Germany and France scrap 100-billion-euro FCAS joint fighter programme over Dassault-Airbus rift

Germany and France have agreed to abandon their joint Future Combat Air System (FCAS) fighter programme, the German government said on June 8, ending Europe's most ambitious defence-industrial project after years of deadlock. A government official told AFP that Chancellor Friedrich Merz and President Emmanuel Macron had "reached the shared assessment that the companies will not be able to come together on building a joint combat aircraft," adding: "They acknowledge this reality."

Launched in 2017 by Berlin and Paris, and later joined by Madrid, FCAS carried an estimated budget of close to 100 billion euros and was meant to replace France's Rafale and the Eurofighter flown by Germany and Spain by around 2040. The programme was dominated by a feud between Dassault Aviation, the French prime contractor, and Airbus, which represented Germany and Spain, over work-shares and patent rights for new developments. Merz first publicly questioned the project in February; in April, after reports it was collapsing, Macron insisted it was "not at all" dead and announced fresh talks.

A central obstacle, Merz had said, was that France's military wanted a next-generation jet capable of carrying nuclear weapons and operating from aircraft carriers -- requirements the Bundeswehr did not share. Germany had proposed building FCAS around two aircraft; France rejected the idea. Both countries are now expected to pursue separate fighters: Dassault will continue to evolve the Rafale, while Airbus could partner with Sweden's Saab, maker of the Gripen, or join the British-Japanese-Italian fighter project.

Not all of FCAS is being scrapped. The German official said the project's core -- a "nervous system that networks aircraft, drones, and other components into an integrated whole," known as the combat cloud -- would continue as a European system, and the two countries' defence ministries are to present a work plan of joint armament projects at an upcoming Franco-German ministerial council. The collapse is nonetheless a setback for European efforts to cooperate more closely on defence and present a united front against a hostile Russia and amid souring ties with the United States.