The NATO summit in Ankara brought a series of important decisions and announcements related to the Alliance’s air capabilities, from strategic transport and airborne surveillance to maritime patrol and combat aviation. Some of the agreements concern specific acquisitions, while others represent a political and industrial framework for future joint programs, with the emphasis placed on multinational cooperation, joint financing and strengthening interoperability within the Alliance.

One of the most important decisions concerns the launch of a new multinational initiative for the Airbus A400M. As Airbus stated in its press release, the governments of Belgium, Croatia, France, Poland, Spain, Turkey and the United Kingdom launched the High Visibility Project for the Airbus A400M during the NATO Summit Defence Forum in Ankara. The initiative should ultimately lead to the establishment of a multinational fleet based on this military transport aircraft.

Airbus states that the new project builds on the success of the Multinational MRTT Fleet program, the joint fleet of Airbus A330 MRTT aircraft, and is designed to address shortfalls in strategic air transport among European allies. The model is based on the principle of pooling and sharing capabilities, with different phases of cooperation potentially including multinational ownership and operation of the A400M fleet, as well as related services such as maintenance, training support, infrastructure and procurement.

For Croatia, this initiative is particularly interesting because it marks the first time the country appears in the context of joint access to a large military transport aircraft that the Croatian Air Force does not operate independently. NATO has not yet announced how many aircraft the future joint A400M fleet would include, where it would be based or to what extent individual countries would participate financially in the program. However, the very fact that some of the participating countries do not operate the A400M nationally shows that the Alliance wants to expand the shared-capability model to countries for which an independent acquisition would be financially and operationally demanding.

According to Airbus, the aim of the project is to create a comprehensive solution that would more efficiently meet national and NATO requirements, while providing greater operational flexibility in areas such as air-to-air refueling, disaster response, medical evacuation and firefighting. Airbus also points out that the A400M is today the backbone of air mobility for the largest European NATO members, with more than 135 aircraft in service and more than 270,000 flight hours accumulated by the global fleet.

In parallel with the A400M initiative, NATO has, according to AeroTime, also confirmed the selection of Saab’s GlobalEye system as its future airborne early warning and control platform, and as the successor to the Boeing E-3A Sentry AWACS fleet. GlobalEye is based on the Bombardier Global 6000/6500 business jet and is equipped with the Erieye Extended Range radar, which enables surveillance of targets in the air, at sea and on land. AeroTime reports that a joint procurement of up to ten aircraft is planned.

The GlobalEye decision is particularly significant because NATO had previously selected the Boeing E-7A Wedgetail, but that plan was abandoned following changes in U.S. procurement plans. This gives Sweden’s Saab an opportunity for its largest GlobalEye contract to date, while also continuing the trend of strengthening the European defense industry in key NATO capabilities. Reuters, cited by AeroTime, reports that deliveries could begin around 2030, with an estimated price of between 400 and 450 million U.S. dollars per aircraft.

Another important part of the Ankara agreements concerns unmanned systems for surveillance of large maritime areas. AeroTime reports that Denmark, Finland, Germany and Norway have launched the procurement of up to five Northrop Grumman MQ-4C Triton unmanned aircraft, designed for long-endurance intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions at high altitude. Triton is expected to strengthen NATO’s ISR capabilities, particularly in the Arctic, the North Atlantic and other strategically sensitive maritime regions.

At the same time, Denmark announced its own acquisition of two Boeing P-8A Poseidon aircraft. According to AeroTime, the move will significantly strengthen Denmark’s maritime surveillance, anti-submarine warfare and sovereignty protection capabilities in the Arctic and the North Atlantic. The procurement is part of Denmark’s defense agreement for the 2024–2033 period and is particularly linked to surveillance of the areas around Greenland and the Faroe Islands. The P-8A Poseidon, a military derivative of the Boeing 737-800, is already operated by the United States, the United Kingdom, Norway, Australia and Germany.

In addition to the A400M project, Airbus’ press release also states that Finland has officially joined the Multinational MRTT Fleet program. The joint A330 MRTT fleet now includes nine participating countries: the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Norway, Germany, Belgium, Czechia, Sweden, Denmark and Finland. According to Airbus, nine A330 MRTT aircraft are currently in operational service out of a total of 12 ordered, and the fleet has so far been deployed on NATO’s eastern flank, participated in civilian and refugee evacuations from Afghanistan and taken part in multinational exercises in the Indo-Pacific region.

The summit also carried a particular political dimension through the meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, during which the issue of Turkey’s possible return to the circle of F-35 users was reopened. According to AeroTime, Trump said the United States would lift sanctions on Turkey and make a decision on a possible F-35 sale, but the key unresolved issue remains Turkey’s Russian-made S-400 air defense system.

Turkey was removed from the F-35 program in 2019 precisely because of its purchase of the S-400, as the United States assessed that the Russian system posed an unacceptable security risk to the protection of the aircraft’s sensitive characteristics, particularly its low-observable features. AeroTime reports that one possible option is to send the S-400 system to a third country, but no agreement has been reached so far. In addition to political obstacles, legal restrictions in the United States also remain in place, preventing the transfer of F-35 aircraft to Turkey as long as Ankara possesses the S-400.

The Ankara summit therefore highlighted two parallel directions in the development of NATO’s air capabilities. On one hand, the Alliance is increasingly moving toward joint, multinational fleets and capabilities that individual countries would find difficult to develop on their own. On the other hand, major political and strategic tensions remain present, especially in relations between the United States and Turkey.

In practical terms, the announcements from Ankara mean a strengthening of NATO’s transport, surveillance and maritime capabilities, but also send a clear message that future major acquisitions will increasingly be the result of joint programs, industrial cooperation and political compromises within the Alliance.