- and labor-poor Türkiye had to take the convenient route of receiving rather than developing and producing weapons, though not always appreciating whether the received materiel would serve its defense needs or geopolitical vision—of course, Türkiye hardly had a geopolitical vision outside of NATO and Europe during the Cold War.
The second factor is necessity born out of bad experiences with allies, especially the United States. When Türkiye intervened in Cyprus in 1974 to prevent its NATO ally Greece from annexing the island, Washington and many Western partners imposed an arms embargo on Ankara, which served as a wake-up call. Three of the biggest Turkish defense exporters—ASELSAN, ROKETSAN, and TAI—were founded in the 1970s and 1980s to reduce the country’s reliance on defense imports. Not surprisingly, U.S. sanctions on Türkiye for its purchase of the S-400 air defense system from Russia in 2017 brought up the memories of the 1970s.[5]
Third, and in contrast with the second factor, Türkiye partnered up with its Western allies, especially the U.S., once the Cyprus arms embargo ended. In the late 1980s, TAI began working with General Dynamics (and later with Lockheed Martin) to assemble F-16 Fighting Falcon jets at its main plant in Ankara. While the Turkish Air Force became the world’s second-largest user of the F-16 after the U.S. Air Force, TAI gained the skill set to produce most of the aircraft’s parts by the time the assembly lines closed in 2012. Of the more than 300 F-16s produced in Türkiye from 1987 until 2012, 46 of them went to the Egyptian Air Force.[6] Similar partnerships with the U.S. and France carried over to the production of utility helicopters.
Today, from small arms to high-end components and platforms, the United States and other NATO allies are often the largest export market for Turkish defense firms.[7] Before Ankara’s expulsion from the fifth-generation F-35 stealth fighter project in 2019, about 10 Turkish companies were producing more than 900 parts to be assembled at the Lockheed Martin facilities in Texas.[8]
Fourth, and perhaps most importantly, Türkiye’s geopolitical priorities have shifted since the end of the Cold War in 1990. In dealing with various terrorist groups, the near-destruction of at least three states in its neighborhood (Iraq, Libya, and Syria), and Russia’s resurgence, Ankara found itself in need of a robust arms industry.
On top of those dynamics came Türkiye’s transition to an export-oriented economy in the 1980s and a booster shot from the customs union with the European Union in 1995, which enabled it to become something of a China (i.e., an industrial powerhouse) at the intersection of Europe, Asia, and Africa.
In this context, many leading heavy-industry companies such as BMC, Otokar, and Assan found themselves branching out into the defense space in the 1990s. A lesser-known firm that started its career in 1984 as an automobile and machine parts producer made a similar move in the late 2000s by turning to unmanned aerial vehicles. They are known as Baykar, the producer of the TB-2 and Akıncı drones.
Türkiye’s defense and aerospace companies are slated to roll out even more impressive products than these platforms. TAI’s Hürjet jet trainer and light attack/fighter is expected to start mass production in 2026. Spain has already lined up as a buyer for Hürjet, and a close reading of news outlets and open-source reports indicates that Egypt and the UK might join the buyers’ club.[9]
At sea, following the launch of the 27,000-ton amphibious assault ship TCG Anadolu (jointly developed and produced with Spain’s Navantia) that is currently testing new-generation Baykar-made TB-3 drones for its air wing, Türkiye has started initial production on its 60,000-ton aircraft carrier. The ship is expected to feature a naval variant of the Hürjet along with a coterie of Turkish-designed and produced weapon systems, including Baykar’s Kızılelma, which is billed as the world’s first unmanned jet fighter. The carrier will be escorted by various MILGEM warships and locally built submarines.
If you have attended a defense fair in Türkiye or elsewhere around the world, there is a good chance that you have seen those systems or their mockups. After all, the platforms and the firms that produce them almost always helm defense, aerospace, and technology fairs in Türkiye. Turkish companies that manufacture parts and subcomponents for those platforms feature their work when attending expos in other countries because it generates public and commercial interest in Turkish products and services.
