Türkiye’s Kizilelma Unmanned Fighter Executes World-First Beyond Visual Range Air-to-Air Strike
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Turkey’s Bayraktar Kizilelma unmanned fighter scored the first recorded beyond visual range air-to-air kill by a jet-powered UAV during a Black Sea test on 30 November 2025. The verified engagement signals a major leap in unmanned combat capability and moves sixth-generation doctrine toward operational reality.
On 30 November 2025, Türkiye once again advanced the frontiers of unmanned aviation, as Baykar announced that its Bayraktar Kizilelma unmanned fighter had made history by becoming the first in the world to destroy an aerial target using a beyond-visual-range air-to-air missile. Conducted over the Black Sea near Sinop, the live-fire trial saw Kizilelma use Aselsan’s MURAD AESA radar to guide TÜBİTAK SAGE’s Gökdoğan missile against a high-speed jet-powered target, turning what had previously been a simulated kill chain into a fully verified engagement. According to Baykar, supported by footage and analysis reported by Army Recognition, this shot confirms that a jet-powered, combat-configured UAV can now execute genuine BVR air-to-air kills. For air forces worldwide, the event marks a turning point in loyal-wingman and unmanned fighter concepts, with Türkiye positioning itself among the first states to move beyond experiments and into operationally meaningful unmanned air-to-air combat.
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The Kizilelma test showcased a jet powered unmanned fighter detecting, tracking, and destroying a fast moving aerial target with a Gökdoğan BVR missile guided by its MURAD AESA radar, proving a complete end-to-end air-to-air kill chain (Picture Source: Army Recognition / Baykar / Aselsan)
The latest test was conceived as a complex crewed-uncrewed operation. Five F-16s from Merzifon’s 5th Main Jet Base formed up with Bayraktar Kizilelma over Sinop, rehearsing future mixed formations in which manned fighters and unmanned jets share the same air battle space. Selçuk Bayraktar, Baykar’s chairman and chief technology officer, took a rear seat in one of the two-seat F-16s, overseeing the scenario from the air as Kizilelma, bearing tail number TC-OZB5, flew in a five-ship line-abreast with the fighters. The unmanned aircraft carried a single Gökdoğan missile under its right wing while a Bayraktar Akıncı UAV orbited nearby to film the event. Once the jet-powered target drone was launched, Kizilelma detected and tracked it using the onboard MURAD radar before firing the Gökdoğan and achieving a direct hit, an engagement that Bayraktar described as opening “the door to a new era in aviation history” for radar-guided unmanned air combat.
Behind the spectacular imagery is a tightly integrated system-of-systems that combines several of Türkiye’s key defence products on a single platform. Kizilelma itself is a low-observable, jet-powered unmanned fighter with a maximum take-off weight around 8.5 tonnes, a payload capacity of about 1.5 tonnes and a combat radius close to 500 nautical miles, designed to operate at up to roughly Mach 0.9 and to launch from short-runway vessels such as the TCG Anadolu. Its MURAD 100-A/110-A family AESA fire-control radar, developed by Aselsan, provides wide-band, electronically steered beams, simultaneous air-to-air and air-to-surface modes, and BVR missile guidance with multi-target tracking using a GaN-based antenna. Complementing radar, Aselsan’s Toygun electro-optical targeting system supplies high-definition MWIR imaging, automatic target recognition, laser designation and long-range passive tracking up to around 35 km, optimised for integration on both manned fighters and unmanned platforms. On the effector side, TÜBİTAK SAGE’s Gökdoğan is an active-radar guided beyond-visual-range missile with a range reported at more than 65 km, lock-on-after-launch capability and mid-course updates via datalink, placing it in the same class as the AIM-120 family. In the Sinop test, the missile was fired from a wing pylon, but Kizilelma’s design also allows BVR weapons to be carried in internal bays, a configuration that will further reduce radar cross-section for deep penetration or high-threat missions.
