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France and Germany cancel joint future combat air system project
The cancellation follows years of disputes over program leadership and requirements, leaving Germany to consider whether it can rely on a UK-led Tempest option instead.
France and Germany abandoned their joint future combat air system project in June, according to the Guardian Business, signaling further fragmentation in European efforts to develop next-generation fighters.
The program had been pursued through fraught cooperation since 2018, but efforts between German chancellor Friedrich Merz and French president Emmanuel Macron ultimately failed, prompting France to consider pushing ahead with its own fighter approach while Germany questioned whether it would develop its own aircraft.
The article says Germany may be left as a secondary customer to the Tempest jet under the global combat air programme led by the UK, Italy and Japan, while the wider debate in the UK during the summer centered on military spending targets and a return of John Healey as defence secretary amid questions about meeting a 3% of GDP defense-spending goal.
It also attributes the joint program’s collapse to disagreements, including arguments between Dassault Aviation and Airbus Defence and Space over who would lead the work, along with reportedly differing views on aircraft requirements such as carrier compatibility, while competitors like the Tempest and the US F47 are described as focusing on AI, advanced stealth and drone swarms.