The Prestige: Türkiye’s 5th-Gen Jet Fighter, MMU Kaan
Perhaps the most well-known and anticipated Turkish defense product is TAI’s nascent fifth-generation stealth jet fighter, MMU Kaan, which will place Türkiye in an exclusive club with China, Russia, and the United States in the early 2030s. Reflective of Turkish arms manufacturers’ liking for assertive names (“Kaan” means “ruler” or “master” in Turkic languages), the project is billed as Türkiye’s “war of liberation in aviation” because the ability to mass-produce 100 units for the Turkish Air Force and several hundred for allied countries will immunize Ankara to embargoes, granting it near-complete operational independence from its NATO allies, especially the United States.
When Kaan was originally conceived in the early 2010s, it was expected to complement the 100 or 120 F-35 Joint Strike Fighters (JSF) that Ankara was to receive. However, upon Türkiye’s ejection from the F-35 project under the U.S. Congress’s “Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act” (CAATSA) in 2020 for its purchase of the S-400s from Russia, Kaan had to assume all of the F-35’s duties such as the ability to penetrate enemy airspace, jamming its radars without detection, and to strike deep behind front lines.
While Türkiye will produce almost all the parts and subcomponents for Kaan, it will rely on outside suppliers for two critical systems for the foreseeable future—the engines and the ejection seats. Despite past rumors that Turkish companies will provide the latter, the latest reports indicate that Kaan will continue to use the venerable Martin-Baker ejection seats.[10] It is the engines that will remain the sticking point. For the initial blocks of Kaan that are expected to go into production in 2028, TAI plans to integrate the General Electric F110-129 turbofan jet engines that are also used on the F-16s. Meanwhile, TAI’s engine subsidiary (TEI), a joint venture with GE Aerospace, continues to develop a jet engine with a low heat signature befitting a stealth engine. The engine is expected to become operational in the mid-2030s.
In addition to its status as “Türkiye’s war of independence in aviation,” Turkish defense industry circles see MMU Kaan as something more. Exporting the platform to friendly and allied countries would give Ankara an immeasurable geopolitical clout. An obvious candidate is Azerbaijan and other fellow Turkic republics. The Saudis also have expressed interest in acquiring the Kaan because their attempts to acquire F-35s remain elusive while it is uncertain if the Global Combat Air Program consortium (Italy, Japan, and the United Kingdom) will onboard Saudi Arabia. Similarly, the UAE tried to acquire F-35s but failed due to U.S. conditions that were meant to assuage Israel, the only operator of the JSF in the Middle East.[11] It is unclear whether Abu Dhabi is interested in the Kaan, yet.
A tale of three fairs: IDEF, Teknofest, and SAHA EXPO
The oldest Turkish defense, aerospace, and technology fair is IDEF (International Defense Industry Fair), organized every two years since 1993 by the Turkish Armed Forces Foundation (Türk Silahlı Kuvvetlerini Güçlendirme Vakfı, TSKGV). Given its sponsor’s mission statement—to strengthen the Turkish Armed Forces—IDEF carries a more military-oriented focus compared to the other two main events on Türkiye’s defense industry calendar.
Along with carrying the honor of being the country’s oldest defense fair, IDEF’s sponsor, TSKGV, owns majority shares in several leading Turkish arms corporations. Other than TAI, the list includes ASELSAN (shorthand for “military electronics industry”), which specializes in producing electronics hardware, including air defense systems; ROKETSAN (rockets and missiles); HAVELSAN (short for “air electronics industry”), which focuses on software and other IT solutions for all military branches; ASPİLSAN and İŞBİR, producers of batteries and electricity generators/alternators, respectively.
