Turkey unveils its first domestically built mini-submarine

Turkey unveiled its first domestically built mini-submarine at SAHA Expo 2026, a milestone that Istanbul Technical University-based defense company Datum Submarine Technologies announced after completing the vessel’s first dive tests off the coast of Karamürsel on April 14, 2026.

The Multi-Purpose Mini Submarine, developed with support from Turkey’s Presidency of Defense Industries, completed assembly at Sefine Shipyard before making its inaugural unmanned dive in waters off Karamürsel. Officials from the Presidency of Defense Industries and Turkish Lloyd surveyors witnessed the test. The project carries an additional distinction: it is the first submarine project to receive classification from Turkish Lloyd, the country’s maritime classification society, marking a formal quality and safety certification milestone for Turkey’s nascent submarine industrial base.

The vessel is built from Turkish-sourced components to a degree that Datum describes as over 80 percent domestic content. The pressure hull was manufactured by Yakut Kazan, the motor by Femsan DC Motor Factory, and the propeller by Eriş Pervane. The 100 percent domestically designed platform represents a deliberate effort to build sovereign industrial capability rather than rely on foreign supply chains — a priority that Turkey’s defense establishment has pursued aggressively across multiple domains over the past decade.

What Datum has built is not just a single vehicle. The company describes the Multi-Purpose Mini Submarine as the foundation for a family of specialized platforms, each tailored to a distinct operational requirement. The know-how accumulated through the project, per Datum’s own description, enables the custom design and construction of mini-submarines matched to operational needs defined by the Turkish Naval Forces Command.

The most ambitious derivative in that family is the Sinarit, a large unmanned underwater vehicle with a modular payload architecture that Datum’s board chairman, Istanbul Technical University faculty member Dr. Münir Cansın Özden, describes as “an underwater pickup truck.” The Sinarit fits inside a standard cargo container and can be transported by A400M military transport aircraft, giving it strategic mobility that most undersea platforms cannot match. The space freed by removing the crew is converted into 3.8-meter modular payload bays, and the vehicle can carry up to 12 different payload configurations depending on the mission.

The payload options Datum has described are extensive. The Sinarit can deploy Baykar drones for swarm UAV attacks, lay up to 12 Malaman smart bottom mines, launch Akya and Orka torpedoes, surface to conduct intelligence collection using Aselsan Mercan electro-optical sensors, conduct mine countermeasure operations using Meteksan’s synthetic aperture sonar and a remotely operated vehicle, and strike surface, land, and air targets using Roketsan’s Atmaca and Çakır missiles alongside TÜBİTAK’s Gezgin and Gökdoğan missiles. The vehicle is designed with a low sonar cross-section, high acoustic quieting, and no radar or satellite signature while submerged, making detection, in Datum’s characterization, nearly impossible.

Planned future integration includes Aselsan sonars and the capability to fire Roketsan’s Orka torpedo, which would equip the Sinarit for anti-submarine warfare missions in addition to its already broad strike and ISR portfolio. The vehicle is also envisioned as a test platform for systems being developed under Turkey’s national submarine program, MİLDEN, allowing subsystems to be evaluated in a dynamic underwater environment without pulling combat submarines from operational duties.

The Trança Combat Mini Submarine addresses a different requirement entirely. Designed for Turkey’s Special Underwater Assault Command, the SAT Commandos, Trança can transport six operators and their Diver Propulsion Device systems dry over a range of 400 nautical miles from a submerged launch point. The vessel carries two heavy torpedo tubes capable of firing the Akya torpedo and the Akata missile, and can deploy up to 10 Malaman mines — giving Turkey’s special operations forces a clandestine insertion and strike platform with meaningful organic firepower.

The Kırlangıç, or Gurnard, seabed warfare mini-submarine occupies yet another operational niche. Specialized for critical underwater infrastructure operations, the Gurnard can cut undersea cables and lay Malaman mines against pipelines and port facilities. The sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines in the Baltic Sea in 2022 demonstrated how strategically significant — and how vulnerable — undersea infrastructure can be. Turkey’s decision to develop a platform explicitly designed for that mission set reflects a clear-eyed reading of how modern naval competition is expanding below the surface.

Datum has also developed a Submarine Personnel Rescue Vehicle, intended to prevent a repeat of the Dumlupınar disaster, one of Turkey’s most painful naval tragedies. The company, which includes retired submariners among its staff, describes completing and delivering the rescue vehicle to the Rescue Underwater Command for the use of Turkish submariners as one of its primary aspirations.