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President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned that the world has entered an extremely chaotic period in which nations lacking strength on the ground risk losing their seat at the negotiating table altogether, or worse.
"We are in the middle of an extremely chaotic period in which those who are not strong on the ground cannot find a place for themselves at the table; in fact, they can find themselves on the menu," Erdogan said.
"Türkiye is one of the countries that recognized the spirit of this new era very early and read it in the most accurate way," he added.
The Turkish president made the remarks at the Istanbul Naval Shipyard Command during a ceremony marking the delivery of the Offshore Patrol Vessel CAm. Roman to the Romanian Naval Forces Command and the commissioning and flag-raising of Turkish Naval Forces Command platforms.
President Erdogan said the world is undergoing one of its most fundamental transformations since the Cold War, with familiar patterns collapsing and a new security paradigm emerging, one he described using the phrase "strength breaks the game."
He said every crisis Türkiye has faced has reaffirmed that national security is too vital a matter to entrust to others.
"Türkiye is one of the countries that recognized the spirit of this new era very early and read it in the most accurate way," he said.
"Our defense industry is the driving force behind our vision of a 'great and powerful Türkiye.' Thank Allah, in the 23 years since we set out on the path toward a 'fully independent Türkiye' in defense, we have come a very long way. Despite facing obstacles, restrictions and covert and overt embargoes, we walked patiently toward our goal. We believed in ourselves, we trusted our defense sector. In the end, we reached levels that could not even have been imagined 23 years ago," he stated.
Erdogan noted that Türkiye now ranks as the world's 11th-largest defense exporter.
"Last month, we achieved a historic success by exporting $996 million worth of defense and aerospace products. Twenty-three years ago, our annual exports were $248 million; today we achieve that figure in just a single week," he said.
He said Türkiye's military shipbuilding industry is experiencing "the most intensive and productive days" in the 103-year history of the Republic, having exported more than 140 naval platforms to different regions to date.
"From the smallest boat to our drone carrier TCG Anadolu, from destroyers to submarines, to our national aircraft carrier MUGEM, we can build all our surface and underwater platforms with our own national capabilities," the Turkish president noted.
"We are one of the countries capable of building the most warships simultaneously," he added.
He said Türkiye is currently building more than 50 warships, more than 15 of which are intended for export to friendly and allied countries.
"We produce platforms of different types and classes, from our national aircraft carrier to air defense destroyers, frigates to offshore patrol vessels, landing ships to submarines, with a domestic content ratio exceeding 80%," he said, adding that Türkiye's combined naval projects, including research, design and production of unmanned maritime vehicles, now total approximately €25 billion ($28.6B).
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Erdogan stated that Türkiye's naval forces, which previously had regional power projection capability through TCG Anadolu, have now achieved global power projection capability, a development he called "a source of national pride."
He said the MUGEM (Milli Ucak Gemisi)—meaning National Aircraft Carrier— project has made Türkiye the seventh country in the world capable of designing and producing its own aircraft carrier.
He said the critical subsystems used aboard the vessels delivered, including combat management systems (CMS), search and fire control radars, sonar systems, and close-in defense weapons (CIWS), were entirely developed by domestic and national companies.
"Our ships are equipped with domestically produced ammunition and weapons systems that are superior in quality to their equivalents. Thank Allah, we compete with ourselves in every field and try to surpass the thresholds we set for ourselves," he said.
"Our strong defense infrastructure, established under the leadership of Aselsan, Roketsan, Havelsan, Machine and Chemical Industry (MKE) and TUBITAK, enabled the production and delivery of these systems in a short time," Erdogan said.
"With the sales agreement we signed with Romania, Türkiye has, for the first time in its history, exported a warship to a NATO and European Union member country. The success demonstrated during the ship's testing, training and operational readiness processes has once again proven the quality of Turkish naval platforms to the entire world," Erdogan stated.
He said the world's painful security environment makes it essential for friends and allies to deepen their cooperation.
"With this understanding, we see it as our duty to share the capabilities and opportunities we possess in our defense industry with our friendly countries," he said.
Erdogan said relations between Türkiye and Romania, built over years on a spirit of alliance, are "experiencing their historic peak."
He noted the two countries elevated their relationship to a strategic partnership in 2011 and gave it an institutional dimension through the High-Level Strategic Cooperation Council (HLSCC) established in 2024.
"The ceremony we are holding here today is the embodiment of this strategic partnership at sea. The CAm. Roman corvette is the most concrete demonstration of the will of two allied countries to jointly build security in the Black Sea and our region," Erdogan said.
He called Black Sea security an inseparable part of the broader Euro-Atlantic security architecture and said he valued growing cooperation between Türkiye, Romania and Bulgaria in areas including mine countermeasures, expressing hope that cooperation would expand further.
"With this ceremony, held with the participation of the president, we are taking the Turkish-Romanian friendship that has been refined throughout history one step further," he noted.
"While delivering the CAm. Roman corvette to the Romanian Naval Forces, we take pride in adding our Kochisar offshore patrol vessel to our own inventory. I wish both of these sister ships, built on the same dock and the product of the same engineering mind, to be auspicious for our navies," Erdogan said.
Erdogan also marked the commissioning of the offshore patrol vessel TCG Kochisar.
"This platform, which we built under our Offshore Patrol Vessel Project, will, Allah willing, successfully carry out many missions, from intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance to search and rescue, from combating piracy to maritime surveillance and non-combat operations," he said.
He outlined Türkiye's broader regional posture: "Türkiye's goal is not to generate tension in our region but to strengthen peace, justice, tranquility, and stability. We are not pursuing crisis, chaos, conflict, or confrontation with anyone; on the contrary, we stand for strong cooperation based on mutual respect. We have no designs, and have never had any, on anyone's territory or sovereignty. We have no designs, and have never had any, on anyone's legitimate rights and interests. At the same time, we will not allow anyone to threaten our sovereignty, pose a threat to our country, or harm our interests. Our principle is clear: we neither consume anyone else's rights, nor do we allow our own rights to be consumed."
"We see it as a natural extension of this understanding to contribute to the security needs of our friends and allies with our own national capabilities," he continued.
"Both ships we have sent off to sea today from this dock embody this vision, this belief, this determination," Erdogan added.
Erdogan congratulated the Ministry of National Defense, the Presidency of Defense Industries, the Naval Forces Command, the Istanbul Naval Shipyard Command, ASFAT and all companies, engineers, technicians, and workers involved in the project, wishing the CAm. Romanian corvettes work well for Romania.
He said he believed the TCG Kochisar would proudly fly the flag in Türkiye's "Blue Homeland," adding: "May Allah keep our sailors' bows steady and their fortunes open."
Following the ceremony, Erdogan met privately with Romanian President Nicuşor Dan and his accompanying delegation.
The closed-door meeting was also attended by Minister of National Defense Yasar Guler, Interior Minister Mustafa Ciftci, Chief of General Staff Gen. Selcuk Bayraktaroglu, Presidential Communications Director Burhanettin Duran, and Presidential Chief Security and Foreign Policy Adviser Ambassador Akif Cagatay Kilic.
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