{"id":998593,"date":"2026-05-19T09:51:48","date_gmt":"2026-05-19T07:51:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/fcas-scaf-is-dead-europe-sixth-gen-fighter-split\/"},"modified":"2026-05-19T09:52:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-19T07:52:09","slug":"fcas-scaf-is-dead-europe-sixth-gen-fighter-split","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/fcas-scaf-is-dead-europe-sixth-gen-fighter-split\/","title":{"rendered":"SCAF Is Dead: Europe&#8217;s 6th-Gen Fighter Project Just Broke in Two"},"content":{"rendered":"<style>.et_pb_title_container h1.entry-title { padding-top: 40px !important; }<\/style>\n\n<p>It was supposed to be Europe&#8217;s answer to the F-35. A continental sixth-generation fighter, jointly built by France, Germany and Spain, flanked by drone wingmen and tied together by a &#8220;combat cloud&#8221; stretching from Brest to Bavaria. Six years and several billion euros later, the partnership is in pieces \u2014 and the man who may have just sealed its fate is a German chancellor who barely spoke about it in his campaign.<\/p>\n\n<p>On 18 February 2026, Friedrich Merz sat down with the German political podcast <em>Machtwechsel<\/em> and delivered a line that one European defence minister immediately translated into a death notice. &#8220;The French need, in the next generation of fighter jets, an aircraft capable of carrying nuclear weapons and operating from an aircraft carrier,&#8221; Merz said. Then he added the dagger: &#8220;That&#8217;s not what we currently need in the German military.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n<p>Within hours, Belgium&#8217;s defence minister Theo Francken \u2014 whose country had been considering joining FCAS as an observer \u2014 posted three words on X that crystallised what insiders had whispered for over a year. &#8220;SCAF is dead.&#8221; The Future Combat Air System, the most ambitious aerospace project on the continent, had just been declared a corpse by a politician who would have been one of its customers.<\/p>\n\n\n<div style=\"background:#eef2f7;border-radius:10px;padding:18px 22px;margin:24px 0 28px;font-size:15px;line-height:1.6\"><strong style=\"display:block;margin-bottom:10px;color:#333;font-size:14px;letter-spacing:0.04em;text-transform:uppercase\">Quick Facts<\/strong><div style=\"display:flex;border-top:1px solid #d8dee8;padding:6px 0\"><span style=\"flex:0 0 38%;color:#555\">Programme name<\/span><span style=\"flex:1;color:#222\">FCAS (Future Combat Air System) \/ SCAF in French<\/span><\/div><div style=\"display:flex;border-top:1px solid #d8dee8;padding:6px 0\"><span style=\"flex:0 0 38%;color:#555\">Partner nations<\/span><span style=\"flex:1;color:#222\">France, Germany, Spain<\/span><\/div><div style=\"display:flex;border-top:1px solid #d8dee8;padding:6px 0\"><span style=\"flex:0 0 38%;color:#555\">Industrial leads<\/span><span style=\"flex:1;color:#222\">Dassault Aviation (FR), Airbus (DE\/ES), Indra (ES)<\/span><\/div><div style=\"display:flex;border-top:1px solid #d8dee8;padding:6px 0\"><span style=\"flex:0 0 38%;color:#555\">Engine partners<\/span><span style=\"flex:1;color:#222\">Safran (FR), MTU Aero Engines (DE), ITP Aero (ES)<\/span><\/div><div style=\"display:flex;border-top:1px solid #d8dee8;padding:6px 0\"><span style=\"flex:0 0 38%;color:#555\">Originally targeted entry into service<\/span><span style=\"flex:1;color:#222\">around 2040<\/span><\/div><div style=\"display:flex;border-top:1px solid #d8dee8;padding:6px 0\"><span style=\"flex:0 0 38%;color:#555\">Cost (lifetime, all phases)<\/span><span style=\"flex:1;color:#222\">Estimated \u20ac100+ billion<\/span><\/div><div style=\"display:flex;border-top:1px solid #d8dee8;padding:6px 0\"><span style=\"flex:0 0 38%;color:#555\">Competing European project<\/span><span style=\"flex:1;color:#222\">GCAP \u2014 UK, Italy, Japan \u2014 service ~2035<\/span><\/div><div style=\"display:flex;border-top:1px solid #d8dee8;padding:6px 0\"><span