Türkiye urged NATO members Tuesday to eliminate defense trade restrictions and sanctions among allies, arguing that closer industrial cooperation is essential to strengthening military readiness and collective security.
"We must work together to eliminate trade restrictions and sanctions in the defense sector among allies," Vice President Cevdet Yılmaz told the NATO Defense Industry Forum ahead of a gathering of NATO’s leaders in Ankara.
"If we want to enhance the alliance’s level of military readiness and strengthen our collective security, we must work together to remove these senseless sanctions and restrictions from the table."
For much of the past two decades, Ankara has expressed frustration over its Western allies' failure to provide adequate defense systems against missile threats despite Türkiye being a major NATO member.
Ahead of the NATO summit, its top officials reiterated that defense trade restrictions between NATO allies must be removed and expressed strong interest in joining Europe's defense initiatives.
Calling for broader international collaboration, Yılmaz said Türkiye views defense cooperation not only through exports but also through joint production, design and technology development with allies.
He also urged greater integration of Türkiye into European defense structures.
"All bilateral restrictions among allies should be lifted, and Türkiye, which makes a significant contribution to NATO's European pillar, should be able to participate in all European defense and security initiatives, particularly those of the European Union," he said.
Without such cooperation, production capacity would expand more slowly and costs would rise, Yılmaz added, arguing that a more resilient Euro-Atlantic security architecture depends on aligning industrial capacity, technological expertise and operational experience toward common strategic goals.
"Türkiye is ready to play a role in this framework as a strong, reliable and contributing partner," he said.
Türkiye currently ranks 11th among global defense exporters and aims to enter the top 10 in the near future.
"Using a football analogy, Türkiye aims to play in the first division," Yılmaz said.
Defense and aerospace exports have surpassed $11 billion over the past 12 months, with more than half of shipments destined for NATO allies and European Union member states.
The Turkish defense industry is now producing advanced systems across the air, land, naval, cyber and space domains.
Türkiye injected billions of dollars to transform from a nation heavily reliant on equipment from abroad to one that is a major exporter and where homegrown systems now meet almost all of its defense industry needs.
The country currently exports more than 230 defense systems to 185 countries.
As of Tuesday, Türkiye is hosting 32 NATO leaders, as well as officials from the Gulf and Asia-Pacific region, for a summit that it hopes will emphasize alliance unity and bolster deterrence.
U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to pull his country out of the alliance while Washington has moved to withdraw troops, planes, ships and weapons from Europe due to tensions among allies over burden-sharing, defense spending and U.S. complaints about allies' lack of involvement in Iran war.
Türkiye's Yılmaz said the alliance was entering what he described as a new phase, or "NATO 3.0," in which the burden of defense spending would be shared more equitably among members.
Last year, allies agreed on a defense spending goal of 5% of gross domestic product (GDP) by 2035.
"The next challenge is to transform higher defense spending into concrete capabilities and the industrial production capacity required to support them," said Yılmaz.
He added that manufacturing capacity must be expanded rapidly and in a coordinated manner across the alliance.
As the summit kicked off, allies started to reveal large-scale defense pledges, with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte announcing new investments by member states.
The pledges included a push to spend $40 billion on NATO's drone defense capabilities over the next five years and to train more soldiers as drone operators.
Tuesday's pledges are "worth tens of billions of dollars and growing," Rutte said.
The NATO chief also called for a "bonfire of red tape," urging allies to slash administrative hurdles to rapidly expanding the alliance's defense capabilities.
