Macron: France, Germany push ahead with FCAS fighter jet project

Emmanuel Macron and Friedrich Merz have agreed to continue work on the troubled Future Combat Air System (FCAS), signaling renewed political backing for the flagship European defence programme despite lingering industrial disputes.

Speaking on Friday (April 24) after talks on the sidelines of an EU summit in Cyprus, Macron dismissed suggestions the project was collapsing, Caliber.Az reports via foreign media.

"No, not at all," Macron said when asked by a reporter if the FCAS project was dead. "We had a good discussion this morning with the chancellor, and we gave a mandate to our defence ministries to work precisely on several areas, on a range of different issues," he said.

"Not just the future combat aircraft, but various levers of cooperation between our two countries."

A German government spokeswoman confirmed the leaders’ discussion, adding:

"The Chancellor and the President instructed their defence ministers to continue working on various areas of cooperation and to agree on the next steps. This work will be completed in the coming weeks."

The FCAS programme — a roughly €100 billion ($116.85 billion) effort involving France, Germany and Spain — aims to develop a next-generation air combat system combining a manned fighter jet with drones and a shared digital network, often described as a “combat cloud.”

However, progress has been repeatedly threatened by disputes between key industrial players, notably Dassault Aviation and Airbus, over control of the core fighter jet component.

The disagreement has raised doubts about whether the partners can maintain a unified approach to the programme. Recent comments from defence officials in Paris and Berlin also pointed to diverging timelines for key decisions, with one side pushing for a near-term resolution while the other signaled a need for further mediation.

At the heart of the dispute is leadership of the next-generation fighter, a central element of the FCAS system, which is designed to integrate crewed aircraft, armed drones and sensor networks into a single operational framework.

Some industry insiders have speculated that France and Germany could scale back ambitions by abandoning the joint fighter jet while continuing cooperation on drones and the digital backbone that would enable real-time data sharing across platforms.

Such a move, however, would carry political risks, particularly for Macron, who has championed European defence integration.

By Aghakazim Guliyev