Spain's purchase of the Turkish TAI Hürjet fighter jet and its inexplicable unit cost

The government of Pedro Sánchez confirmed yesterday one of the most controversial military purchases in recent times in Spain.

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This Tuesday, the Council of Ministers approved a contract for the "integrated training system, ITS-C" for an amount of 3.12 billion euros. This morning, Infodefensa reported that the contract will be awarded to Airbus and Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) for the purchase of 45 TAI Hürjet light fighter jets, with the participation of several Spanish defense industry companies. The contract also includes a simulator. These aircraft will replace the F-5BMs of Wing 23, based in Talavera La Real, which have been used for years by the Spanish Air Force for fighter and attack training.

Something doesn't add up with the announced amount for this program. In June, the Spanish Ministry of Defense spoke of an investment of 1.375 billion euros for 28 or 30 Hurjet fighter jets. This announcement was already surrounded by controversy; the acquisition procedure was described as "opaque" and "politically" motivated by the opposition: "There has been no formal request for proposals, no competitive process, and no technical or economic comparison with other alternatives," denounced Senator José Antonio Monago of the People's Party.

So, Spain is now going to pay €3.12 billion (126% more than announced in June) for a fleet 50% larger than what was announced four months ago. Obviously, something doesn't add up. It should be recalled that on June 30, the Spanish media outlet El Confidencial Digital published a report based on military commanders' statements, in which they claimed that price was the deciding factor in choosing the Hurjet, as it was 30% cheaper than the M-346 or the T-50, its competitors from Italy and South Korea, respectively. That outlet published the following list of unit prices:

• Hürjet: 18-20 million euros per unit.
• M-346: 26-28 million euros per unit.
• T-50: 25-27 million euros per unit.

With 30 Hürjets at €20 million per unit, the program's cost would have been €600 million. This would represent 43.63% of the €1.375 billion budgeted for the program. It can be concluded that the additional €775 million would cover the simulator and spare parts program, among other expenses. With 45 Hürjets, the program's cost would rise to €900 million, considering (as in the previous estimate) the maximum price per unit published by the aforementioned media outlet and provided by military commanders. This €900 million is only 28% of the €3.12 billion approved yesterday.

To give you an idea of ​​how excessive this program is, in 2022 Poland bought 48 FA-50 light fighters (the combat version of the T-50) for $3 billion, about €3.0297 billion at the exchange rate at the time. Dividing the amounts, the final unit price would be €61.11 million per aircraft (since when you buy a fighter jet, you're not just buying the aircraft itself). Likewise, in 2018 Poland bought 4 M-346s for 115 million euros, a unit cost of 28.75 million.

However, Spain is going to pay an average of €69.33 million for each Hürjet, an aircraft that is still under development and hasn't even entered service with any air force, with all the problems that this can entail. In the end, it seems that Spanish taxpayers are going to pay for the promotion of the TAI Hürjet in Europe, paying a higher amount per aircraft than we would have actually paid if the government had chosen the M-346 or the T-50 (or even the fighter version of the South Korean training aircraft).

In Spain, we are already accustomed to inexplicable cost overruns in defense programs, but that doesn't mean they should be considered normal. We must bear in mind that right now the Sánchez government is currently embroiled in several corruption scandals and that this inexplicable Hürjet deal is being carried out with a country, Turkey, which has the worst political corruption index in all of NATO according to the NGO Transparency International, ranking 107th (worse than Morocco and on par with Algeria). I hope the parliamentary opposition will demand explanations for this.

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Photos: Turkish Aerospace Industries / Ministerio de Defensa / FEINDEF 2025.