European armaments project
Decision on air combat system FCAS postponed again
Updated 12/30/2025 – 10:11 p.mReading time: 1 min.
It is expected to be the most important and expensive prestige project in European arms cooperation. Whether it will actually be realized remains to be seen.
Germany and France have again postponed the decision on the European air combat system FCAS – this time to an indefinite date. “Contrary to the original planning, a final decision on the continuation of the FCAS project has not yet been made at the end of the year,” a government spokesman told the German Press Agency upon request.
“The reason for this was the comprehensive German-French agenda in foreign and security policy issues, which has not yet made it possible to address the issue of joint combat aircraft at the level of the President and the Chancellor,” says the spokesman’s statement, which was also reported by the defense portal “Hartpunkt”. “We cannot give a new date for a decision at this point.”
FCAS stands for “Future Combat Air System” and, if implemented, would be the largest and most expensive European armaments project. In addition to Germany and France, Spain also wants to participate. The total costs are estimated to be in the three-digit billion range. The air combat system is intended to fly in conjunction with unarmed and armed drones and is therefore more than just a combat aircraft. The plan is for it to replace the Eurofighter from 2040.
The decision on the implementation was originally supposed to be made by the end of August, but was then postponed until the end of the year, mainly due to differences over the share of the companies Dassault, Airbus and Indra in the project. The three countries have now also failed to achieve this target. What happens next is still completely open.
