1) Technology Transfer

Turkey developed a small defense industry in the past 20 years but some essential defense technology items are to time & money consuming to invented by yourself – so you try to "buy" or "license" the technology to save time/money.

The USA does not support 100% technology transfer to turkey – happened with the Bell AH-1Z chopper deal…where the USA didnt want to transfer radar, firing & mission computer and even forbidden the later modification of the choppers with "turkish technology developments". Italy offered 100% technology transfer with the Augusta Mangusta A129 attack chopper but lately the producer of the chopper engines (us company) forbidden italy to transfer the engine technology. The other point is that the leclerc tank was never an option for turkey………the german leopard 2A6ex was the only real deal for turkey.

The price of the korean XK2 seems high compared 8,5 Mio Dollar to the 6 Mio Dollar of the Leo 2 or the 5 Mio of the M1 Abraham A1 but keep in mind……the price is for FULL technology transfer. You are buying/licensing the software code, patents and so on.

But the Korean XK2 deal is not just a transfer…..korea and turkey will work together to implement turkish defense technology into the XK2 to create the turkish version "Altay MBT".

It seems that standard communication, IR sensors, Engine, mission computer and other parts will be turkish developments. C4, ABC protection, armour, firing computer and other parts will be korean or modified versions.

The cannon is still based on the german rheinmetall 120mm L55 technology which is also used in the M1A2, Leo 2, Merkava 4, XK2 and so on. The best cannon outthere.

Other Reasons:

2) France did illegally aclaimed turkey of the so-called armenian genocide even international law states that such acclaims can not be stated without a international court or tribunal. Even the UK did such a tribunal in the year 1918 and dropped the charges against the former imperial state of the ottomans. France uses every 4 years the so-called armenian card in the elections and lately to keep turkey out of the EU.

Because of the same reason France was canceled out of the 2 times of bidding for the turkish surveillance spy-sat projekt "gökturk" and the fregate project.

3) Germany

Even many politicans and the german defense industry want to sell the turks the Leo 2 with full technology transfer (even just the version 2A5) – the other politicians and the media uses the "kurdish problem" as a "no-go" even a MBT is usually not used against guerillas & terrorists………light APC or AV are the better choice. So, the germans dropped out …..BUT it seems that turkey gets the MTU Engine for the XK2 as full technology transfer from germany.

4) Connection Turkey and Korea

Since the korean war the ties between turkey and korea are very good. Almost 15 000 turkish soldiers served in korea with the UN forces and the turkish brigade (7000men) fought in the korean war. Therefore turks have a very good reputation in korea. Teakwondo is also almost a national sport in turkey…..brought back with turkish soldiers from korea. Samsung and LG are very succesfull brands in turkey and the quality of korean products is highly regarded in turkey.

The korean language and the turkish language are settled in the same language tree of the Altaic-mongol languages. They are different branches in this tree but somehow related….like hungarian and finnish language which are also far related with the turkish language.

So, enough chitty chat. Hope my informations helped!

cheers

Alan

I definitly belive that the Koreans would sell out the Kurds. But Koreans are very interested in stealing any resources too. I think Korea will go with whatever side can offer her more gold.

Also, is XAV being proposed as part of the package?