While IDEF fairs used to feature only a dozen or so Turkish and international firms in the past, especially because of Türkiye’s incessant political and economic crises in the 1990s that limited the ability to develop or buy different weapons systems, the last one in 2023 saw participation by about 1,500 firms from 54 countries. Nearly 100,000 visitors from 107 countries visited the fair, which featured around 200 official and commercial delegations from 78 countries.[12] Tellingly, while IDEF used to be a mostly industry-exclusive event, it added additional “public days” to its calendar due to popular interest in defense and aerospace technologies.[13]
Compared to IDEF, Teknofest is a much more civilian-oriented event. Organized by the Turkish Technology Team (T3) Foundation led by Selçuk Bayraktar, chairman of the Baykar corporation and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s son-in-law, Teknofest has been held every year since 2018 with a theme that is shaped by input from the public. To generate further public interest, Teknofest invites selected teams of high school and university students from Türkiye and more than 100 other countries who compete with their science and technology projects for respectable sums of prize money and with the aim to find potential investors for their ideas. At times, Teknofest really leads the curve: The 2024 festival showcased rocket launches by the young participants and attempts at vertical re-entry/recovery of the projectiles, inspired by SpaceX’s revolutionary Falcon and Starship rockets.[14] Likewise, the Turkish Air Force’s aerial acrobatics teams, SoloTürk and Turkish Stars, put on impressive shows for public viewing.
These approaches have worked like a charm. So popular Teknofest has become, in 2022, together with the event held in the northern Turkish city of Samsun on the Black Sea coast, a second Teknofest was held in Azerbaijan, Türkiye’s close ally, fellow Turkic republic, and importer of Turkish military hardware. In 2023, three separate legs were held in Türkiye’s largest cities—Istanbul, Ankara, and Izmir—that saw a total of about 4.5 million visitors.[15] Aside from serving as a forum for civilian technologies, Teknofest features Baykar’s famed drones, but the organizers also invite other defense and aerospace companies (especially TAI) to showcase their wares. This is interesting because, in the field of armed UAVs, Baykar and TAI are competitors. Not only are the two firms the lead drone suppliers for Türkiye’s military and security services, but they also dominate the global marketplace in medium- and high-altitude, long-endurance UAVs—MALE and HALE, respectively.[16]
If IDEF is the main defense fair and Teknofest a civilian celebration of technology, SAHA EXPO blends the strengths of the two by combining defense and civilian technology firms while offering its own specialties. Organized by SAHA Istanbul, a non-profit association that serves as a cluster for defense, aviation, and space technology firms in Türkiye’s largest city, its chairman is Haluk Bayraktar, CEO and chief technology officer of Baykar and Selçuk’s brother.
Like IDEF, SAHA EXPO organizes its events around leading Turkish defense firms as well as international companies. SAHA EXPO also welcomes the public and hosts events and people who get a lot of attention. For example, last year’s event featured panel talks and photo ops with Türkiye’s first two astronauts, Turkish Air Force pilot Col. Alper Gezeravcı, who participated in the Axiom-3 mission in early 2024, and Tuva Cihangir Atasoy, a civilian engineer who partook in the Virgin Galactic 07 suborbital mission in June 2024. Tellingly, both men were introduced to the public by none other than President Erdoğan at Teknofest 2023.
Besides its mix of military and civilian technologies, platforms, and celebrities, SAHA EXPO also acts as a commercial node. One of the highlights of the fair is providing opportunities and the physical space for confidential business-to-business and government-to-government meetings. Several government agencies opened pavilions at the event, noteworthy among them the Turkish Presidency’s Investment Office, the agency whose primary responsibility is promoting national and international investments in Türkiye.
The organizers also invite panels, keynote speeches, product and service launches, and agreement ceremonies by participating firms, both large and small. Per SAHA Istanbul estimates, while business deals worth US$2-3 billion were expected during the last event in October 2024, in fact, more than 100 entities ended up signing US$6.2 billion worth of agreements. Of that, US$4.3 billion will be in exports from Turkish companies.[17]
Like IDEF and Teknofest, SAHA EXPO showcases Türkiye’s rising star in the fields of defense, aviation, and space. Last year, the event welcomed 100,000 visitors from more than 120 countries, and nearly 1,500 companies participated, split roughly equally between Turkish and international. Additionally, over 400 public and private sector delegations from 48 countries, including 180 procurement delegations, visited SAHA EXPO. Twenty-seven countries showed up at the ministerial level, including 16 defense ministers.[18] Of course, SAHA Istanbul does not wait for two years from one fair to another. The organization hosts regular panels, get-togethers, and other events related to defense, aviation, and space technologies.
