Following several weeks of speculation (including what in retrospect was fake news from Bloomberg that "Turkey Weighs New U.S. Call to Delay Buying Russian Missiles"), in a televised speech in Istanbul late on Saturday, Bloomberg reported that Turkey's executive president Erdogan invited yet another sharp gap down in the lira when trading resumes in a few hours, after he not only ruled out US demands that Turkey delay the purchase of an advanced Russian missile-defense system, but - assuring that Trump and NATO will be furious at Turkey's regime - said he may bring forward the delivery date from July.
"It is definitely out of the question for us to step back on the issue of S-400s, it is a done deal,” Erdogan said “Our deal was to have the S-400s delivered to us by July; they will probably bring that forward."
Erdogan's defiance has not gone unnoticed and on Thursday, the lira slumped after Trump terminated a preferential trade agreement with Turkey in retaliation for Ankara's stubborn support of the Russian deal; the latest escalation took place after the Trump admin last week asked Ankara to delay taking the system to 2020 although it is now clear that won't happen.
In many ways Erdogan's decision on whether to proceed with the Russian S-400 deal over a competitive deal offered by the US, involving Patriot missiles, is seen as a barometer of US superpower "standing" among frontier nations, those where there is a clash between Moscow and DC for future influence.
And even though pushing ahead with the deal carries the risk that renewed US sanctions that could plunge Turkey into renewed economic turmoil, slam the lira and accelerate the country's surging inflation, the accord with Putin also highlights Turkey’s aspirations for an increasingly independent role in regional policies and, obviously, the mutual erosion of trust with Washington.
"The S-400 is a defensive system and has a long range. As for the payment plan, Russia has given us very suitable conditions,” Erdogan said, saying that Turkey has sent 100 engineers to Russia to help make the weapons. And just to make sure Trump is truly pissed off, Erdogan also vowed to continue future cooperation with Russian, saying that "after the S-400s, the S-500s are also considered and there will be co-production of S-500s as well."
As reported on numerous prior occasions, the proposed purchase has anger ed Trump’s administration, which argues that integrating such a system into NATO’s second-largest army could help Moscow gather critical intelligence on the stealth capabilities of the next generation F-35 fighter planes, which Turkish manufacturers help build. Erdogan dismissed the U.S. argument and said Turkish military experts were good at deciding what to purchase.
To be sure, Trump's retaliation has yet to be manifest; should the US presidentr wish to punish Turkey more, not only could Turkey be expelled from the Lockheed Martin F-35 program, but also face sanctions under two pieces of legislation: the Magnitsky Act and CAATSA, which allows the punishment of entities doing business with parts of the Russian state. As Bloomberg notes, a bipartisan group of eight senior U.S. House members introduced a resolution on Wednesday calling on Turkey to cancel the planned S-400 acquisition.
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