This live-fire engagement is the latest step in a rapid and methodical development path. Initial conceptual work on the MIUS (Combat Unmanned Aircraft System) programme dates back to 2013, with Kizilelma’s first public design images appearing in 2021. The drone’s maiden flight took place on 14 December 2022, followed by a dense sequence of envelope-expansion sorties, formation flights with Turkish Air Force F-16s and public demonstrations at Teknofest. On 20 October 2025, Kizilelma completed its first MURAD AESA radar flight test, moving from simple weapons-carriage towards radar-led air-to-air functionality. Only a month later, on 20 November 2025, an Army Recognition-documented sortie saw the unmanned jet electronically “shoot down” an F-16 by detecting and tracking it with MURAD and simulating a Gökdoğan engagement over north-western Türkiye, validating the national radar-to-missile digital kill chain on an unmanned platform. The Sinop campaign now adds the missing piece: an actual BVR missile fired from Kizilelma and physically destroying a jet-powered target, transforming a theoretical capability into a demonstrated one.
At the tactical level, this combination of low-observable unmanned platform, AESA radar and indigenous BVR missile changes how air-to-air combat roles can be distributed within a force. Kizilelma’s size, range and near-fighter-like performance make it suitable as a loyal wingman for F-16s and, in the future, for the TF Kaan, allowing manned aircraft to remain further from the threat while unmanned jets press into contested airspace. Equipped with MURAD and Toygun, the drone can detect and classify targets at long range using both active radar and passive electro-optics, then engage with Gökdoğan in a fire-and-forget profile while receiving updates over secure data links. The ability to carry missiles internally or underwing allows operators to trade between stealth and loadout depending on mission, while the absence of a pilot reduces political and human risk in high-threat environments. In dense air defence zones, Kizilelma could be tasked to fly ahead of manned fighters, forcing adversary sensors and shooters to reveal themselves, or to act as a forward picket that silently detects low-observable aircraft using a mix of active and passive sensors. Over time, as software and autonomy mature, multiple Kizilelma airframes could be networked to cooperate in multi-axis attacks or to maintain persistent air policing in areas where manned patrols would be costly.
The strategic and geostrategic implications of this test extend beyond Türkiye’s borders. By executing a BVR air-to-air kill using nationally developed platform, radar, missile, mission computer and data link, Türkiye has demonstrated a largely sovereign air-combat kill chain, reducing dependence on foreign export approvals for critical subsystems. Regionally, an operational Kizilelma equipped with Gökdoğan and MURAD complicates planning for neighbouring air forces in the Aegean, Eastern Mediterranean, Black Sea and wider Middle East, adding an unmanned dimension to airspace control, deterrence patrols and suppression of enemy air defences. Industrially, the capability strengthens Türkiye’s position as an exporter of integrated combat systems rather than individual drones, enabling packages that include UCAVs, sensors and effectors. This trajectory is reinforced by Italy’s decision to co-produce Baykar UAVs, including Kizilelma, through the LBA Systems joint venture: Grottaglie is set to host composite manufacturing and final assembly for the jet-powered UCAV, framed as a loyal-wingman-class platform compatible with future fighters such as GCAP. That structure not only offers European customers a supply chain inside the EU but also suggests that Kizilelma-type unmanned fighters could become part of NATO’s broader airpower mix, with Europeanised variants tailored to regional requirements.
These advances are explicitly linked to Türkiye’s emerging sixth-generation air combat vision. During a media event in Ankara in October 2025, Aselsan detailed how the TF Kaan fighter and drones such as Kizilelma and Anka-3 will be tied together through the Indigenous Flight Datalink, stealth-mode communications and a mission system architecture designed from the outset for manned-unmanned teaming and distributed operations. Kaan is envisaged not only as a stealth fighter but as an airborne command-and-control node capable of orchestrating loyal-wingman UAVs to conduct suppression of enemy air defences, electronic attack and deep-strike missions. In this construct, Kizilelma is positioned as the higher-speed, more agile unmanned teammate, carrying air-to-air missiles, precision weapons or electronic payloads while receiving and sharing data across a mesh network. The live Gökdoğan firing demonstrates that one of the core sixth-generation building blocks, a networked, unmanned shooter capable of executing BVR engagements based on indigenous sensors and data links, now exists in working form. Combined with ongoing work on stealth communications, multi-platform sensor fusion and AI-enabled mission management, this points to a future Turkish air force in which air superiority is delivered by a family of cooperating platforms rather than a single flagship fighter.