style=\"flex:0 0 38%;color:#555\">Trigger of February 2026 crisis<\/span><span style=\"flex:1;color:#222\">Friedrich Merz interview on <em>Machtwechsel<\/em> podcast<\/span><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">A Slow-Motion Strip-Tease<\/h2>\n\n<p>FCAS has been bleeding out for years, but no one in Paris or Berlin has been willing to call the time of death. The trouble started almost the moment the contracts were signed in 2017: who runs the show, who writes the software, who owns the intellectual property, and \u2014 crucially \u2014 whose engineers sit at the front of the room when Dassault&#8217;s NGF flight-test data is unpacked.<\/p>\n\n<p>Paul Taylor, senior visiting fellow at the European Policy Centre, has been watching this train run off the rails since 2022. He put it bluntly to <em>Breaking Defense<\/em> after Merz&#8217;s interview aired.<\/p>\n\n\n<div style=\"background:#f8f9fa;border-left:4px solid #d32f2f;padding:20px 22px;margin:18px 0 24px;border-radius:0 8px 8px 0;font-size:16px;line-height:1.7;display:flex;gap:20px;align-items:flex-start\"><a href=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/1\/1b\/2024-08-21_Event%2C_CDU%2C_Wahlkampf_mit_Friedrich_Merz_in_Erfurt_2024_STP_3111_by_Stepro.jpg\/600px-2024-08-21_Event%2C_CDU%2C_Wahlkampf_mit_Friedrich_Merz_in_Erfurt_2024_STP_3111_by_Stepro.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"flex-shrink:0\"><img data-opt-id=584131749  fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/1\/1b\/2024-08-21_Event%2C_CDU%2C_Wahlkampf_mit_Friedrich_Merz_in_Erfurt_2024_STP_3111_by_Stepro.jpg\/600px-2024-08-21_Event%2C_CDU%2C_Wahlkampf_mit_Friedrich_Merz_in_Erfurt_2024_STP_3111_by_Stepro.jpg\" alt=\"Paul Taylor\" style=\"width:96px;height:96px;border-radius:50%;object-fit:cover;object-position:center;display:block;border:2px solid #ddd\"><\/a><div><em>&ldquo;My sense is that it&apos;s been clear for a year or two that FCAS is dead, it just won&apos;t lie down, because it&apos;s a political project. Akin to a very slow motion strip tease. Merz&apos;s latest assessment is another way of saying this thing is dead.&rdquo;<\/em><div style=\"margin-top:10px;font-size:14px;color:#555\"><strong>Paul Taylor<\/strong> &mdash; Senior visiting fellow, European Policy Centre<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n<p>The diagnosis Taylor offers is the one nobody in Paris or Berlin wants to read out loud: Franco-German aerospace projects don&#8217;t get cancelled, they get quietly replaced by other Franco-German aerospace projects so the politicians involved never have to attend a funeral.<\/p>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin:0 0 24px\"><img data-opt-id=1355203253  fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/a\/a2\/FCAS_NGF_mock-up_at_Paris_Air_Show_2019_%282%29.jpg\/1280px-FCAS_NGF_mock-up_at_Paris_Air_Show_2019_%282%29.jpg\" alt=\"FCAS NGF mockup at Paris Air Show 2019\" style=\"max-width:100%;height:auto;border-radius:6px\"><figcaption style=\"font-size:13px;color:#777;text-align:center;margin-top:6px;font-style:italic\">The full-scale FCAS Next Generation Fighter mockup unveiled at Le Bourget in June 2019 \u2014 the moment of maximum political optimism. (Wikimedia Commons)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">The Dassault Question<\/h2>\n\n<p>If you want a single name for why FCAS is in the state it is in, it is Eric Trappier. The Dassault Aviation CEO has spent the last three years arguing, in increasingly undiplomatic language, that Dassault must lead the New Generation Fighter \u2014 the manned-aircraft core of FCAS \u2014 because Dassault is the only company on the continent that has actually designed, flown, exported and combat-proven a modern combat aircraft. The Rafale is the reference. Eurofighter, in Trappier&#8217;s telling, is a committee aircraft.