France's President Emmanuel Macron (L) and Germany's Chancellor Friedrich Merz arrive to attend an informal EU leaders' retreat at the Alden Biesen Castle, in Alden Biesen, central Belgium, on February 12, 2026. LUDOVIC MARIN / AFP
Germany does not need the same fighter jets as France, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said in an interview broadcast on Wednesday, February 18, signalling that Berlin could abandon a flagship joint defence project.
"The French need, in the next generation of fighter jets, an aircraft capable of carrying nuclear weapons and operating from an aircraft carrier. That's not what we currently need in the German military," Merz said on the German podcast Machtwechsel.
The Future Combat Aircraft System (FCAS) program was launched in 2017 to replace France's Rafale jet and the Eurofighter planes used by Germany and Spain by 2040. Yet the scheme, which has been jointly developed by the three countries, stalled last year, as France's Dassault Aviation got into heated disputes with Airbus, which represents the German and Spanish interests in the project.
The project has also fallen foul of wider French-German disagreements, with Berlin accusing Paris of not making enough effort to boost defence spending.
