Washington-Ankara Fighter Consultations F-35 relate to the settlement of outstanding issues by the end of the program in Turkeynotes the State Department regarding the second round of talks held January 18 in Washington.

Asked by the Hellas Journal website, US State Department spokesman Ned Price explained that both sides are negotiating to gradually close the issues that have arisen due to Turkey’s exclusion from the F-35 program.

The US Department of Defense statement does not mention the content of the negotiations, but only notes that the two delegations agreed to continue consultations at the next meeting, which is to be held in Ankara in the spring of 2023. Following the release of the statement, a Pentagon spokesman declined to comment on the subject of the consultations, saying “at this time we have no further details to share.”

However, shortly thereafter, Ned Price clarified that Turkey’s re-entry into the F-35 program was out of the question, as the neighboring country continued to be under the CAATSA (Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act) sanctions regime due to the acquisition of Russian S-35s. . 400 system. “Nothing has changed regarding Turkey’s suitability for the F-35 program. The Ministry of Defense issued a statement (on the second round of consultations). This is a discussion about how we will gradually bring the elements of this program to the end,” he stressed.

Turkey was removed from the F-35 program on September 23, 2021, saying it had paid $1.4 billion in advance for the first five fighter jets. However, Washington believes that the pickup was not the fault of Ankara, since Turkey ignored repeated private and public warnings, thereby deliberately violating US law. Finally, in addition to the financial controversy associated with the non-receipt of fighters, there are still a number of technical problems associated with the smooth exit of Turkey from the fighter production program.

^{Source: RES-IPE}