Why S-400 for Turkey?

2194 views

Russian surface-to-air-missiles (SAMs) is profoundly capable weapons (although S-500 which is better replacement in development). Particular strengths of S-400 is their extended reach, its flexible ability to strike different targets such as aircraft, bruise and ballistic missiles and its sophisticated sensors (which Russia claims include some anti-stealth capability). S-400 can perpetrate significant destruction to enemies. It range enable the system to detect and terminate the aerial refueling tankers or airborne early warning and control aircrafts which is very vital for any country to reserve its military position.

The geography limits its capabilities. If S400 needs to be allocated in mountainous area, then it might detect the target missile not before hundreds of km but tens of km before it hits. One battalion of S400 has 8 missile launchers. Each has 4 missiles totaling to 32 missiles. If the system is not protected by modern air defenses, it might be a problem there will be determined onslaught.

Turkey intends to operate the S-400 while developing its own SAM system, called HISAR. Thre are three versions of Hisar; A, O, U. Hisar-U,, which is not operational, yet, has +150km distance capability with maximum 20 km attitude range. Turkey intends to protect the system with HISAR-U but will not replace with S-400 which still provides superiority over HISAR-U. Therefore, it shall not be expected that Turkey will give up S-400 easily while will also stop developing much sophisticated SAM to replace S-400.