<\/p>\n\n<p>That argument has not gone down well in Munich, Madrid or Berlin. Airbus Defence and Space, with Indra alongside it, holds two of the three industrial votes. Both companies want a flat partnership, with workshare set by national contribution and a common digital design environment. Paris counters that committees don&#8217;t ship fighters on time.<\/p>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin:0 0 24px\"><img data-opt-id=2070311990  data-opt-src=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/0\/0e\/Eric_Trappier.jpg\/1280px-Eric_Trappier.jpg\"  decoding=\"async\" src=\"data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20viewBox%3D%220%200%20100%%20100%%22%20width%3D%22100%%22%20height%3D%22100%%22%20xmlns%3D%22http%3A%2F%2Fwww.w3.org%2F2000%2Fsvg%22%3E%3Crect%20width%3D%22100%%22%20height%3D%22100%%22%20fill%3D%22transparent%22%2F%3E%3C%2Fsvg%3E\" alt=\"Eric Trappier, CEO of Dassault Aviation\" style=\"max-width:100%;height:auto;border-radius:6px\"><figcaption style=\"font-size:13px;color:#777;text-align:center;margin-top:6px;font-style:italic\">Eric Trappier, CEO of Dassault Aviation since 2013, has publicly insisted that the New Generation Fighter cannot be designed by committee. (Wikimedia Commons)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n<p>Paul Lever, formerly the UK ambassador to Germany and now a fixture of the trans-Channel defence-policy circuit, told <em>Breaking Defense<\/em> the breakdown is no longer about flag-waving. It is about engineering authority and the price tag attached to it.<\/p>\n\n\n<div style=\"background:#f8f9fa;border-left:4px solid #1565c0;padding:20px 22px;margin:18px 0 24px;border-radius:0 8px 8px 0;font-size:16px;line-height:1.7;display:flex;gap:20px;align-items:flex-start\"><a href=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/0\/0e\/Eric_Trappier.jpg\/600px-Eric_Trappier.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"flex-shrink:0\"><img data-opt-id=1597661978  data-opt-src=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/0\/0e\/Eric_Trappier.jpg\/600px-Eric_Trappier.jpg\"  decoding=\"async\" src=\"data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20viewBox%3D%220%200%20100%%20100%%22%20width%3D%22100%%22%20height%3D%22100%%22%20xmlns%3D%22http%3A%2F%2Fwww.w3.org%2F2000%2Fsvg%22%3E%3Crect%20width%3D%22100%%22%20height%3D%22100%%22%20fill%3D%22transparent%22%2F%3E%3C%2Fsvg%3E\" alt=\"Paul Lever\" style=\"width:96px;height:96px;border-radius:50%;object-fit:cover;object-position:center;display:block;border:2px solid #ddd\"><\/a><div><em>&ldquo;My guess would be, Merz is preparing the ground to cancel the project. The Germans are saying they can&apos;t work with Dassault. Dassault wants a share of the work that is grossly disproportionate, and Trappier is unwilling to pass on secret information about the engineering aspects. Financially, it&apos;s all getting a bit of a disaster.&rdquo;<\/em><div style=\"margin-top:10px;font-size:14px;color:#555\"><strong>Paul Lever<\/strong> &mdash; Former UK Ambassador to Germany<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n<p>The intellectual-property fight is the bit nobody discusses on camera. Dassault&#8217;s flight-control source code, gleaned from Mirage 2000 and Rafale, is treated in Saint-Cloud roughly the way SpaceX treats Raptor engine telemetry. Airbus&#8217;s German engineers want to read it; Trappier wants Dassault to write a clean, French version that nobody outside the team gets to touch. Until that disagreement is resolved, no joint code base can exist \u2014 and without a joint code base, there is no joint fighter.<\/p>\n\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">Merz Says the Quiet Part Out Loud<\/h2>\n\n<p>What changed on 18 February was not the technical disagreement. That has been frozen in place for two years. What changed is that the new German chancellor said, in public, on a podcast, that France and Germany now need different fighters. Carrier capability and nuclear-strike certification \u2014 the two pillars of the French requirement \u2014 are not what the Luftwaffe wants from a sixth-gen jet. Germany is happy with the Eurofighter for the deep-strike role and the F-35 for nuclear sharing under NATO.