A Pentagon official announced that Ankara should return the Russian S-400 air systems to Moscow, if it was seeking US Patriot systems.
In a press briefing, US Assistant Secretary of Defense Jonathan Rath Hoffman said: “The position of the Pentagon chief has been quite clear since the first day of his tenure in office, that Turkey will not acquire a Patriot unless it returns the S-400.”
This came in a comment by Hoffman on the statements of Turkish President Rajep Tayyip Erdogan, who said, earlier, that Washington had “softened” its position regarding the purchase of Russian S-400 anti-air systems.
According to Erdogan, all that the United States now requires from Turkey in this regard is the non-introduction of Russian systems into service.
On March 5, Erdogan confirmed that the deployment of the S-400 systems in Turkey would begin next April.
In 2017, Ankara concluded an agreement with Moscow to purchase S-400 systems, becoming the first NATO country to acquire these anti-air systems.
Ankara‘s decision has angered the United States and NATO, and Washington continues its efforts to get Turkey to abandon its decision.
In response to Turkey‘s failure to comply with US pressure, Washington excluded Ankara from the U.S. program for the production of the fifth-generation bomber fighter, the F-35. The United States also threatened to impose several sanctions on Turkey for obtaining the “S-400“, but has refrained from carrying out this promise until now, to avoid the escalation of the dispute between it and Ankara, which warned that it would not leave the sanctions against it unanswered.
Source: Tass
