Countermeasure systems for Turkish helicopters: spotlight on Canadian military exports.

The Deal

Davis Engineering of Ottawa will supply 159 infrared countermeasure systems for the Turkish Army's UH-1H, AB-205, and AB-212 utility helicopters. The contract, worth more than $12 million, will add to almost $125 million in Canadian military goods that have been transferred to Turkey since 1984. The countermeasure systems are intended to reduce the heat (infrared) "signature" of military helicopters, making them less susceptible to detection by infrared equipment and to attack by heat-seeking devices. In particular, the system shortens the effective range of surface-to-air missiles, an advantage sought after Turkey confirmed that two of its helicopters were shot down by Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) rebels using Russian SA-7 "Grail" surface-to-air missiles in 1997. According to the military industry periodical Jane's Defence Weekly, "following the loss of a Cougar and a Super Cobra last year ..., the TLFC [Turkish Land Forces Command] has embarked on a programme to equip its helicopter force with defensive aids" and Davis Engineering is one of three sources for helicopter exhaust suppressors.

The Context

Since 1984, at least 27,000 people have died in an ongoing internal war between Turkish government forces and the PKK. Most of the Turkish conflict deaths have been civilian. The PKK have killed Kurdish villagers, especially alleged informers and village guards paid and armed by the government, but human rights groups attribute most deaths to government attempts to purge the PKK from southeastern Turkey and northern Iraq. In repeated intense military operations, government troops and special forces have destroyed hundreds of Kurdish villages by bombing and by fire, and invaded northern Iraq in efforts to destroy the PKK and its networks of support in the countryside. Thousands of civilians have been killed as a result.

Human rights groups also point to persistent human rights violations by Turkish special forces. In addition to responsibility for brutal village depopulation campaigns that have created hundreds of thousands of internal refugees, national police and special forces are accused of arbitrary arrests, torture, and disappearances. Moreover, in a recent report on Turkey, the US-based organization Human Rights Watch noted that "contrary to arguments made by US officials ..., all Turkish units, including the regular Turkish Army and Air Force, are implicated in abuses."

Given recent history, there is little reason to doubt the use of the range of Turkish military helicopters in future operations against the PKK, operations that will continue to offer pronounced risk of human rights abuses against Kurdish civilians. In the past, utility helicopters of the kind being fitted with Davis heat suppressors have been used to move troops quickly into place in the mountainous regions of southeastern Turkey, and in some cases at least, to move captured civilians out.

The Policy

Canadian export control guidelines call for close control of military exports to countries involved in, or under threat from, hostilities. They also call for control of sales to persistent violators of human rights, unless there is "no reasonable risk" of the equipment being used against civilian populations. These guidelines have not prevented extensive arms transfers to Turkey since the onset of the Turkish conflict. In addition to nearly $58 million in fluctuating commercial arms sales to Turkey reported since 1984, the government provided 50 CF-104 fighter aircraft and spares valued at over $67 million under the "Assistance to Developing NATO Nations Program" in 1986. Ignoring subsequent evidence of the use of F-104 aircraft in the internal conflict, in 1995 Canada also was prepared to sell upgraded CF-5 fighter aircraft to Turkey from Department of National Defence surplus stocks. A major invasion by Turkish forces into northern Iraq at the time brought temporary media and parliamentary attention to the proposed deal but, in the absence of a government announcement to the contrary, the CF-5 sale may yet proceed.