It is worth noting that the UAE was one of the leading participants at SAHA EXPO 2024. Several Emirati firms, led by EDGE Group, put up impressive pavilions within the same hall in the fairgrounds—essentially forming a national exhibition. This development reflects current trends in Ankara-Abu Dhabi ties as the UAE is slated to become one of the leading defense markets and partners for Türkiye. The two countries have signed two dozen or so framework agreements on defense industry cooperation in the last two years. In 2023, EDGE Group Chairman and UAE Secretary-General of the Advanced Technology Research Council H.E. Faisal Al Bannai said that his company has allocated “several billions of dollars” to invest in Turkish defense firms. While Baykar is helping EDGE with integrating the Emirati-produced “Desert Sting 16” smart munition on its drones, Türkiye’s Otokar and Tawazun Holding (also part of EDGE) are co-producing the “Rabdan” armored combat vehicles based on Otokar’s Arma 8×8.[19]
Challenges and opportunities
If war is a continuation of politics by other means as Carl von Clausewitz once said, defense production is also very much part and parcel of that process. In growing its defense and security sectors and furnishing hardware and other solutions to its own forces and friends, Türkiye has a long way before it has fulfilled its own ambitions of becoming one of the world’s premiere defense and security providers. Several challenges beckon.
The first is that Türkiye is still a medium-income country that depends on energy imports and runs a large current accounts deficit topped by inflation and currency fluctuations. Although the defense budget doubled in 2024 and the share of defense and security in the GDP has reached 4% (twice what NATO rules stipulate), those figures come to a total budget of about US$47 billion for 2025. In a world where Türkiye’s fellow middle powers such as France, India, Saudi Arabia, and the United Kingdom spend US$ 80-90 billion per year (and the U.S., Russia, and China spend hundreds of billions), Ankara will have to make some tough choices on what to develop and what to import.[20]
Related to that, the second challenge is balancing strategic autonomy/independence with the realities of geopolitics and economics. Türkiye’s aspirations to become impervious to embargoes are commendable and wise. But as several leading Turkish defense analysts have pointed out, developing and producing defense materiel will only become more costly as platforms become more sophisticated and other countries with robust industrial ecosystems such as China and South Korea have grown their footprints in the market.[21]
To be fair, Türkiye’s military-industrial complex is quite successful in delivering results on budget. And while no Turkish project has taken the luxury of going over budget as is wont in the United States (think of the F-35, the Littoral Combat Ship project, shuttered Zumwalt-class destroyers, and the Bradley Fighting Vehicle), timeliness is a different issue. Due to a lack of funds or poor decision-making (be it through political interference or corporate indecision), several projects get delayed, as most notoriously with the Altay main battle tank that has entered serial production after a delay of almost 10 years. Similarly, domestic engines that should have found their way into various land and aviation systems are still undergoing development and testing (certification and serial production are further away). When it comes to engines, Türkiye remains at a disadvantage.
To overcome such obstacles and ensure efficiency, the country’s SSB has had to assume a greater mandate over product and service development as well as government procurement, but that creates its own challenges, the third. While SSB’s oversight of defense companies enables product and service specialization, prevents product and service duplication, and upholds efficiency, Türkiye’s overregulated business environment also leads companies to take much longer with the final product “rollout.” Meanwhile, an uncertain tax and investment environment prevents otherwise innovative startups and small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) from reaching their full potential even as they see lucrative export and profit opportunities before them.
That brings us to the fourth challenge, one that even SSB cannot regulate. Because many companies wish to join the prestigious defense and security sector, they run the risk of glutting the market and cutting down on profit margins in an already competitive environment. That problem is visible at the defense and technology fairs where many companies working on similar problems put up pavilions near each other. Duplication of efforts affects the fairs in other ways. Especially at IDEF and SAHA EXPO (less so with Teknofest), it can be a struggle to find a novel theme, niche, or attendees offering a different “vibe” to the public from one year to the next. IDEF and SAHA EXPO organizers work extremely hard to leave the space (physical and temporal) between each other and ensure that their “look and feel” are different than previous years.
