For years, the European Future Fighter Fighter (FCAS) project has been a symbol of the joint military plans between Germany and France and a fundamental pillar of efforts to build independent European military capabilities. However, the project, which was launched by former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron in 2017, and joined by Spain in 2019, was accompanied by repeated disagreements from its early stages, and collided with increasing obstacles related to sharing roles, intellectual property rights, and leading the development process.
With the faltering negotiations between Airbus and Dassault and their inability to overcome differences, hopes for the completion of the project, which aimed to develop a sixth-generation fighter and an integrated European combat air system, faded.
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Ultimately, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and French President Emmanuel Macron announced yesterday evening the failure of the project, one of the biggest setbacks that European defense cooperation has witnessed in recent years.
But why did this project fail, what is the extent of the damage resulting from its failure, what alternatives are available to Germany in these turbulent times to develop future fighters, and who bears responsibility for the failure?
What does the Future Fighter Project mean?
The “Future Air Combat System” project is seen as one of the most ambitious defense projects in European history, and was launched by Germany and France in 2017 with the aim of developing a new generation of European combat air capabilities.
The project was not limited to developing an aircraft that was scheduled to replace, starting in 2040, the “Eurofighter Typhoon” joint fighter between Germany, Britain, Italy, Spain, and the French “Rafale,” but it also aimed to build an integrated combat system linking manned aircraft, drones, and command and control systems.
Initial estimates of the project’s cost exceeded 100 billion euros (about 108 billion dollars), making it the largest joint arms project witnessed on the European continent.
According to a report by the second German television channel (ZDF), the dispute between the two main companies in the project, Airbus and Dassault, has become so deep that political support, especially from the German government, has become useless, since the French Defense Industries Corporation (Dassault), which manufactures fighters such as the Mirage and Rafale, saw that it is the primary body responsible for developing the fighter of the future.
On the other hand – as ZDF adds – Airbus, a semi-governmental German-French company, in which Spain participates in a small part, was supposed to assume responsibility for providing the digital infrastructure, including the development and management of accompanying drones.
But Dassault apparently refused to share sensitive technical patents with Airbus, and the channel quoted officials as saying that Merz made direct contact with Dassault President Eric Trappier to reach a solution, but he did not succeed in convincing him to overcome the differences.
The channel quoted military expert Christian Molling as saying that the reason for the failure of this ambitious industrial cooperation is due to the inability of the two parties to reach a solution on two basic issues: the first is who owns future technology, and the second is who benefits financially from it, and because the French industrial sector was not ready to move forward with the partnership in the desired manner.
What alternatives are available to Germany?
From a German perspective, the political damage resulting from the failure of the project is not significant, but from an economic standpoint, the numbers indicate that Germany incurred financial losses estimated at more than three billion euros (about 3.2 billion dollars) after the designs and studies for the new fighter became useless.
Major defense projects of this type have a distinctly political character and are considered, in essence, a commitment to industrial cooperation, which makes their continuation primarily dependent on a political decision.
Despite the collapse of the project, Germany seeks to maintain an idea based on integrating drones and artificial intelligence into a unified combat network, in addition to benefiting from the results of research and technologies that have been developed so far in any future project for a new air combat system.
However, fundamental questions remain unanswered, the most important of which is whether Germany will be able to rely on itself and develop alternatives to the Eurofighter Typhoon by 2040? Or will it resort to European or Western partners, and seek to implement this project in cooperation with these partners?
The ZDF report indicates that Airbus is ready to continue developing a new fighter independently after the collapse of the project, and also raises the option of Germany cooperating with Sweden to develop a future-generation combat aircraft.
At the same time, Britain, Italy and Japan are working on a separate project to develop an advanced stealth combat aircraft, a project that Germany may join. Therefore, Berlin has several options to compensate for the failure of its project with France, whether by developing its own program or by engaging in new defense partnerships with other European and Western countries.
The daily newspaper TAT quoted Catherine Hoeffler, a professor specializing in European armaments and defense policies at the University of Geneva, as saying that major defense projects of this type have a distinctly political nature and are considered, in essence, a political commitment to industrial cooperation, which makes their continuation dependent in the first place on a political decision, and it seems that the political will necessary to move forward with this project was not strong enough.
Does Dassault bear responsibility for failure?
Regarding the accusations directed at the French side, specifically Dassault, that it sought to acquire a larger share of the project by 80%, Hoefler said that she could not confirm the numbers circulating regarding the company’s claim, but she believes that this story may contain an element of the truth.
The professor explained that the French view of the project differs from that of the Germans, as the French believe that Germany, in turn, was seeking to achieve greater gains from the project and benefit from advanced French experience in the military aviation industry.
The professor added that the positions of the two governments reflect the complex difficulties facing joint arms projects, as each country seeks to achieve the greatest possible economic and technological gains, while at the same time ensuring that the other party does not obtain a significant advantage, which has made reconciling political goals and economic interests difficult.
The left-liberal German magazine Der Spiegel – in an opinion article by writer Paul Anton Krüger – supported Chancellor Merz’s decision to cancel the project by saying, “Despite the strong arguments calling for maintaining cooperation between Germany and France, Chancellor Merz’s decision to end the project worth 100 billion euros (about 108 billion dollars) is considered correct.”
From the point of view of German interests, the alternative options would have led to worse results, so abandoning the project is not evidence of the weakness of Meretz’s leadership, as the Green Party claims or as some French circles insinuate.
The writer adds that the two governments could have increased pressure on the companies concerned to save the project, but the main problem was on the French side, because Macron, as the end of his term approaches, lacks sufficient political influence to convince the head of Dassault to change his position.
Meretz is all exhausted
The writer considered that Mertz had exhausted all his capabilities to save the project and address the disputes that had existed since the era of the previous government, as Berlin intensified its political contacts with Paris and participated in mediation efforts between the companies concerned. Mertz also personally intervened and held talks with the president of Dassault in order to reach a settlement that would preserve the future of the project.
However, the president of the French company stuck to his position and did not show a willingness to concede and insisted that his company assume full leadership of the development program, and maintain control over the intellectual property rights and technologies that will be developed within the project.
According to the writer, responding to these demands would have practically marginalized Airbus and turned it into a mere supplier of components instead of being a major partner in the program.
Germany would also gradually lose its expertise and technological capabilities in the field of designing and developing combat aircraft, which the writer describes as a high price that cannot be justified from both an industrial and defense standpoint. Therefore, he concluded that rejecting these conditions and ending the project was the most responsible option for Germany.
