Turkey will take delivery of a Russian S-400 air defence system in the first half of July, president Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday, striking a defiant tone as he insisted that the US would not risk damaging relations with a key strategic ally by hitting the country with sanctions.
In a rare briefing with international media, Mr Erdogan said that training of 100 military personnel had been completed and that the Turkish military had decided where to station the batteries.
“As I’ve said before, the issue of the S-400, for us and for Russia, is a done deal — it’s a concluded matter,” he said. “The training and so on has also been completed. We have trained about 100 staff.”
“I do believe that delivery will commence by the 15th of next month and the deployment, once the delivery has commenced. The positions have been identified by the Turkish armed forces. The missiles will be deployed in those locations.”
As the anniversary of a violent attempted coup d’état that convulsed the country in 2016, July 15 is a date that is loaded with political significance in Turkey, but Mr Erdogan later clarified that the system would not be delivered on that day itself.
Washington has issued a series of increasingly vocal warnings to Turkey, a Nato member, over its plan to buy the advanced Russian technology, which they say poses a threat to the security of the new F-35 fighter jet that is being rolled out across Europe.
The Pentagon has already begun taking steps to remove Turkey from the F-35 programme in retaliation for the purchase. Meanwhile, US officials say that Turkey is almost certain to face punishing sanctions under legislation aimed a stymieing the Russian defence sector — a move that could strike a severe blow to the fragile Turkish economy.
Mr Erdogan, however, dismissed these warnings, insisting that US President Donald Trump would agree with him that sanctions were not necessary.
“I do not see any possibility that such sanctions will be imposed,” he said.
“At the end of the day, Turkey is not just any country. We have a strategic partnership, it goes back tens of years.
The Turkish president repeated his belief that Mr Trump would take steps to prevent sanctions on his country — a view that analysts say represents a misunderstanding of the US system and the relevant legislation. He said that he would level with the US president at next week’s G20 summit in Japan. “We will of course say: do you find such sanctions against Turkey acceptable? I do believe he will say he does not.”
He added: “I will ask him to do what is necessary. It’s that simple, since we are friends, since we are strategic partners.”