In this context, the fifth challenge to Türkiye’s defense, aerospace, security and technology sector and their fairs is the risk of “overselling” or outright condescension by both Turkish and international commentators (few of them actual experts). During SAHA EXPO 2024 in Istanbul, the 23 October terrorist attack at TAI headquarters in Ankara led to a flurry of misleading comments and social-media posts from a few international commentators about the physical safety of the event. At other times, some opponents of President Erdoğan try to use delays or other setbacks in big-ticket defense projects to disparage the projects wholesale—that is, if they are not outright lying about them.
By contrast, some pro-Erdoğan personalities “oversell” developments in Türkiye’s defense industry space. A notorious example is of a retired Turkish Army colonel who has gone on multiple TV and social media channels to claim that indigenous air-to-air missiles (Gökdoğan, Bozdoğan, and Gökhan) that will be mounted on the MMU Kaan will be able to sink enemy aircraft carriers or that the recently launched Reis-class submarines will have vertical-launch capability to fire cruise missiles.[22] In a fit of tragicomedy, laymen who are misinformed by such sources often attack actual experts who try to correct the misinforming non-experts.
The sixth and final challenge is that Türkiye lacks what might be called a civilian “spinoff” from its defense sector. If one thinks of the many military projects since the 20th century that have given us many of the conveniences of modern life—jetliners, satellites, microwave ovens and telephones and the Internet—it is a mystery why Türkiye does not have a bigger “military-adjacent” civilian sector. For example, a company such as ULAK A.Ş., an ASELSAN subsidiary that works on 4G and 5G wireless communication technologies, is still not given the sort of state support that major powers such as the United States, the EU, China, and Russia provide to the likes of GE, Boeing, Airbus, Huawei, and Sukhoi.
Of course, these challenges also bring unique opportunities for Türkiye. An uncertain international environment has enabled Türkiye to gain “first mover” advantages and start work early on with UAVs, USVs, and MILGEM warships. Realizing its shortcomings in financing projects, Ankara is now much more proactive about finding program partners and potential buyers even before a particular platform goes into mass production. On this point, the growing domestic and international interest in the Turkish defense, aerospace, and technology ecosystem has given a sense of mission and purpose to both the public and industry professionals. While Türkiye has lost many engineers and different sorts of defense industry professionals to other countries in recent years, the “brain drain” may be coming to an end.[23] As this author witnessed, industry executives who used to consider careers abroad last year have decided to stay on following the attack on TAI.
In other good news, if the government continues to pursue orthodox economic policies as it has begun to do so since 2023, there is no reason why Türkiye cannot continue its high levels of growth in the coming years while maintaining the value of the Turkish lira and curbing inflation. And once the Turkish government addresses the country’s financial and economic woes, it ought to create a system where a development fund could endorse national R&D efforts in defense, security, and aerospace while an export-import bank could help to set better commercial conditions for other countries to purchase Turkish platforms or engage in joint production schemes with Turkish firms.
Conclusion
Türkiye’s leading defense, security, aerospace, and technology fairs serve multiple purposes:
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Create marketing opportunities for Turkish businesses to export their goods and services— Türkiye’s defense budget of US$47 billion is simply not enough to buy all (or even most) of what national firms have to offer. Even if Türkiye’s GDP was three to four times its current size (nominally US$1.3 trillion and US$3.45 trillion as purchasing power parity in 2024), Turkish industries could provide way more goods and services than what the country could afford.[24]
The fairs, then, help defense companies secure funds through exports while bolstering Türkiye’s geopolitical weight. Türkiye is a growing but liquidity-poor economy, so the Turkish military-industrial complex lacks ready funds to test new ideas and develop experimental products. In this context, only reliable exports will bring in the funds that would enable major players as well as SMEs and startups to take chances on new ideas.
- Offer networking and business development opportunities not only to Turkish and international businesses, but also to industry professionals, prospective employees, and potential investors.
