Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack,

Turkish media recently claimed that Russia offered to buy back their country’s S-400s that it received in 2019 in order to then resell them to other clients, which Turkiye is supposedly receptive to since it wants to end its spat with the US over this and is also developing a domestic analogue that can replace them. 

Polish media added that “Ankara still does not actively use them. They were never integrated into NATO, their missiles are already halfway through their shelf life, and maintenance costs pose a burden”.

Meanwhile, Indian media suggested that this deal could result in their country finally receiving its delayed S-400s, which would first have to be upgraded by Russia. While neither Russia nor Turkiye have confirmed this report, it’s sensible enough to be taken seriously for the time being at least. Russia can’t spare any S-400s from the front for export, Turkiye has since largely reconciled with the US and no longer needs the S-400s either, while India is eager to receive more of these systems as soon as possible.

Each corresponding party’s interests are more urgent than ever because:

• Russia needs to regain its rapidly declining role in the global arms market after most of its production has been redirected from export to the front since 2022;

• the new TRIPP Corridor creates the basis for a US-Turkish military-strategic partnership along Russia’s entire southern periphery so long as the S-400-related US sanctions are first lifted;

• and spring’s Indo-Pak clashes made air defense a renewed priority for Delhi.

The original goal behind Turkiye’s import of the S-400s is no longer relevant either. Back then, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan deeply distrusted the US due to its (at minimum indirect) role in summer 2016’s failed coup, hence why he agreed to this air defense deal a year later. Turkiye was also very displeased with direct US military support for Ankara-designated Kurdish terrorists in Syria. After TRIPP and Jolani’s/Sharaa’s rise to power, however, the aforesaid imperatives became outdated for the most part.

The stage is therefore set for a grand deal between the US, Turkiye, Russia, and India, at least in theory and only tacitly in the case of the US-Russia, US-India, and Turkiye-India, but it remains to be seen whether it’ll materialize.

There are some forces that might torpedo it though, chiefly hardliners in the US and Russia, who might respectively object to the principle of a NATO ally selling military equipment back to Moscow and Russia buying back a weapons system that it sold to a NATO ally who now funds Ukraine.

Each side’s hardliners would therefore have to be sidelined in order for this deal to go through and it can’t be assumed that both Trump and Putin are able to do so in the current political conditions amidst escalating US-Russian tensions.

Furthermore, the US is also taking a hard line against India nowadays led by Trump personally, which reduces the odds that it would agree to have Turkiye indirectly supply India with Russia’s S-400s after Trump just punitively tariffed India for continuing to buy Russian arms.

Accordingly, while the details of this proposed arrangement make perfect sense with respect to each side’s interests as explained, political factors vis-à-vis the calculations of American and Russian hardliners could ultimately ruin any possibility for such a deal.

If the political will exists at each of those two’s highest levels, however, then it’s recommended that they encourage their media surrogates to articulate the inherent strategic benefits in order to help persuade the hardliners to reconsider their resistance.