Türkiye’s domestically developed 5th-generation fighter jet will be named “KAAN,” President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan announced Monday.
Erdoğan’s remarks came after the TF-X, known as the National Combat Aircraft (MMU), made a runway debut and successfully completed its first taxi test after starting its engines for the first time in mid-March, Daily Sabah reported.
“Türkiye is now in every field, on land, in sea and submarine, in air and space,” Erdoğan told the “Century of the Future” event in the capital Ankara.
Erdoğan watched as KAAN and Hürjet, Türkiye’s first nationally built jet-powered trainer and light attack aircraft, rolled on the runway of the Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) headquarters in Kahramankazan district.
The fifth-generation aircraft has been developed by TAI with an aim to replace the F-16 aircraft in the inventory of the Air Forces Command, which is planned to be phased out starting in the 2030s. The project was launched in 2016.
With this aircraft, Türkiye becomes one of the few countries with the infrastructure and technology to produce a fifth-generation combat aircraft, Erdoğan said.
The 21-meter jet is able to reach a maximum speed of 1.8 Mach thanks to its twin engines, which can produce 29,000 pounds (13,000 kilograms) thrust each.
KAAN boasts all technologies and features found in fifth-generation warplanes. It will provide the opportunity to strategically attack air-to-air and air-to-ground targets. It has a completely domestic infrastructure for secure data sharing and the use of smart munitions.
With its high-performance radar, electronic warfare, electro-optics, communication, navigation and identification capability, it will achieve increased combat power with precision and accurate firing from internal weapon slots at high/supersonic speed. It also has automatic target recognition and detection, multiple data fusion and artificial intelligence capabilities.
The project helped Türkiye advance in technology areas such as low visibility, internal weapons slots, high maneuverability, increased situational awareness and sensor fusion, all features that are required for a new generation aircraft.
