F-35 News. Pentagon: Turkey’s S-400 Acquisition to Be Devastating to F-35 Program

via Sputnik.

Turkey’s deployment of Russian S-400 air defence systems would be devastating for the US F-35 fighter program, Acting Assistant Secretary of Defence for International Security Affairs Kathryn Wheelbarger said at an event on Thursday.

"Completion of this transaction would be devastating, not only to the F-35 program… It would potentially rupture Turkish interoperability with NATO, a key aspect of the defence of the Alliance and let’s be clear — the S-400 is a Russian system designed to shoot down an aircraft like the F-35. And it is inconceivable to imagine Russia not taking advantage of that collection opportunity," Wheelbarger said at the Atlantic Council in Washington.

Story here. 

1.  I checked.  This is being widely reported now.

2.  I KNEW SOMETHING WAS UP!  Whenever there is gonna be bad news for the F-35 program you can see the propaganda amp up.  We've seeing that this past week.

3.  The talk is now that the Turk purchase of the S-400 MUST NOT HAPPEN.  Yeah right.  This has turned from a simple diplomatic row into a measuring of dicks contest.  At this point I don't see how EITHER SIDE can back down.  If the Turks do then they lose face in the entire Middle East and will be seen crumbling to US pressure.  If the US does then the same applies in reverse.  The time for diplomacy was months ago but that window has closed.

This is getting a bit fun to watch.  More to come I'm sure.