Turkey is most likely not getting its hands on the F-35. As we speak many US senators are hell bent on imposing sanctions on Turkey for the S-400 purchase. This will be delayed because of US elections however they're teetering on the brink.
Turkey's economy is currently not doing well and as a result Erdogan wants to claim natural gas fields from southern Cyprus to remedy the situation. The Europeans however are not going to stand for this and will surely impose sanctions over this issue alone, never mind other issues like Turkey building a serious missile capacity that can threaten Europe or the nuclear reactors that Russia is going to build for Turkey within the next decade.
Turkey can always purchase jets like the SU-35 from Russia, that's on option, however the TF-X being produced by the British company BAE is what they're really looking forward to. Although like I've stated, with their current expansionist foreign policy, they might run into a situation where EU/US sanctions prevent them from acquiring vital spare parts for this jet.
Turkey's current foreign policy has truly put them in between a rock and a hard place so to speak, No matter where they purchase their 5th generation fighter jet from they will seemingly have conflicting issues.
Whether they choose the USA, EU/UK or Russia, their foreign policy will then be limited by the will and whims of those nations . For Turkey it would almost be better to buy from the Chinese, since China is not as involved in Turkey's immediate sphere of influence. However I doubt Turkey would purchase 5th generation fighters from China because of their opposition to the Uighur issue.
Then there's the Korean KF-X,. At first glance that might seem like a good fit since Turkey is already cooperating with the Koreans on the Altay tank. Then again the KF-X is more than likely going to utilize a significant amount of western hardware and technology. The fact of the matter is that Korea is really nothing more than a US vassal so they're basically at square one, with the puppet strings again leading to the US.
Turkey's economy is currently not doing well and as a result Erdogan wants to claim natural gas fields from southern Cyprus to remedy the situation. The Europeans however are not going to stand for this and will surely impose sanctions over this issue alone, never mind other issues like Turkey building a serious missile capacity that can threaten Europe or the nuclear reactors that Russia is going to build for Turkey within the next decade.
Turkey can always purchase jets like the SU-35 from Russia, that's on option, however the TF-X being produced by the British company BAE is what they're really looking forward to. Although like I've stated, with their current expansionist foreign policy, they might run into a situation where EU/US sanctions prevent them from acquiring vital spare parts for this jet.
Turkey's current foreign policy has truly put them in between a rock and a hard place so to speak, No matter where they purchase their 5th generation fighter jet from they will seemingly have conflicting issues.
Whether they choose the USA, EU/UK or Russia, their foreign policy will then be limited by the will and whims of those nations . For Turkey it would almost be better to buy from the Chinese, since China is not as involved in Turkey's immediate sphere of influence. However I doubt Turkey would purchase 5th generation fighters from China because of their opposition to the Uighur issue.
Then there's the Korean KF-X,. At first glance that might seem like a good fit since Turkey is already cooperating with the Koreans on the Altay tank. Then again the KF-X is more than likely going to utilize a significant amount of western hardware and technology. The fact of the matter is that Korea is really nothing more than a US vassal so they're basically at square one, with the puppet strings again leading to the US.
Well according to the president of the Turkish defense industries, there will be no stop-gap fighter purchase, other than a possible F-35 purchase. Focus is on the TF-X and probably most probably an indigenous F-16 upgrade.
But then again, you never know happens and circumstances might change. IMO low chance of a Russian fighter being bought because of the bad political consequences with the S-400 purchase. They might go for the eurofighter or more F-16's if the F-35 is not available.
TBH, they should've gone for the F-35 as their last fighter and use this decade (2020-2030) to build a formidable missile arsenal with precision strike capability with various ranges and association infrastructure like Iran has done for the last 30 years. Turkey is very similar to Iran in terms of geography suitable for underground missile bases and the like. They might not built an arsenal as large as the Iranians because of the higher prices, but the quality and reliability will most probably be better than the Iranian ones. Higher reliability and quality means a higher Pk.
All of this would mean shelving the TF-X program and go for an F-35+indigenous air-to-air UCAV. 150 or so F-35 with 300-450 wingman UCAV's, with MIUS, Akinci's and the like + a huge ballistic missile arsenal is a very potent, balanced and diverse precision strike capability. And the gained technology of the ballistic missiles would translate to other fields like air-defense and a space program.