Turkey’s foreign ministry has rejected as “unserious” claims that the United States had requested the use of Turkish bases to support its ongoing military operations on Iran, according to ministry sources cited in local media.
The denial came after Turkish analyst Gönül Tol, founding director of the Turkey program at the Middle East Institute (MEI), a Washington-based think tank, said in a post on X on Tuesday she had been told by a Pentagon official that Washington had sought access to Turkish bases to station aerial refueling aircraft, aiming to keep them away from the immediate conflict zone.
Bu sabah konuştuğum bir Pentagon yetkilisi, ABD'nin Türkiye'den, İran savaşını desteklemek üzere, üs kullanım hakkı talep ettiğini söyledi. Amaç, havada yakıt ikmali yapmak için kullanılan tanker uçaklarını Türk üslerinde tutarak çatışma bölgesinden uzak tutmak.
Türkiye'nin…
— Gönül Tol (@gonultol) March 17, 2026
Responding to the claim, Turkish Foreign Ministry sources said no such request had been made and no discussions were underway with any country regarding parliamentary authorization for base use.
“The allegation is not true. There have been no talks with any country on such a motion. These are unserious claims,” the sources said, according to Medyascope.
US troops are stationed in Turkey at İncirlik Air Base in the southern province of Adana and at the Kürecik radar base in eastern Turkey, which operates under NATO.
İncirlik has long been used by US forces and also hosts military personnel from Spain and Poland, according to the base’s website.
US troops are also stationed at Kürecik in eastern Malatya province, where they operate an early warning radar system that NATO describes as a key part of its missile defense shield, capable of detecting missile launches from Iran.
Although Ankara has denied that radar data from Kürecik has ever been used to assist Israel, the site has long been a source of tension with Tehran.
The defense ministry also distanced itself from the reports, with sources quoted as saying that people raising the claim were attempting to draw Ankara into responding publicly.
The remarks came after the United States and Israel began to launch strikes on Iran on February 28, with tensions escalating due to Iran’s retaliatory strikes on US assets in Gulf countries.
Ankara has maintained a cautious stance since the start of the conflict, calling on all sides to halt attacks while condemning both violations of Iran’s sovereignty and retaliatory strikes in the Gulf.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on March 13 that keeping Turkey out of the “fire pit” was Ankara’s top priority, while Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan has also stressed that Turkey wants to avoid entanglement in the war.
The war has already touched Turkey directly. NATO air defenses intercepted a third ballistic missile from Iran in Turkish airspace on March 13, according to the Turkish Defense Ministry, after similar incidents earlier in the month. Iran denied responsibility.
Meanwhile, Turkey’s defense ministry announced Wednesday that NATO was deploying a new Patriot missile battery at İncirlik Air Base, just days after a third ballistic missile from Iran was shot down.
“Another Patriot system … is being deployed … in addition to the existing Spanish Patriot system stationed there,” a ministry official told reporters at the Turkish air base, just outside the southern city of Adana.