TR UAV/UCAV Programs | Anka - series | Kızılelma | TB - series

boredaf

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Who said that the provider (Turkey) and the customer (Burkina Faso) know that the satellite network is/has been manipulated by third parties?
Why are there (double) agents, spies, organizations in the world that try to outdo each other, otherwise there would be no secret services in general?
Who says that all soldiers, civil servants and the like in Burkina Faso are clean without exception and are not corrupt themselves?
And if you can't achieve it through money, then through blackmail.
The Israeli secret service operates through intermediaries in Turkey, they were arrested, and you ask me why this should happen....
Unfortunately, I don't trust Burkina Faso's secret service & security system to use Turkey's system-critical platforms while protecting Turkey's security & confidentiality.
Mate, what are you talking about? You didn't even reply to anything that was said in the post you quoted. Why would Akıncı need access to our military satellites when it can be used with LOS, and even if it needed satellite access why would we give them access to our own military ones? And even if we somehow did, why would we allow them to upload anything to our own systems?
 

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Old article but interesting!

EMERGENT PLAYER – TURKEY’S DRONE INDUSTRY​

  1. Aviation Features
  2. Emergent player – Turkey’s drone industry


24th September 2021
FEATURE
Spurred on in the early 2000s by the growing international unmanned market, Turkey developed an indigenous drone industry and has become a significant UAV player
The history of Turkey’s rise as a verifiable developer and exporter of unmanned aerial systems can be charted back to attempts to acquire US and Israeli aircraft in the mid- to late-2000s – efforts that, for a number of reasons, purportedly did not meet Ankara’s hopes or intentions.

Image 1
The Bayraktar platform, seen here in prototype form, has been widely distributed among Turkey’s armed forces. Baykar

Long considered the premier suppliers of military unmanned solutions, the US and Israel had snatched a considerable share of the global market for such systems, a situation that Turkey, as with many countries at the time, had no choice but to engage in.
In the mid-1990s, the country had sought out US manufacturer General Atomics Aeronautical Systems (GA-ASI) for the procurement of Gnat 750 and Gnat 1 unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), designed for tactical level surveillance and support missions. These entered service in 1995 and were used over the next decade by the Turkish military. Having gained significant operational experience with the GA-ASI UAVs, Turkey returned to the company in the mid-2000s to undertake what became a multi-year campaign to procure MQ-1 Predator and MQ-9 Reaper UAVs, which would offer a significant capability boost in terms of endurance and overall platform sophistication.
However, a combination of issues – notably a reluctance on the part of the American political administration at the time, under US President Barack Obama, to sell such systems to Turkey – resulted in the collapse of the earlier announced Foreign Military Sale.
The result of these endeavours – failures as far as Ankara was concerned – solidified the thoughts of the country’s ruling and industrial elite to ensure that Turkey would be able to provide for its own needs by developing a viable indigenous defence design, development and manufacturing capability. This ambition extended to all warfighting domains, to include unmanned systems capable of providing intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR), as well as surface strike capabilities.
At the same time, Turkey had also successfully acquired a small number of Heron 1 UAVs from Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), but widespread complaints by the country’s political class regarding platform failures and unsuitability – claims roundly denied by IAI – further soured the idea that foreign-sourced military equipment was a viable course of action.
During a Royal United Services Institute round table discussion on Ankara’s unmanned ambitions in May this year, Haluk Bayraktar, CEO of Turkish UAV original equipment manufacturer Baykar, which produces platforms such as the Bayraktar TB2 medium altitude, long endurance (MALE) system, suggested that after 2000 there “had been in a shift” in the direction the country was heading to meet its unmanned requirements.
“Twenty years ago, there were 20 companies [in Turkey’s military industrial base]. Now there are 2000,” Bayraktar said, adding there had been “an increase” in the number of military capabilities provided by indigenous sources.
Indigenous growth and exports
For Baykar, research efforts began on unmanned systems in 2000, achieving first flight and autopilot operations in 2004. This was followed in 2006 with the development of the Mini- and Malazgirt-class UAVs. First delivery of the Mini UAV to Turkey’s military was met in 2007, with the Malazgirt UAVs following in 2009. Baykar achieved the first export of Mini platforms in 2012.