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Engage the Turkish public and offer “buy-in” while improving Türkiye’s popularity among sympathetic audiences in other countries. Public (especially youth) interest drives much of the traffic (in-person as well as online) to Turkish defense, aerospace, and technology news and fairs have proven to be great avenues to recruit candidates from universities and technical schools.
As discussed earlier, a larger critical mass of people gaining experience in the field of military and military-adjacent technologies for the benefit of civilian products and services will take time until Türkiye develops itself into a high-tech economy like Japan or South Korea.
Disclosure: The author served as the international media coordinator for SAHA EXPO 2024, held in Istanbul on 22-26 October 2024.
[1] Barın Kayaoğlu, “How Turkey’s soldiers and spies saved the day in Syria,” Al-Monitor, March 8, 2020, https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2020/03/turkey-syria-russia-turkish-spies-saved-the-day-in-idlib.html.
[2] Tayfun Özberk, “STM starts construction of first LMS Batch 2 for Royal Malaysian Navy,” Naval News, December 8, 2024, https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2024/12/stm-starts-construction-of-first-lms-batch-2-for-royal-malaysian-navy. Also see TRENDS Senior Researcher and Head of TRENDS Türkiye Office Dr. Serhat Süha Çubukçuoğlu’s book, Turkey’s Naval Activism: Maritime Geopolitics and the Blue Homeland Concept (Palgrave MacMillan, 2023).
[3] Ezgi Akın, “Buoyed by drones, NATO deals, Turkey defense exports hit record $7.1B,” Al-Monitor, January 3, 2025, https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2025/01/buoyed-drones-nato-deals-turkey-defense-exports-hit-record-71b;”
Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), “Global military spending surges amid war, rising tensions and insecurity,” April 22, 2024, https://www.sipri.org/media/press-release/2024/global-military-spending-surges-amid-war-rising-tensions-and-insecurity; SIPRI, “Financial value of the global arms trade,” Undated, https://www.sipri.org/databases/financial-value-global-arms-trade.
[4] “Sayılarla Türk Savunma Sanayii” SavunmaSanayi360, https://www.savunmasanayii360.com/tr/sayilarla-turk-savunma-sanayii;
Burak Ege Bekdil, “Turkey Launches ‘Aggressive’ Defense Export Campaign,” Defense News, January 19, 2017, https://www.defensenews.com/global/2017/01/19/turkey-launches-aggressive-defense-export-campaign.
[5] “Defying Limits: Türkiye’s Defence Industry and the Challenge of US Sanctions,” Herdem Attorneys at Law, Undated, https://herdem.av.tr/defying-limits-turkiye-s-defence-industry-and-the-challenge-of-us-sanctions.
[6] “Mısır F-16 Programı,” Türk Havacılık ve Uzay Sanayii (TUSAŞ), Undated, https://www.tusas.com/urunler/ucak/f-16/misir-f-16-programi.
[7] Göksel Yıldırım, “Savunma ve havacılık sanayisi 2021’i yeni ihracat rekoruyla kapattı,” Anadolu Ajansı, January 3, 2022, https://www.aa.com.tr/tr/ekonomi/savunma-ve-havacilik-sanayisi-2021i-yeni-ihracat-rekoruyla-kapatti/2464139.
[8] Marcus Weisberger, “Turkey Will Make F-35 Parts Throughout 2020, Far Longer Than Anticipated,” Defense One, January 14, 2020, https://www.defenseone.com/policy/2020/01/turkey-will-make-f-35-parts-longer-anticipated/162426.
[9] Barın Kayaoğlu, “In first, Turkey to export jets, military vessels to NATO allies: What to know,” Al-Monitor, December 29, 2024, https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2024/12/first-turkey-export-jets-military-vessels-nato-allies-what-know.
[10] “KAAN’s Ejection Seat at Tests,” TurDef, September 29, 2023, https://turdef.com/article/kaan-s-ejection-seat-at-tests.
[11] Jared Szuba, “Intel: UAE suspends F-35 talks over US security demands,” Al-Monitor, December 14, 2021, https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2021/12/intel-uae-suspends-f-35-talks-over-us-security-demands.
