Russia woos Turkey for its fighters, sends Sukhoi Su-35S, Su-57E for Technofest 2019

A Russian Sukhoi Su-35S multirole supersonic 4++ Generation fighter flew over the skies of Istanbul on Sunday while the 5th Generation stealth fighter Su-57 landed at the Ataturk Airport a day earlier for for the six-day Technofest 2019 techno festival. Russia is aggressively wooing Turkey to buy the Su-35S and Su-57E jets after it successfully sold the S-400 Triumf anti-aircraft missile system.

Turkey's Anadolu News Agency reported that Su-35S flew for almost 15 minutes and demonstrated its supermanoeuvrability while another the Russian multipurpose amphibious aircraft Beriev Be-200 showed its firefighting capabilities. Several Turkish leaders have opined that the country should look at Russian fighters after it was kicked out of the F-35 Lightning II stealth fighter programme by the United States of America for refusing to back down from the S-400 Triumf deal. Washington has also stopped the deliveries of the F-35 combat aircraft which Ankara had already paid for.

Technofest 2019 is Turkey's first aerospace and technology festival and comes just a couple of weeks after Russia's MAKS 2019 aero show where the former showed great interest in the  Su-35S and Su-57E jets, both of which were personally checked by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan..

During MAKS 2019 Russia’s Federal Service for Military Technical Cooperation spokesperson had claimed that Turkey had already started negotiations for Su-35S and Su-57E fighters with even Erdogan stating that there was a possibility of his country going in for a Russian jet.

While the Su-35 has been in active service with the Russian Air Force since 2015, the Su-57 has just entered serial production and the first fully-combat ready jet will join the military in late 2019. The Russian Defense Ministry has ordered over 70 Su-57 jets for the air force. The Russian Air Force already flies 84 Su-35s. China also has the Su-35 in its arsenal and keen on buying more jets while Indonesia has ordered 11 jets.