From an analytical standpoint, the Sinop test suggests several trajectories for the Kizilelma programme and for unmanned air combat more broadly. First, it confirms that BVR air-to-air engagements by unmanned jets are no longer a theoretical ambition: a national UCAV has now fired a radar-guided missile at a jet-powered target and scored a proven kill. Second, when combined with the earlier simulated F-16 engagement, it shows a step-by-step maturation of doctrine in which Kizilelma transitions from demonstrator to a platform able to assume portions of the air-superiority mission alongside, and eventually in front of, manned aircraft. Third, it will likely reinforce Baykar’s ambition to expand the Kizilelma family beyond the current single-engine configuration. Public information already points to planned Kizilelma-B and Kizilelma-C variants, including a twin-engine option intended to deliver higher speed and payload, which would further close the performance gap with fifth-generation fighters while retaining unmanned attritability. Finally, the fact that Kizilelma can carry Gökdoğan inside an internal bay as well as on external pylons suggests a path towards low-observable BVR tactics, where the UCAV approaches in a stealth configuration, opens its bay only briefly to launch and then returns to a low-signature profile. Together with teaming concepts involving Kaan and F-16s, this opens the door to new theories of air warfare in which algorithmic decision-making, distributed sensing and unmanned shooters become decisive variables.
This historic firing makes clear that unmanned air combat has entered a new phase. By proving that a jet-powered UCAV can independently detect, track and destroy a high-speed aerial target with an indigenous BVR missile, Türkiye has demonstrated not only a technical achievement but also the credibility of a broader sixth-generation ecosystem built around Kaan, Kizilelma, Anka-3 and a national radar-and-missile family. The test reinforces a shift in which air superiority will increasingly be delivered by mixed formations of crewed and uncrewed aircraft, with unmanned fighters such as Kizilelma assuming some of the highest-risk roles. For industry, the result underlines that future competition will not be limited to classic fighter programmes but will extend to integrated packages of drones, sensors and effectors. For military planners, the message is equally direct: the era in which only manned fighters could contest the air domain at long range is ending, and doctrines, procurement and training will now have to adapt to a battlespace where the decisive shot may come from a stealthy, unmanned wingman.
Written by Teoman S. Nicanci – Defense Analyst, Army Recognition Group
Teoman S. Nicanci holds degrees in Political Science, Comparative and International Politics, and International Relations and Diplomacy from leading Belgian universities, with research focused on Russian strategic behavior, defense technology, and modern warfare. He is a defense analyst at Army Recognition, specializing in the global defense industry, military armament, and emerging defense technologies.
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Turkey’s Bayraktar Kizilelma unmanned fighter scored the first recorded beyond visual range air-to-air kill by a jet-powered UAV during a Black Sea test on 30 November 2025. The verified engagement signals a major leap in unmanned combat capability and moves sixth-generation doctrine toward operational reality.
On 30 November 2025, Türkiye once again advanced the frontiers of unmanned aviation, as Baykar announced that its Bayraktar Kizilelma unmanned fighter had made history by becoming the first in the world to destroy an aerial target using a beyond-visual-range air-to-air missile. Conducted over the Black Sea near Sinop, the live-fire trial saw Kizilelma use Aselsan’s MURAD AESA radar to guide TÜBİTAK SAGE’s Gökdoğan missile against a high-speed jet-powered target, turning what had previously been a simulated kill chain into a fully verified engagement. According to Baykar, supported by footage and analysis reported by Army Recognition, this shot confirms that a jet-powered, combat-configured UAV can now execute genuine BVR air-to-air kills. For air forces worldwide, the event marks a turning point in loyal-wingman and unmanned fighter concepts, with Türkiye positioning itself among the first states to move beyond experiments and into operationally meaningful unmanned air-to-air combat.
The Kizilelma test showcased a jet powered unmanned fighter detecting, tracking, and destroying a fast moving aerial target with a Gökdoğan BVR missile guided by its MURAD AESA radar, proving a complete end-to-end air-to-air kill chain (Picture Source: Army Recognition / Baykar / Aselsan)
The latest test was conceived as a complex crewed-uncrewed operation. Five F-16s from Merzifon’s 5th Main Jet Base formed up with Bayraktar Kizilelma over Sinop, rehearsing future mixed formations in which manned fighters and unmanned jets share the same air battle space. Selçuk Bayraktar, Baykar’s chairman and chief technology officer, took a rear seat in one of the two-seat F-16s, overseeing the scenario from the air as Kizilelma, bearing tail number TC-OZB5, flew in a five-ship line-abreast with the fighters. The unmanned aircraft carried a single Gökdoğan missile under its right wing while a Bayraktar Akıncı UAV orbited nearby to film the event. Once the jet-powered target drone was launched, Kizilelma detected and tracked it using the onboard MURAD radar before firing the Gökdoğan and achieving a direct hit, an engagement that Bayraktar described as opening “the door to a new era in aviation history” for radar-guided unmanned air combat.
