New key feature for Turkish UCAVs: Hitting air targets

Domestic and national UCAVs, which are one of the pillars of Türkiye's defense industry, are to gain another very important capability. Turkish UCAVs, which will be able to use the Sungur air defense missile in the near future, will both have achieved a very rare capability in the world and further consolidate their power on the battlefield. In this context, the cooperation agreement signed between BAYKAR and ROKETSAN for the Sungur air defense missile is considered very valuable. The Sungur missile was developed by ROKETSAN and was designed in a structure that can be used both as a vehicle-mounted and by a single soldier. Defense Industry Researcher Kadir Doğan said that the fact that ROKETSAN, which was first established to produce Stingers, an equivalent of Sungur, has reached a point where it is able to produce more successful products than Stinger, is a historical achievement. He also further explained why he sees the integration of Sungur missiles to UCAVs, emphasizing that with this integration, Turkish UCAVs will gain the ability to perform air-to-air missions, albeit partially. 'The main aim here may be specifically destroying other manned/unmanned systems that make reconnaissance/observation.' Doğan also emphasized the cost of the Sungur missiles, which is exponentially cheaper compared to other air defense missiles, adding the versatility of the Sungur missiles as they can be used both in the air and on the ground. Drawing attention to the position of Türkiye at the unmanned aerial vehicles around the world, Doğan said that 'In fact, we can say that the air engagement of UCAVs is the last point of this technology.' 'From this point of view, Türkiye is one of the 3-4 most advanced countries in the world in terms of unmanned aerial vehicles.'