<\/p>\n\n<p>Inside the Belgian defence ministry, Francken \u2014 who had been quietly testing the political water about joining FCAS \u2014 read Merz&#8217;s words and chose to leap before anyone could push him. On X he wrote:<\/p>\n\n\n<div style=\"max-width:550px;margin:0 auto 28px\"><iframe class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/embed\/Tweet.html?id=1891987530574901621&#038;theme=light\" style=\"width:100%;height:400px;border:none;border-radius:12px;overflow:hidden\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n\n\n<p>&#8220;There will be no Franco-German sixth-generation fighter jet,&#8221; he added in a follow-up post. &#8220;Belgium was an observer in the program. We will reassess our position.&#8221; For a NATO defence minister whose country was supposed to be a future customer, that is about as final as it gets without an official press release.<\/p>\n\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">While Paris and Berlin Fight, London, Rome and Tokyo Build<\/h2>\n\n<p>The other story Merz&#8217;s interview accidentally amplifies is what the Brits and Italians are doing with their own sixth-gen project. The Global Combat Air Programme \u2014 GCAP, born from BAE Systems&#8217; Tempest concept and Japan&#8217;s F-X requirement \u2014 is in a different stage of life. There is a signed treaty governing it, a Reading-based international governmental organisation running it, and a digital-twin programme already churning out flying surfaces in the wind tunnel. Entry into service is targeted at 2035 \u2014 five years before FCAS&#8217;s official date, and probably ten years before the rebuilt French and German programmes can field anything real.<\/p>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin:0 0 24px\"><img data-opt-id=1123964620  data-opt-src=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/8\/8c\/Tempest_DSEI_2019.jpg\/1280px-Tempest_DSEI_2019.jpg\"  decoding=\"async\" src=\"data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20viewBox%3D%220%200%20100%%20100%%22%20width%3D%22100%%22%20height%3D%22100%%22%20xmlns%3D%22http%3A%2F%2Fwww.w3.org%2F2000%2Fsvg%22%3E%3Crect%20width%3D%22100%%22%20height%3D%22100%%22%20fill%3D%22transparent%22%2F%3E%3C%2Fsvg%3E\" alt=\"BAE Systems Tempest mockup at DSEI 2019\" style=\"max-width:100%;height:auto;border-radius:6px\"><figcaption style=\"font-size:13px;color:#777;text-align:center;margin-top:6px;font-style:italic\">BAE Systems&apos; Tempest mockup at DSEI London 2019. The British-Italian-Japanese GCAP is now widely seen as Europe&apos;s most credible sixth-generation programme. (Wikimedia Commons)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n<p>GCAP&#8217;s politics are no less complicated than FCAS&#8217;s \u2014 Britain post-Brexit, Italy juggling NATO and continental loyalties, Japan facing a Pacific arms race \u2014 but the project has one structural advantage Paris and Berlin do not. None of the three GCAP partners has serious continental territorial pride to bruise. BAE leads the manned-aircraft work, Leonardo does the electronics, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries does the structures and Pacific integration, Rolls-Royce and Avio Aero do the engines. The pecking order was set out before contracts were signed. Nobody is trying to retrofit it.<\/p>\n\n<p>Italy has now publicly said it would consider letting Spain or Germany join GCAP if FCAS collapses. Switzerland, Sweden and Saudi Arabia are all watching. The Times of London reported in March 2026 that Riyadh has begun preliminary contract talks for GCAP airframe purchases \u2014 talks that Saudi officials only ever conducted with the French, until recently.