Image 2
Turkey has achieved some success in the export market, with Ukraine, Azerbaijan and Poland all acquiring the Bayraktar TB2. Baykar

These early steps laid the groundwork to make greater strides towards the development of larger, more capable systems, not just from Baykar but also the likes of Turkish Aerospace Industries with its Anka family, which resembles the platforms Ankara had sought from US-based suppliers a decade previously.
In 2012, Baykar followed the Mini and Malazgirt platforms with the development of a tactical class UAV, with the first delivery taking place in 2014. By 2017, the company had started work on the Akinci high altitude, long-endurance (also knows as HALE) platform, achieving the maiden flight in 2019.
The Akinci represents the current pinnacle of Baykar’s unmanned systems development, able to operate at altitudes of up to 40,000ft and with an endurance of 24 hours. The platform can carry a greater external payload compared to its predecessors – around 900kg – and will feature an active electronic scanning array radar and signals intelligence capability, including electronic and signals intelligence.
However, as earlier outlined, Turkey’s indigenous unmanned industry also set its sights on the global market, taking what it considers were failures in foreign procurement to offer platforms to countries that might otherwise not be able to acquire such capabilities due to financial or political reasons.
Although active in the market for more than a decade, Turkey’s announced sale of four Bayraktar TB2 mission sets to Poland, each comprising six UAVs, was a watershed moment. This was the first time that Turkey had managed to sell into a NATO country, with the deal including a logistics and training package, according to Mariusz Błaszczak, the Minister of National Defence. Błaszczak revealed that the contract covers the delivery of mobile ground control stations, SAR radars and training simulators, as well as the provision of Roketsan’s laser-guided MAM-L and MAM-C anti-tank missiles, enabling the provision of tactical surveillance, search and rescue and surface strike operations. The contract also provides for a 24-month warranty, as well as transfer of technology to ensure the capability for platform services and sustainment.
The Polish Ministry of National Defence stated that one Bayraktar TB2 mission set was valued at approximately $67m, suggesting an overall programme procurement cost of $402m. The first Bayraktar TB2 set of is scheduled to be delivered to the Polish Armed Forces by the end of 2022, with the entire order completed by the end of 2024.

Image 3
Baykar’s Akinci UAV is the latest platform developed by the company, which has continued to evolve its unmanned technology over the past 20 years. Baykar

The Bayraktar TB2 is one of the most established MALE tactical UAVs produced by Turkish industry, capable of conducting ISR and combat missions using guided missiles carried on four suspension points under the wings. In addition, the platform is capable of fully autonomous taxiing, take-off, landing and flight, reducing operator workload to aid mission efficiency. The system has a flight endurance of up to 27 hours, a maximum take-off weight of 700kg and a maximum speed of around 220km/h. Additionally, the platform has an operational ceiling of 27,000ft and a beyond-line-of-sight range of 1,800km.
Baykar has also achieved export successes in the Middle East, following the March 2018 order by Qatar for six Bayraktar TB2 UAVs, which was the first export order of the type. The deal, signed with Qatar’s Reconnaissance and Surveillance Centre (RSC), included three ground control stations, training and associated equipment, including a UAV operations centre. Qatar had earlier bought smaller unmanned platforms from the Turkish company, acquiring ten Bayraktar Mini UAVs in 2012 under a $3.95m contract, becoming the first UAVs in the Qatar Armed Forces inventory.
Other international operators of the Bayraktar TB2 include Azerbaijan and Ukraine, although details are less clear as to platform numbers for these two customers.
What is clear is the place that unmanned systems now have on the modern battlefield, following Azerbaijan’s experience in conducting operations against Armenian military forces during the Nagorno-Karabakh war of 2020, in which unmanned systems played a decisive role in the conflict. Turkey has also put platform theory into practice in Operations Euphrates Shield (2016), Olive Branch (2018) and Spring Shield (2020) in Syria.
Speaking during RUSI’s May briefing, Can Kasapoglu, director of security and defence research programme at Istanbul-based think tank EDAM, outlined the evolving role of combat and surveillance UAVs on the modern battlefield: “In each operation... we observed trends. First, integration of land-based fire support, where the drones are force multipliers. Second, drones used in the suppression of enemy defences. Third, pinpoint target. And fourth, drone footage [is] used in information operations in the digital sphere of modern conflict.”
Defence diplomacy
Another factor in the export of UAV systems into the international market is the political benefit that comes with it – the element of defence diplomacy that, in some form or other, influences virtually all elements of geopolitics today.

