Turkey Rejects Offers for American Patriot Missile Batteries; S-400 Sufficient for Air Defence

Amid mounting Western pressure on Turkey to abandon its contract to acquire Russian S-400 missile batteries - Washington has provided the NATO state with a number of options to avoid economic sanctions from the U.S. Treasury, which it has repeatedly threatened to impose on major clients for Russian arms including Ankara and in late 2018 imposed on China for acquisition of the very same weapons system. These have included either acquiring the Russian weapons systems but leaving them inactive, which Turkey flatly rejected, or possibly the acquisition of American MIM-104 Patriot missile batteries alongside the S-400. The latter option would considerably undermine the blow to the prestige to Western arms manufacturers of seeing a NATO member acquire a Russian system over their own, while also providing the manufacturer Raytheon with profitable contracts - an economic boost to the U.S. defence industry in line with President Trump’s policy of supporting arms exports. Turkey for its part has considered the second option, and has for several months been negotiating for acquisition of the Patriot system.

Patriot systems to suit Turkish defence needs are estimated to cost $3.5 billion, considerably more than the S-400, and their capabilities leave much to be desired in comparison. Where the S-400 is capable of deploying almost ten different types of munitions, each tailored to interception specific targets at various ranges from 400km to under 30km - allowing it to effectively function as a multi layered air defence system on its own, the Patriot is equipped with just a single missile type with a range of under 200km - less than half the range. Where the S-400 is capable of intercepting up to 80 targets simultaneously - guiding up to 160 missiles at once, the Patriot  is restricted to intercepting approximately a dozen. The S-400’s anti stealth capabilities, 600km detection range and access to hypersonic missiles are among the other features which place it well ahead of the Patriot.

In the first week of March 2019 Turkey rejected the American offer to provide Patriot missile systems, according to a report by Bloomberg citing official Turkish sources. While Ankara has remained adamant that it will not reconsider plans for S-400 acquisition, and has requested both generous loans and considerable technology transfers in order to consider acquiring the Patriot alongside it - with the missile system otherwise providing few capabilities the Russian platform lacks. Head of the main state body dealing with arms procurement and production, Ismail Demir, stated regarding the ongoing negotiations: "it is not possible for us to accept the content and details of the proposal as it is at the moment. The conditions must be discussed, there are a series of issues that must be clarified and a compromise must be reached.” Whether Turkey will eventually accept to acquire the Patriot under pressure, or whether it will become a target for American economic sanctions, remains to be seen.