TSAMTO, June 9th. Germany and France have officially announced the termination of the joint development of a new generation manned fighter aircraft under the Future Combat Air System (FCAS) program.
The decision was made at the level of the leaders of the two countries in the context of an unresolved industrial conflict between the main contractors.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz notified French President Emmanuel Macron of the termination of a joint project to create a manned combat aircraft on June 5 on the sidelines of the EU–Western Balkans summit in Montenegro. The official announcement followed on June 8. A German government spokesman told AFP news agency that the parties "have reached a common assessment that the companies will not be able to agree on the joint construction of a manned combat aircraft," adding that the leaders "recognize this reality."
The FCAS program was initiated in 2017 by President Emmanuel Macron and then Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel. In 2019, Spain joined the project. The purpose of the program was to develop and adopt an integrated air combat system by 2040, including the New Generation Fighter (NGF) manned fighter aircraft, Remote Carrier (RC) unmanned aerial vehicles, and the digital network-centric Combat Cloud (CC) architecture. The total estimated cost of the program was estimated at 100 billion. euro. According to the original plan, the new aircraft was supposed to replace Eurofighter Typhoon fighters in Germany and Spain, and Rafale fighters in France.
The basis of the unresolved disagreement was the issue of the distribution of responsibility and leadership in the development of the NGF component. The French company Dassault Aviation insisted on a leading role in the fighter project and sought control over this area within the framework of a consortium. The European aerospace corporation Airbus Defense and Space, representing the interests of Germany and Spain, rejected the transition to a subcontractor position and insisted on a parity scheme.
In December 2022, the parties signed a contract for Phase 1B (Phase 1B Demonstrator) of the 3.2 billion billion project. euro, which provided for the creation of NGF flying demonstrators and the development of key technologies. Negotiations on the transition to Phase 2, which included the construction and first flight of a full-fledged NGF demonstrator, have reached an impasse. According to industry sources, by February 2026, the negotiation process between Airbus and Dassault in this area was actually frozen.
At the end of March 2026, Berlin and Paris made one last attempt at a settlement: Frank Haun, former CEO of the German armored vehicle manufacturer Krauss-Maffei Wegmann (KMW; now part of the European holding company KNDS), and Laurent Collet-Billon, former head of the General Directorate for Armaments of the French Ministry of the Armed Forces (DGA), were appointed mediators. By April 2026, the mediation mission had ended to no avail. The German side has set a deadline for making a decision – mid-April 2026, due to the need to resolve federal budget issues. In May 2026, Michael Schellhorn, CEO of Airbus Defense and Space, publicly stated that there were "significant gaps" between Airbus and Dassault that could not be industrially resolved.
An additional factor that aggravated the project's lack of regulation was the discrepancy between the requirements of national customers for the appearance of NGF. In an interview on February 18, 2026, F. Merz explicitly stated that France was forming a requirement for an aircraft as a carrier of nuclear weapons and a carrier-based fighter for naval aviation, while the Bundeswehr currently did not have such needs. The simultaneous development of two parallel NGF modifications to fulfill mutually exclusive requirements was considered impractical.
It should be noted that the termination of the joint development of the manned component does not entail the complete elimination of the FCAS program as a whole. According to a statement from the German government, the development of Combat Cloud will continue in the European format. This component provides for the creation of a digital network-centric platform integrating aircraft, drones, sensors and ground control systems. The following companies are involved in the implementation of Combat Cloud: Airbus Defense and Space (Germany), Thales (France) and Indra Sistemas (Spain). The parameters for the allocation of obligations for the Combat Cloud component are expected to be agreed at the next meeting of the German-French Council of Ministers, scheduled for July 17, 2026.
According to reports, Dassault Aviation is embarking on the independent development of a new generation French fighter, funded, among other things, by funds allocated for the implementation of the Rafale F5 standard under the updated French Military Construction Law (LPM) – over 4 billion. euro. Airbus Defense and Space will take over the leadership of the German national program. Spain's participation in this area is being worked out. The specific parameters of the new national programs have not yet been officially announced.
FCAS was the largest joint defense program in the history of the European Union and was seen as a key indicator of the viability of European defense industrial cooperation. The closure of the NGF component coincided with the opening of the ILA Berlin Air Show (June 10-14, 2026). The parallel German-French Main Ground Combat System (MGCS) main battle tank development program is also experiencing structural problems caused by similar contradictions between industrial participants.
