Britain’s Burnham says open to Germany joining warplane project
Britain, Italy and Japan are working on the Global Combat Air Programme, which aims to replace the Eurofighter Typhoon and Mitsubishi F-2 jets used by those countries.
British Prime Minister Andy Burnham expressed openness to Germany joining the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP), according to a statement made during his visit to Berlin. The GCAP aims to replace the Eurofighter Typhoon and Mitsubishi F-2 jets currently utilized by Britain, Italy, and Japan. This comes in the wake of the collapse of the France-Germany warplane project, known as Future Combat Air System (FCAS), which fell apart in June due to disagreements between the involved companies.
During his interaction with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Burnham conveyed Britain's openness to Germany's participation in GCAP, hoping to engage Italy and Japan in the endeavor as well. However, the FCAS project's demise, attributed to French aerospace group Dassault's demand for greater control over the initiative, could complicate Germany's potential inclusion in GCAP.
This is primarily due to the fact that significant defense firms in all three countries have already allocated most of the work, posing a potential obstacle to Germany's entry. Despite this, Swedish aerospace firm Saab, along with Airbus, has been identified as a possible partner for Germany and Japan in the development of a next-generation fighter jet.
Written by urgent.news from Free Malaysia Today's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
