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Berlin, December 5 - In a stunning development shaking Europe’s defense landscape, members of the German Bundestag’s Defense Committee have formally demanded that Berlin immediately withdraw from the Future Combat Air System (FCAS), the ambitious trinational 6th-generation fighter jet program led by France, Germany, and Spain. The call, spearheaded by committee heavyweights from both the CDU/CSU and the traffic-light coalition, cites skyrocketing costs, chronic delays, endless industrial disputes, and France’s perceived dominance over the €100 billion-plus project as unacceptable risks for German taxpayers and the Luftwaffe’s future capabilities.
Committee members argue that Germany’s original 33% work-share and financial commitment has morphed into a French-led endeavor where Dassault Aviation repeatedly blocks German companies, especially Airbus Defence and Space, from leading critical technology pillars. Recent revelations that Phase 1B contracts remain unsigned two years after political agreement, combined with France’s unilateral push for its own engine preferences and sensor suite, have fueled accusations that Paris treats Berlin as a junior partner rather than an equal. Critics inside the Bundestag now openly question whether the Bundeswehr will ever receive a stealth combat aircraft before the 2040s, with some estimating total German contributions could exceed €50 billion for a platform that may arrive too late to replace aging Tornado and Typhoon fleets.
The demand for withdrawal has triggered intense debate across Europe’s defense community. Proponents of staying in FCAS warn that an abrupt German exit would collapse the entire program, damage relations with Paris and Madrid, and leave the continent without a credible 6th-generation fighter against Russian and Chinese advances. Yet an increasing number of German lawmakers counter that national security cannot be subordinated to European symbolism, especially when alternative paths, strengthening the Anglo-Italian-Japanese GCAP/Tempest partnership or a bilateral U.S. cooperation on NGAD-derived solutions, appear both faster and more technologically sovereign.
As the Bundestag Defense Committee prepares a binding resolution for early 2026, Chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz has remained conspicuously silent, leaving Europe’s largest economy at a historic crossroads. Will Germany abandon the troubled FCAS 6th-generation fighter jet project it helped launch in 2017, or will political pressure from the Élysée once again force Berlin to double down on a program many now consider the “European Concorde of defense”? The coming weeks will determine whether the era of Franco-German leadership in European fighter aircraft development is finally over.
