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IN VIEW Special report by Ged Henderson
in association with
Eurofighter Typhoon
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ENTER NOW 5 December 2025
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TURKISH DELIGHT FOR DEFENCE SECTOR
The signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between the Turkish and UK governments relating to the potential purchase of Eurofighter Typhoon aircraft will have been greeted with a sense of relief in all corners of Lancashire.
There have been growing concerns over the lack of new Typhoon orders and its potential impact on the air defence sector. Going on to seal a multi-billion pound deal to supply the fighter jets to Turkey will ease those concerns.
It will enable the final assembly line for the Typhoon at BAE Systems’ Warton plant to restart and will be welcome news for the programme’s well established supply chain in the county.
The Unite union issued a worrying statement in early July – before news of the pending Turkish deal emerged – reporting that hundreds of workers at Warton had been transferred to other BAE factories or to RAF bases as there were no further domestic or export orders for the Typhoon.
In a damning statement general secretary Sharon Graham said: “Workers at BAE and across the whole UK defence and manufacturing industry will be looking at the ending of the Typhoon final assembly production at Warton and asking how a
government promising to turn defence spending into ‘British growth, British jobs, British skills, British innovation’ could let it happen.”
The contract currently being finalised with Turkey is reported to be for a maximum of 40 aircraft although it is understood the exact number is still being discussed.
The Typhoon workshare agreement would see more than a third of each aircraft destined for Turkey manufactured in the UK; the rest of each aircraft would be produced by the Eurofighter partner nations.
Final production at the Warton site would include radars from Edinburgh and engines from Bristol, helping secure thousands of UK jobs – around 20,000 are supported by the Typhoon programme, primarily in Lancashire and the wider North West.
The Prospect union’s general secretary Mike Clancy has welcomed the pending deal with Turkey. He said: “This agreement shows the importance of government leadership to delivering a coherent defence industrial strategy.
“For too long key capabilities and skilled workers have been lost by industry when programmes end, and there is lack of clarity about what work will follow. This potential deal would help bridge
the gap for combat aviation until the Global Combat Air Programme fully ramps up.
“This clear, long-term pipeline of both UK and export orders is needed for every area of the defence industry, in particular naval shipbuilding.”
The Eurofighter Typhoon is a multi-role highly advanced fighter jet, in operation with nine air forces across the world, and has a reputation for its performance, reliability, availability and survivability.
It is made by a consortium of three of Europe’s largest defence groups: BAE Systems, Airbus and Leonardo.
A successful deal with Turkey could also help the consortium’s talks with other countries, such as Qatar and Austria, as it looks to win more orders for the programme in what is a highly competitive market.
Continuing Eurofighter assembly in Lancashire is seen as vital in bridging the gap until the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP) fully ramps up and in securing the skills needed to deliver it.
The UK is a partner with Italy and Japan in GCAP, working to develop the sixth-generation fighter and accompanying systems, with much
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