[12] Selçuk Böke, “IDEF’23 rekorların fuarı oldu,” Hürriyet, August 26, 2023, https://www.hurriyet.com.tr/ekonomi/idef23-rekorlarin-fuari-oldu-42320839.
[13] Tolga Yanık, Uğur Aslanhan, “IDEF 2025 ziyaretçilerini dörtlü yapısıyla ağırlayacak,” Anadolu Ajansı, August 17, 2024, https://www.aa.com.tr/tr/ekonomi/idef-2025-ziyaretcilerini-dortlu-yapisiyla-agirlayacak/3306331
[14] “TEKNOFEST 2024 dikey inişli roket yarışması başlıyor,” TRT Haber, September 11, 2024, https://www.trthaber.com/haber/turkiye/teknofest-2024-dikey-inisli-roket-yarismasi-basliyor-877084.html.
[15] “TEKNOFEST İzmir’e rekor katılım: 1 milyon 100 bin ziyaretçi,” Yeni Asır, October 18, 2023, https://www.yeniasir.com.tr/gundem/2023/10/18/teknofest-izmire-rekor-katilim-1-milyon-100-bin-ziyaretci.
[16] Esra Karataş Alpay, “How Türkiye beat China and the US to become a drone leader,” TRT World, September 2024, https://www.trtworld.com/magazine/how-turkiye-beat-china-and-the-us-to-become-a-drone-leader-18212119.
[17] Barın Kayaoğlu, “Turkey slated to boost defense exports after major arms fair sees $6.2B in contracts,” Al-Monitor, November 3, 2024, https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2024/10/turkey-slated-boost-defense-exports-after-major-arms-fair-sees-62b-contracts.
[18] “Milli Takım Gibi SAHA’ya Çıktılar,” Savunma Sanayi Org, October 29, 2024, https://www.savunmasanayi.org/milli-takim-gibi-sahaya-ciktilar.
[19] Barın Kayaoğlu, “What’s next for Turkey-UAE ties as economic cooperation hits record high?” Al-Monitor, June 30, 2020, https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2024/06/whats-next-turkey-uae-ties-economic-cooperation-hits-record-high.
[20] Barın Kayaoğlu, “Turkey’s military scorecard: Naval and aerial advances but lacks money, speed,” Al-Monitor, March 24, 2024, https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2024/03/turkeys-military-scorecard-naval-and-aerial-advances-lacks-money-speed; Ragıp Soylu, “Turkey defence and security budget surges to record $47bn,” Middle East Eye, October 18, 2024, https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/turkey-defence-security-budget-highest-47bn.
[21] Sıtkı Egeli, Serhat Güvenç, Çağlar Kurç and Arda Mevlütoğlu, “Turkiye’s Defence Industry: Which Way Forward?” International Institute for Strategic Studies and Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research, November 13, 2024, https://www.iiss.org/research-paper/2024/11/turkiyes-defence-industry-which-way-forward; Sıtkı Egeli, Serhat Güvenç, Çağlar Kurç and Arda Mevlütoğlu, “From Client to Competitor: The Rise of Turkiye’s Defence Industry” International Institute for Strategic Studies and Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research, May 1, 2024, https://www.iiss.org/research-paper/2024/05/from-client-to-competitor-the-rise-of-turkiyes-defence-industry.
[22] While air-to-air missiles cannot sink any military vessel, neither do the Reis-class submarines have vertical launchers for cruise missiles. They can only launch torpedoes, anti-ship missiles, and mines from tubes on their bow.
[23] Ali Bakeer, “Challenges threaten the rise of Turkey’s defense industry,” Middle East Institute, May 14, 2019, https://www.mei.edu/publications/challenges-threaten-rise-turkeys-defense-industry.
[24] International Monetary Fund, “World Economic Outlook database: October 2024,” https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/WEO/weo-database/2024/October/weo-report?c=186,&s=NGDP_RPCH,NGDPD,PPPGDP,NGDPDPC,PPPPC,PCPIPCH,&sy=2022&ey=2029&ssm=0&scsm=1&scc=0&ssd=1&ssc=0&sic=0&sort=country&ds=.&br=1.