Image 4
Ukraine had previously acquired the Bayraktar TB2 for its military, one of the earlier steps into the European continent. Ukrainian MOD

Taking the Polish Bayraktar TB2 acquisition as an example, Poland’s political class was keen to highlight the deal as not only improving the military capabilities of the country’s armed forces, but also the defence and political co-operative benefits that would follow.
“Yesterday, the presidents of Poland and Turkey talked about security on NATO’s eastern flank, including the security of Poland and Turkey. They also discussed our military co-operation. This is the framework that we, the defence ministers, fill,” stated Błaszczak on May 25, following his meeting with Hulusi Akar, Turkey’s Minister of National Defense.
A statement from Poland Ministry of National Defence pointed to discussions between the two ministers such as military co-operation, both bilateral and within the framework of NATO (both countries being NATO members), while also raising “matters related to further strengthening the security of NATO’s southern flank region.”
These were particularly pointed comments given the perhaps divergent ambitions that other Alliance members such as Greece and Italy have in the Mediterranean region.
“I am very glad that... I had the honour to sign the contract for the purchase of unmanned aerial vehicles. It is a very good weapon, a proven weapon that significantly increases the capabilities of the Polish Army,” Błaszczak stated. “We have also discussed other possible areas of co-operation, including artillery and various fields of modernisation of the Polish Army.”
Also signed was an agreement between Poland and Turkey concerning the mutual protection of classified defence industry information. Interestingly, the 2021 announcement had been preceded in 2017 by the signing of a Declaration of Intent between Poland and Turkey, which set out areas of future defence co-operation.
Speaking during May’s RUSI round table, Ash Rossiter, the assistant professor of international security at Khalifa University in the United Arab Emirates, said the export of Turkish unmanned systems “may be part” of Turkey’s efforts in building relationships with other states. However, those efforts have not been universally welcomed.
“[There has been] a belief, an acceptance and no small amount of resignation that Turkey has developed drones [and] that has been met with some resignation in the [Middle East] region amongst Turkey’s rivals,” Rossiter explained. ”There is a misunderstanding of how Turkey got to where it got to, and some surprise in Turkey’s rise as a drone power.”
Nevertheless, the facts are on the ground – or, indeed, in the skies. Over the course of a generation, Ankara has created a viable unmanned industry and provided systems of evolving sophistication to its armed forces, while entering into the Great Game of defence geopolitics. Turkey’s efforts to carve a sizeable chunk of the UAV market has been successful and is likely to grow.
By Richard Thomas
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Originally published in AIR International Website​

 

Kitra

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Who said that the provider (Turkey) and the customer (Burkina Faso) know that the satellite network is/has been manipulated by third parties?
Why are there (double) agents, spies, organizations in the world that try to outdo each other, otherwise there would be no secret services in general?
Who says that all soldiers, civil servants and the like in Burkina Faso are clean without exception and are not corrupt themselves?
And if you can't achieve it through money, then through blackmail.
The Israeli secret service operates through intermediaries in Turkey, they were arrested, and you ask me why this should happen....
Unfortunately, I don't trust Burkina Faso's secret service & security system to use Turkey's system-critical platforms while protecting Turkey's security & confidentiality.
You are ranting.