Behind the spectacular imagery is a tightly integrated system-of-systems that combines several of Türkiye’s key defence products on a single platform. Kizilelma itself is a low-observable, jet-powered unmanned fighter with a maximum take-off weight around 8.5 tonnes, a payload capacity of about 1.5 tonnes and a combat radius close to 500 nautical miles, designed to operate at up to roughly Mach 0.9 and to launch from short-runway vessels such as the TCG Anadolu. Its MURAD 100-A/110-A family AESA fire-control radar, developed by Aselsan, provides wide-band, electronically steered beams, simultaneous air-to-air and air-to-surface modes, and BVR missile guidance with multi-target tracking using a GaN-based antenna. Complementing radar, Aselsan’s Toygun electro-optical targeting system supplies high-definition MWIR imaging, automatic target recognition, laser designation and long-range passive tracking up to around 35 km, optimised for integration on both manned fighters and unmanned platforms. On the effector side, TÜBİTAK SAGE’s Gökdoğan is an active-radar guided beyond-visual-range missile with a range reported at more than 65 km, lock-on-after-launch capability and mid-course updates via datalink, placing it in the same class as the AIM-120 family. In the Sinop test, the missile was fired from a wing pylon, but Kizilelma’s design also allows BVR weapons to be carried in internal bays, a configuration that will further reduce radar cross-section for deep penetration or high-threat missions.
This live-fire engagement is the latest step in a rapid and methodical development path. Initial conceptual work on the MIUS (Combat Unmanned Aircraft System) programme dates back to 2013, with Kizilelma’s first public design images appearing in 2021. The drone’s maiden flight took place on 14 December 2022, followed by a dense sequence of envelope-expansion sorties, formation flights with Turkish Air Force F-16s and public demonstrations at Teknofest. On 20 October 2025, Kizilelma completed its first MURAD AESA radar flight test, moving from simple weapons-carriage towards radar-led air-to-air functionality. Only a month later, on 20 November 2025, an Army Recognition-documented sortie saw the unmanned jet electronically “shoot down” an F-16 by detecting and tracking it with MURAD and simulating a Gökdoğan engagement over north-western Türkiye, validating the national radar-to-missile digital kill chain on an unmanned platform. The Sinop campaign now adds the missing piece: an actual BVR missile fired from Kizilelma and physically destroying a jet-powered target, transforming a theoretical capability into a demonstrated one.
At the tactical level, this combination of low-observable unmanned platform, AESA radar and indigenous BVR missile changes how air-to-air combat roles can be distributed within a force. Kizilelma’s size, range and near-fighter-like performance make it suitable as a loyal wingman for F-16s and, in the future, for the TF Kaan, allowing manned aircraft to remain further from the threat while unmanned jets press into contested airspace. Equipped with MURAD and Toygun, the drone can detect and classify targets at long range using both active radar and passive electro-optics, then engage with Gökdoğan in a fire-and-forget profile while receiving updates over secure data links. The ability to carry missiles internally or underwing allows operators to trade between stealth and loadout depending on mission, while the absence of a pilot reduces political and human risk in high-threat environments. In dense air defence zones, Kizilelma could be tasked to fly ahead of manned fighters, forcing adversary sensors and shooters to reveal themselves, or to act as a forward picket that silently detects low-observable aircraft using a mix of active and passive sensors. Over time, as software and autonomy mature, multiple Kizilelma airframes could be networked to cooperate in multi-axis attacks or to maintain persistent air policing in areas where manned patrols would be costly.
