President Erdoğan said: "We took our national combat aircraft KAAN out of the hangar yesterday, which they humiliated by saying, "Its part looks like a radiator," and we witnessed the critical stages of our country's first supersonic fighter jet Hürjet, our heavy attack helicopter Atak-2, and our unmanned combat aircraft Anka-3."
President Erdoğan shared a post on social media about Türkiye's National Combat Aircraft (MMU) KAAN, Hürjet, Atak-2 and Anka-3, which were showcased at the "Debut of Century of the Future" at the Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) headquarters in Kahramankazan.
Stating that Vecihi Hürkuş, Selahattin Reşit Alan, Nuri Demirağ and Nuri Killigil attempted the efforts that Gazi Mustafa Kemal guided by saying, "The future is in the skies," but these visionary initiatives were blocked at home and abroad until his term, President Erdoğan said, "Every time our late preacher Necmettin Erbakan said 'heavy industry initiative,' he was lynched. The subsequent coalitions did not follow the steps taken during late Özal's term. The sincere efforts of many of our idealistic engineers, industrialists, and brilliant young people, whose hearts beat for their country, were failed by devious methods."
Noting that they faced numerous challenges while pursuing their goal of "a fully independent Türkiye in the defence industry," President Erdoğan said:
"They did this sometimes openly and sometimes under the guise of good intentions. When they could not say 'we will stop', they said 'we will intervene'; when they could not show the courage to say 'we will close', they referred to 'competition', and they tried to hide their intentions with fancy phrases. Despite this, we didn't stop; we weren't intimidated; we didn't give up trying, and we didn't even briefly consider abandoning our goals. Thanks be to Allah, we made Gazi's dream 'future' for our nation a reality, which had not been done before, had not progressed even if it had begun, and had even been sabotaged. However, there is still a long way to go. We took our national combat aircraft KAAN out of the hangar yesterday, which they humiliated by saying, "Its part looks like a radiator." We witnessed the critical stages of our country's first supersonic fighter jet Hürjet, our heavy attack helicopter, Atak-2, and our unmanned combat aircraft, Anka-3. We don't just produce planes, helicopters, satellites, tanks, missiles, and weapons. We are producing technology and building the Century of Türkiye all together."