Germany Abandons FCAS Fighter Jet With France

Germany walked away from Europe's most ambitious defence-industrial project on June 8. Chancellor Friedrich Merz and French President Emmanuel Macron agreed to abandon the Future Combat Air System (FCAS), a German government official telling AFP that the two had concluded the lead contractors Dassault Aviation and Airbus "will not be able to come together on building a joint combat aircraft." Launched in 2017, with Spain later joining, the roughly 100-billion-euro programme was meant to replace the Rafale and Eurofighter by around 2040 but had stalled over work-shares, patent rights and France's demand for a nuclear- and carrier-capable jet the Bundeswehr did not need. The Financial Times confirmed Berlin's withdrawal; Dassault will now develop the Rafale further while Airbus weighs partners such as Sweden's Saab, though the project's "combat cloud" networking core is to continue as a European system.

Rather than retreat from military aviation, Berlin is moving to lead it on its own terms. Merz is due to unveil a national aerospace strategy on June 10 at the ILA Berlin air show, aiming to make Germany a leader in advanced military aviation technology and insisting that the country's financial contributions to any future fighter be matched by industrial participation -- precisely the kind of governance dispute that helped sink FCAS.

Those ambitions collide with a weakening economy. German industrial orders fell 3.8% in April, a sharper drop than expected, reversing a 4.5% March gain that had been inflated by pre-orders placed before the Iran war and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, the Federal Statistics Office said; the auto sector was hardest hit, with new orders down 5.3%. The figures landed as Merz, defending his 2026 budget in the Bundestag, warned that Germany's outlook was "very critical" and would require "radical" steps to reverse, even as that budget earmarks 11.5 billion euros to keep supporting Ukraine.