This will be a wholly new MBT design to meet specific Turkish requirements, he said. The SSM, he said,has identified the initial requirement for the TAF as 250 platforms. However, Bayar noted:“In Turkey we have more than 3,000 tanks, the average age of which is fairly old. Over the next 20 years, you can easily assume that the entire fleet will be replaced with new tanks.”
Bayar adds that the current M60A3 upgrade programme with Israel Military Industries and Leopard 1A1s with Aselsan fire control systems have provided Turkey with the infrastructure for the new MBT programme.
“The Leopard upgrade is, however, not simply a fire control upgrade. The whole tank is being disassembled; everything is being replaced with new parts and reassembled. Therefore, I can now say I have a modern fire control system and a final assembly line [at Kayseri] with the tooling and expertise to manufacture new hulls. There are two areas in which we lack the expertise: one is the engine, which we will buy in; the second, which is more important, is the armor – this encompasses the whole spectrum of protection. We will therefore invest in the development of this armor capability and that will be locally designed and manufactured. We will set up that capability, maybe to provide whatever is required for the next 20 years.”