Overview
- German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and French President Emmanuel Macron announced this week that the joint development of the FCAS manned fighter is over, terminating the Franco‑German effort that began in 2017.
- France says it will redirect the roughly €2.5 billion already approved for FCAS into a national fighter programme and aims to field a new aircraft by 2040.
- A German‑led industrial alliance called Team Gen 6 — made up of Airbus Defence and Space, MTU, Hensoldt, MBDA, Autoflug, Diehl Defence, Liebherr and Rohde & Schwarz — formed at the ILA to pursue a successor path and to seek multinational partners.
- Companies and ministers say non‑airframe FCAS elements such as the Combat Cloud, engines and drone programmes should continue but Phase 1B contracts and financing are only secured through the end of September, forcing rapid government decisions to preserve work and know‑how.
- The split highlights a fresh test for European defence autonomy because Germany now faces trade‑offs between buying more US F‑35s as a bridge, joining other international projects like GCAP, or backing a new German‑led development, with major consequences for jobs, industrial workshare and allied relations.