Nobody is denying that countries are spying on each other, including Turkey. Nobody is expecting a random Turk or a customer is going to protect our systems.

You secure your critical infrastructure by having total control over it. In this case, only allow certified software to run. So any modified software will be detected since the certification/checksum will be modified.

You are also giving a random person in Burkina Faso too much credit. USA does not need anyone like that to compromise our systems. Our systems are full of western components which are easily compromised even before they reach us. what is worst, we even have no way of knowing since that hardware/software is closed source most of the time.

So what we can do is to assume that our systems are comprimised from the start and act accordingly. for example, a compromised component/software can activate constantly, randomly, on certain time/condition or on an external signal. Each of these compromises have their own solutions but it is in reality very difficult since even a single transistor/resistor can shut down a billion dollar equipment by overloading critical parts. This was what happened to the Iranian nuclear centrifuges a few years ago. Their engines were overloaded since the PLC were giving randomly errenous values.

Turkey is taking steps to overcome some of these problems. For example we produce some of our own IC but these are 120, 90 or 65nm tech which are litterally 30 year old tech so they can't be used everywhere but good enough for certain critical parts such as cryptography/communication. the time critical parts are performed on american FPGA/CPU/GPU/DSP/PLC or sensors. We are still using Microsoft Windows on a lot of critical systems. That shit is full of holes even to random kids.
 

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“The Americans are testing unmanned F-16s

Three specially rebuilt F-16 aircraft appeared at Eglin Air Force Base. These vehicles are capable of performing autonomous flights and missions.

The aircraft are converted from used F-16 versions C and D. They belong to the VENOM-AFT program. This project aims to experiment with artificial intelligence designed to control autonomous combat vehicles that will be created as a result of the CCA (Collaborative Combat Aircraft) program."

The Russian publication "Military Review" reports this.

1712730257580.png

 

Iskander

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Remote flight control and autonomous flight using AI are two big differences, as they say in Odessa :)
 

blackjack

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Remote flight control and autonomous flight using AI are two big differences, as they say in Odessa :)
you need to read the article you post. I bolded the important parts of the article for you

"The aircraft are converted from used F-16 versions C and D. They belong to the VENOM-AFT program. This project aims to experiment with artificial intelligence created to control autonomous combat vehicles that will be created as a result of the CCA (Collaborative Combat Aircraft) program. It's not just about creating independent unmanned combat aircraft based on the F-16, but also about further improving the artificial brain that will one day control unmanned combat platforms.

The aircraft were transferred to the 96th Test Aviation Regiment and the 53rd Aviation Regiment, which includes, among others: three test departments, a testing and evaluation group and a computer systems department. The restored F-16s will perform autonomous and semi-autonomous flights, but they will be constantly piloted by humans, namely experienced pilots of the aforementioned test units."


1. Creating a UAV based on the F-16
2. One day comment which is they have get to the level of a UAV based platform.
3. Constantly be piloted by humans, so when they get to the level of not constant at all.

If we want a better track record of UAVs.

US
-reported cases of the F-35 self-ejecting pilots that they still have some kind of problems with the F-35s computer. What if a Polish pilot experienced the same self-ejection that happened in Florida and flies all the way to a Russian controlled Ukrainian territory or Russia itself? Ask the Russians kindly to give the F-35 back?
-Stingray drone is only for refueling with status still in the development stage.
-Phantom Ray drone last news update was in 2011.
-X-47B got cancelled or went from a strike aircraft which never fired a missile or a bomb to reconnaissance or refueling purposes
-Why are they trying to make a UAV based on a 4th generation aircraft than a 5th generation aircraft like the F-35? It makes it look like there are stilll problems with the F-35 and having it be a UAV will require more programming challenges.
-XQ-58 flew, but has not ttest fired any weapons

Russia
-Grom UAV has not flew yet which is the equivalent in medium size stealth design like the kizilelma or XQ-58
-Flying the largest stealth UAV Su-70, has its radars, modified engine from round serrated nozzles to flat nozzles, dropped bombs and fired air to air missiles, made 2nd prototype, https://tass.ru/armiya-i-opk/19813189 and a January 2024 claiming production for 2nd half this year.
-announced a drone-based version of the Su-75, and even have a patent of how cockpit modification would work for one.

