Belgium will initially be included as an observer in the complex Future Air Combat System program.
According to a statement by Emmanuel Macron, it is official that Belgium will join the European combat aircraft program SCAF.
For the time being, Belgium will be included as an observer in the complex Future Air Combat System (Scaf) program being developed by France, Germany and Spain, the head of state said on Monday.
“This is a major development,” he said at the end of a ministerial conference on air defense in Europe. “This expansion will allow this project to be anchored even more firmly in Europe at the heart of tomorrow’s air defenses.”
“No nation alone is able to finance such a project”
Bruno Fichefeux, program director at Airbus, said on Monday’s BFM Business program “conjured up a change in logic, because the Belgians have always bought Americans”.
In general, the industrialist justifies this necessary cooperation between the countries with the problem of the enormous costs, since Europe has “a lot of catching up to do with the Americans or the Chinese”.
“No single nation is able to fund these types of projects, so collaboration is needed to pool defense budgets and work together on a project where, through more partners, we are able to fund each of these ambitions.” “
At the end of May, Dassault Aviation chief Eric Trappier said he was opposed to expanding the program to other countries, fearing new difficulties in division of labor between manufacturers.
For his part, French military minister Sébastien Lecornu considered it necessary “to raise the question (…) in so far as it is of industrial and military interest”. He justified this in particular with the need to reduce the costs of a project estimated at around 100 billion euros, experts say.
Likely in 2040
The SCAF is scheduled to enter service by 2040, but there have already been numerous delays.
Launched in 2017 to replace the French Rafale fighter jets and the German and Spanish Eurofighter, the project has been the subject of a long deadlock over the past year due to tensions between French Dassault Aviation and European giant Airbus, pillars of this project backed by the three countries.
This blockade ended on December 1, 2022, after strong political pressure, with the conclusion of an agreement that defined the division of labor for this extensive industrial program.