<\/p>\n\n\n<div style=\"background:#f8f9fa;border-left:4px solid #d32f2f;padding:20px 22px;margin:18px 0 24px;border-radius:0 8px 8px 0;font-size:16px;line-height:1.7;display:flex;gap:20px;align-items:flex-start\"><a href=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/0\/0d\/Eurofighter_Typhoon_FGR4_of_Royal_Air_Force_%28ZJ914%29%2C_Radom_Air_Show%2C_20230826_1701_9964.jpg\/600px-Eurofighter_Typhoon_FGR4_of_Royal_Air_Force_%28ZJ914%29%2C_Radom_Air_Show%2C_20230826_1701_9964.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"flex-shrink:0\"><img data-opt-id=1757631494  data-opt-src=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/0\/0d\/Eurofighter_Typhoon_FGR4_of_Royal_Air_Force_%28ZJ914%29%2C_Radom_Air_Show%2C_20230826_1701_9964.jpg\/600px-Eurofighter_Typhoon_FGR4_of_Royal_Air_Force_%28ZJ914%29%2C_Radom_Air_Show%2C_20230826_1701_9964.jpg\"  decoding=\"async\" src=\"data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20viewBox%3D%220%200%20100%%20100%%22%20width%3D%22100%%22%20height%3D%22100%%22%20xmlns%3D%22http%3A%2F%2Fwww.w3.org%2F2000%2Fsvg%22%3E%3Crect%20width%3D%22100%%22%20height%3D%22100%%22%20fill%3D%22transparent%22%2F%3E%3C%2Fsvg%3E\" alt=\"Theo Francken\" style=\"width:96px;height:96px;border-radius:50%;object-fit:cover;object-position:center;display:block;border:2px solid #ddd\"><\/a><div><em>&ldquo;SCAF is dead. There will be no Franco-German sixth-generation fighter jet. Belgium was an observer in the program. We will reassess our position.&rdquo;<\/em><div style=\"margin-top:10px;font-size:14px;color:#555\"><strong>Theo Francken<\/strong> &mdash; Belgian Defence Minister<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">What Comes Next: Two Fighters, Maybe Three<\/h2>\n\n<p>The most realistic outcome that German and French officials now privately admit is a divorce with shared custody of the cousins. Dassault gets to lead a French-Spanish (or French-Belgian, or French-only) NGF, almost certainly using the Rafale F5 as a bridge platform and Safran&#8217;s M88 engine as the technological launching pad. Airbus and Indra build a Germano-Spanish jet of their own \u2014 probably more Eurofighter-evolution than clean-sheet design. The combat cloud and drone-wingman work, the parts of FCAS that did not depend on a single piloted airframe, are kept alive as a hedge.<\/p>\n\n<p>For Dassault, divorce may quietly be the preferred outcome. The Rafale order book is currently the strongest it has been since the type entered service \u2014 India is finalising a 114-aircraft contract, Indonesia, Egypt, Greece, Croatia and the UAE are all customers, and Saudi Arabia is reportedly back in discussions. A wholly French sixth-gen platform, exportable on French terms, with French software and French combat-cloud certification, is now commercially plausible in a way it was not in 2017.<\/p>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin:0 0 24px\"><img data-opt-id=1750668864  data-opt-src=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/0\/09\/PACFLT_meets_with_leaders_from_French_Navy%2C_Japan_Maritime_Self-Defense_Force_aboard_FS_Charles_De_Gaulle_%288873158%29.jpg\/1280px-PACFLT_meets_with_leaders_from_French_Navy%2C_Japan_Maritime_Self-Defense_Force_aboard_FS_Charles_De_Gaulle_%288873158%29.jpg\"  decoding=\"async\" src=\"data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20viewBox%3D%220%200%20100%%20100%%22%20width%3D%22100%%22%20height%3D%22100%%22%20xmlns%3D%22http%3A%2F%2Fwww.w3.org%2F2000%2Fsvg%22%3E%3Crect%20width%3D%22100%%22%20height%3D%22100%%22%20fill%3D%22transparent%22%2F%3E%3C%2Fsvg%3E\" alt=\"French Navy Rafale Marine F4 lands on FS Charles de Gaulle\" style=\"max-width:100%;height:auto;border-radius:6px\"><figcaption style=\"font-size:13px;color:#777;text-align:center;margin-top:6px;font-style:italic\">A French Navy Rafale Marine F4 lands aboard the FS Charles de Gaulle. Carrier capability is the requirement Germany does not share \u2014 and which Merz used to explain the divorce. (US Navy \/ Wikimedia)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n<p>For Germany, the calculus is harder. Berlin has gone all-in on the F-35A as its nuclear-capable platform of choice, but the Luftwaffe still needs a long-term Eurofighter successor and a credible role for Airbus Defence and Space \u2014 a national champion whose civil-aviation half is already wobbling. A wholly German-Spanish next-generation fighter is plausible on paper, but the price tag, even split with Madrid, is brutal.