The strategic and geostrategic implications of this test extend beyond Türkiye’s borders. By executing a BVR air-to-air kill using nationally developed platform, radar, missile, mission computer and data link, Türkiye has demonstrated a largely sovereign air-combat kill chain, reducing dependence on foreign export approvals for critical subsystems. Regionally, an operational Kizilelma equipped with Gökdoğan and MURAD complicates planning for neighbouring air forces in the Aegean, Eastern Mediterranean, Black Sea and wider Middle East, adding an unmanned dimension to airspace control, deterrence patrols and suppression of enemy air defences. Industrially, the capability strengthens Türkiye’s position as an exporter of integrated combat systems rather than individual drones, enabling packages that include UCAVs, sensors and effectors. This trajectory is reinforced by Italy’s decision to co-produce Baykar UAVs, including Kizilelma, through the LBA Systems joint venture: Grottaglie is set to host composite manufacturing and final assembly for the jet-powered UCAV, framed as a loyal-wingman-class platform compatible with future fighters such as GCAP. That structure not only offers European customers a supply chain inside the EU but also suggests that Kizilelma-type unmanned fighters could become part of NATO’s broader airpower mix, with Europeanised variants tailored to regional requirements.
These advances are explicitly linked to Türkiye’s emerging sixth-generation air combat vision. During a media event in Ankara in October 2025, Aselsan detailed how the TF Kaan fighter and drones such as Kizilelma and Anka-3 will be tied together through the Indigenous Flight Datalink, stealth-mode communications and a mission system architecture designed from the outset for manned-unmanned teaming and distributed operations. Kaan is envisaged not only as a stealth fighter but as an airborne command-and-control node capable of orchestrating loyal-wingman UAVs to conduct suppression of enemy air defences, electronic attack and deep-strike missions. In this construct, Kizilelma is positioned as the higher-speed, more agile unmanned teammate, carrying air-to-air missiles, precision weapons or electronic payloads while receiving and sharing data across a mesh network. The live Gökdoğan firing demonstrates that one of the core sixth-generation building blocks, a networked, unmanned shooter capable of executing BVR engagements based on indigenous sensors and data links, now exists in working form. Combined with ongoing work on stealth communications, multi-platform sensor fusion and AI-enabled mission management, this points to a future Turkish air force in which air superiority is delivered by a family of cooperating platforms rather than a single flagship fighter.
From an analytical standpoint, the Sinop test suggests several trajectories for the Kizilelma programme and for unmanned air combat more broadly. First, it confirms that BVR air-to-air engagements by unmanned jets are no longer a theoretical ambition: a national UCAV has now fired a radar-guided missile at a jet-powered target and scored a proven kill. Second, when combined with the earlier simulated F-16 engagement, it shows a step-by-step maturation of doctrine in which Kizilelma transitions from demonstrator to a platform able to assume portions of the air-superiority mission alongside, and eventually in front of, manned aircraft. Third, it will likely reinforce Baykar’s ambition to expand the Kizilelma family beyond the current single-engine configuration. Public information already points to planned Kizilelma-B and Kizilelma-C variants, including a twin-engine option intended to deliver higher speed and payload, which would further close the performance gap with fifth-generation fighters while retaining unmanned attritability. Finally, the fact that Kizilelma can carry Gökdoğan inside an internal bay as well as on external pylons suggests a path towards low-observable BVR tactics, where the UCAV approaches in a stealth configuration, opens its bay only briefly to launch and then returns to a low-signature profile. Together with teaming concepts involving Kaan and F-16s, this opens the door to new theories of air warfare in which algorithmic decision-making, distributed sensing and unmanned shooters become decisive variables.
This historic firing makes clear that unmanned air combat has entered a new phase. By proving that a jet-powered UCAV can independently detect, track and destroy a high-speed aerial target with an indigenous BVR missile, Türkiye has demonstrated not only a technical achievement but also the credibility of a broader sixth-generation ecosystem built around Kaan, Kizilelma, Anka-3 and a national radar-and-missile family. The test reinforces a shift in which air superiority will increasingly be delivered by mixed formations of crewed and uncrewed aircraft, with unmanned fighters such as Kizilelma assuming some of the highest-risk roles. For industry, the result underlines that future competition will not be limited to classic fighter programmes but will extend to integrated packages of drones, sensors and effectors. For military planners, the message is equally direct: the era in which only manned fighters could contest the air domain at long range is ending, and doctrines, procurement and training will now have to adapt to a battlespace where the decisive shot may come from a stealthy, unmanned wingman.
Written by Teoman S. Nicanci – Defense Analyst, Army Recognition Group
Teoman S. Nicanci holds degrees in Political Science, Comparative and International Politics, and International Relations and Diplomacy from leading Belgian universities, with research focused on Russian strategic behavior, defense technology, and modern warfare. He is a defense analyst at Army Recognition, specializing in the global defense industry, military armament, and emerging defense technologies.
