Pentagon warns of 'serious consequences' after Erdoğan confirms Turkey's S-400 tests

Turkey has tested S-400 air defence missiles
purchased from Russia, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan
said, confirming news reports that tests had been carried out last week.
“It is true, these tests have been done and are
being done,” Erdoğan said in televised
comments after attending Friday prayers in Istanbul.
The United States has threatened sanctions against
Turkey after it took delivery of the S-400s from Russia last year and has
excluded the country from a programme to build and acquire the F-35 stealth
fighter jet. The U.S. State Department has condemned the apparent test firing
in northern Turkey last Friday.
Erdoğan said Turkey
would not act at the behest of the United States. Fellow NATO member Greece had
previously taken purchased and used Russian S-300 missiles, he said.
“These gentlemen are disturbed because this weapon
is Russian,” Erdoğan said. “But we are determined
and will continue what we are doing.”
Washington says activation of the S-400s would
compromise NATO’s defences and potentially allow Russia to gather information
about the F-35 and other U.S. military hardware.
The United States has been clear to Turkey at the
highest levels that the S-400s should not be operationalised, State Department
spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus said last week. Activating the weapon would have
serious consequences for the security relationship, chief Pentagon spokesman
Jonathan Hoffman said.
The S-400 is a successor to the S-200 and S-300
systems and is believed to be capable of engaging a wider variety of targets at
longer ranges than equivalent U.S. systems, according to military analysts.
The United States has offered to provide Patriot
missile systems as an alternative, but Turkey refused because Washington
declined to provide a transfer of the weapon’s technology.
Earlier this week, Turkish Defence Minister Hulusi
Akar said Turkey was sticking to its demands regarding the Patriots.
“Only Russia has responded to Turkey’s needs
suitably,” he said in an interview with Bloomberg. “If you are selling a
system, it is your duty to persuade whoever necessary and deliver the system.”
The Pentagon's chief spokesperson Jonathan Hoffman
quickly condemned the development, and said that an operational S-400 system is
“not consistent with Turkey's commitments as a U.S. and NATO ally.”
“The U.S. Department of Defense condemns in the
strongest possible terms Turkey's October 16 test of the S-400 air defense
system — a test confirmed today by Turkish President Recep Erdogan,” Pentagon
spokesperson Hoffman said in a statement.
Kay Bailey Hutchison, the U.S. ambassador to NATO,
said the United States had worked hard to ensure Turkey dropped plans to
purchase the Russian missiles.
“We, along with our whole NATO alliance, have done
everything we could to divert Turkey from buying a missile defence system by
our acknowledged adversary Russia,” Hutchison said during an online press
conference in Brussels on Wednesday.