<\/p>\n\n<p>And then there is the awkward question nobody in Brussels wants to ask out loud: can Europe actually support three sixth-generation fighter programmes \u2014 GCAP, an evolved Rafale-successor, and an Airbus-led NGF \u2014 at a moment when the continent is also trying to rebuild its munitions stockpiles, scale up Ukraine support, and prepare for whatever Donald Trump decides about NATO in 2027?<\/p>\n\n<p>Francken doesn&#8217;t think so. Neither does Taylor. Neither, behind closed doors, does most of the European Defence Agency. Three programmes is two too many \u2014 and the one with a treaty, a working international organisation, an export pipeline, and an entry-into-service date in the 2030s is the one Europe will keep. The other two will, in Taylor&#8217;s phrase, eventually be allowed to go without a funeral.<\/p>\n\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">The Final Word<\/h2>\n\n<p>FCAS was never really a fighter programme. It was a Franco-German political reconciliation project that happened to involve aircraft. As long as Paris and Berlin needed each other for symbolic reasons, the project could survive almost any technical disagreement. The moment a chancellor decided the symbolism was no longer worth the engineering price, the project stopped making sense. Merz didn&#8217;t kill FCAS \u2014 the disagreement over Dassault&#8217;s workshare killed it. Merz just stopped pretending it was alive.<\/p>\n\n<p><em>Sources: Breaking Defense (Tim Martin, 18 February 2026); European Policy Centre commentary by Paul Taylor; The Times of London on Rafale exports; ECFR analysis &quot;The trouble with FCAS&quot;; <em>Machtwechsel<\/em> podcast (German); Military Watch Magazine; Wikimedia Commons for photography.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n<div style=\"background:#f0f4ff;border-left:4px solid #5C91FF;padding:16px 20px;margin:32px 0 8px;border-radius:0 8px 8px 0\">\n<p style=\"margin:0 0 8px;font-weight:600;color:#333\">Related Posts<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/f-47-gets-5-billion-as-sixth-gen-fighter-race-heats-up\/\">F-47 Gets $5 Billion as Sixth-Gen Fighter Race Heats Up<\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/fa-xx-acat-1-pentagon-direct-oversight-navy-stealth-fighter\/\">F\/A-XX Gets Promoted: Pentagon Takes Direct Command of Navy&apos;s Stealth Jet<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Friedrich Merz said the quiet part out loud: France and Germany now want different sixth-generation fighters. Belgium&apos;s defence minister declared SCAF dead within hours.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":998600,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_yoast_wpseo_focuskw":"","_yoast_wpseo_title":"FCAS Collapse: Europe&#8217;s 6th-Gen Fighter Splits in Two","_yoast_wpseo_metadesc":"Merz&#8217;s February interview triggered Belgium to declare SCAF dead. Inside the Franco-German divorce over Dassault, Airbus and the workshare fight.","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","editor_notices":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[664,670],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-998593","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-military-aviation","category-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>FCAS Collapse: Europe&#8217;s 6th-Gen Fighter Splits in Two<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Merz&#8217;s February interview triggered Belgium to declare SCAF dead. 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