France and Germany want to immediately resolve their differences over FCAS programme, in which Spain also participates.
The FCAS has been stalled for more than a year because of serious disagreements between the interests of French aircraft manufacturer Dassault Aviation, personified by the company's 62-year-old CEO since 2013, Eric Trappier, and those of his German counterpart, Michael Schoellhorn, 55, who has captained Airbus Defence and Space GmbH since July 2021.
The dispute that is preventing the industrial contract from being signed and which is forcing work on the nine technology pillars of the FCAS programme to be put on hold has one main reason: Trappier's refusal to share flight control system information and stealth technologies. As the main contractor for the development of the new aircraft, Dassault is hiding its position by claiming that it does not want Airbus to interfere in the management of its work as the main contractor for the future fighter.
But it looks like a solution is on the way in a few days. Emmanuel Macron and Olaf Scholz have decided to postpone their bilateral summit on 26 October in order to come to their annual meeting with their FCAS homework done. Also with agreements already concluded on other common military programmes of great relevance for defence, the economy and the creation of new jobs in both nations, especially for France.
In the new French government headed since May by Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne, President Macron gave the go-ahead for the replacement of his defence minister, Florence Parly, by Sébastien Lecornu. A colonel in the National Gendarmerie in the reserves and a pragmatic politician, Lecornu had been the head of the Overseas France portfolio in the government of Prime Minister Jean Castex since 2020.
The dispute that is preventing the industrial contract from being signed and which is forcing work on the nine technology pillars of the FCAS programme to be put on hold has one main reason: Trappier's refusal to share flight control system information and stealth technologies. As the main contractor for the development of the new aircraft, Dassault is hiding its position by claiming that it does not want Airbus to interfere in the management of its work as the main contractor for the future fighter.
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