Turkey
-kizilelma has been test flown. dont think it dropped bombs or fired missiles yet in test flights, all eggs in one basket with Ukraine on engines with no confirmation yet if the TF6000 will be used.
-No heavy stealth drone design yet like Su-70, BAE Taranis, Neuron or X-47B which of course require powerful engines which have to designed 1st before deciding on a heavy stealth drone design.
-Test flight for Anka-3 with Ukrainian engines so the rest is self-explanatory like the Kizilelma

Stealth drone design rankings
-US can boldly claim they test flew Heavy stealth drone and Medium stealth drone before anyone else.
-Turkey and US can boldly claim they flew Medium stealth drones before Russia.
-Russia can boldly claim they got the heaviest stealth drone design in service soon to start production on the 2nd half of 2024. And maybe get a heavy stealth supersonic design flying like the Su-75 soon based on their propositions of it.

Does anyone agree with this assessment? Turkey has a lot of ambition on stealth drone projects but what limits it is the obvious case of engines. I wonder how pressure TEI must be feeling right now? They can make the Kizilelma test fire missiles and bombs and claim they test fired missiles on bombs on a Medium stealth UAV before any other country. Personally, I think they should just ask Ukraine to give the patent design of all their engines with some cash if that would help speed up the process of their own UAV engine production.
 

Nutuk

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Nueron was not a heavy drone, specs are nearly similar to ANKA-3
 

blackjack

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I am thinking the reason they have not announced TEI-6000 engines or plans of making own engines for drones because.

1. The war is ongoing and maybe Ukraine can win.
2. Since they constantly initiated peace plans between Russia and Ukraine which resulted in nothing in Istanbul, maybe a secret agreement with Russia not to bomb drone engine facility there.
3. Maybe Russia can win and Turkiye will purchase those engines from Russia instead.
4. Dont want to announce their own domestic drone engine production publicly without making it look like they don't have faith in a certain side winning.

I am scratching my head on this.
 

Rodeo

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I am thinking the reason they have not announced TEI-6000 engines or plans of making own engines for drones because.

1. The war is ongoing and maybe Ukraine can win.
2. Since they constantly initiated peace plans between Russia and Ukraine which resulted in nothing in Istanbul, maybe a secret agreement with Russia not to bomb drone engine facility there.
3. Maybe Russia can win and Turkiye will purchase those engines from Russia instead.
4. Dont want to announce their own domestic drone engine production publicly without making it look like they don't have faith in a certain side winning.

I am scratching my head on this.
No reason for speculation. TF6000 was quoted for both KIZILELMA and ANKA-3 by the officials, including Selçuk Bayraktar.

--

Golden Age of Turkish Aviation

TARGET KIZILELMA

I congratulate the @TEI_TUSAS team for successfully firing Turkey's first national turbofan engine, TF6000.

 

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Kaan Azman 

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After a bit of research, I found out that AEI Systems that Canik acquired also made a VENOM LR without dampers, VENOM. They stated to AA that KIZILELMA is on the table, just with a variant without dampers. They actually referred to VENOM, not baseline ADEN. They told me back in IDEF'23 that ADEN isn't considered for KIZILELMA, which somewhat bamboozled me as it is a pure pain to mount a revolver cannon with dampers complicating integration structurally.
 

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Akıncı and TB2 mockups appeared with Chilean flag at a regional trade-show. Chile is on the map as a likely user.

Screenshot 2024-04-12 at 09-55-51 UAV Exports.png
 
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