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Germany and Sweden not discussing FCAS partnership, say defense ministers

STOCKHOLM — German defense minister Boris Pistorius and his Swedish counterpart Pål Jonson say that Germany and Sweden are not in talks aimed at securing a new Future Combat Air System (FCAS) partner to replace France, despite tensions between Berlin and Paris.

The disclosure came during a press conference addressing defense cooperation with Stockholm in Berlin Tuesday. When asked whether Germany was exploring alternatives to French participation amid an industrial dispute over how to move forward with the forthcoming Phase 2 technology demonstrator, Pistorius said, “No such discussions are taking place.” 

The FCAS, a collaborative effort between Germany, France and Spain, aims at developing a next-generation fighter jet and associated systems to replace aging fleets of Eurofighter Typhoon and Rafale by 2040. The program, which includes Airbus, Dassault and Spain’s Indra, is Europe’s push to modernize defense capabilities and technological autonomy.

According to previous media reports, Berlin’s strained relations with Paris over Europe’s €100 billion flagship fighter jet program are prompting Germany to consider replacing France with Sweden or the UK if no agreement is reached by year’s end.

Germany will host a trilateral meeting with France and Spain in Berlin in October to discuss how to proceed with the future fighter program. Pistorius emphasized that Berlin expects clear results from the project by the end of the year.

“A decision must and will be made regarding whether and how FCAS will continue” he shared.

Eric Trappier, CEO of France’s Dassault, said during an inauguration ceremony of a new company production facility in Cercy, northwest France on Tuesday, “I don’t mind if the Germans are complaining. If they want to do it on their own, let them do it on their own,” according to AFP. France could also develop a future fighter jet alone, he added. 

Jonson said during Tuesday’s press conference he was “surprised” to be fielding questions related to Sweden’s potential involvement in a joint fighter jet project with Germany.

Stockholm’s discussions with Berlin currently focus on Ukraine support, electronic warfare and deterrence, “not on the Franco-German FCAS project. That’s a bilateral issue between those countries,” he explained. Sweden had previous ties to the UK-led Tempest fighter jet program but left to rethink its plans. Stockholm has since opted to carry out future fighter studies and is targeting a preferred choice of either partnering with an already established project or going it alone by 2030. 

Separately during the press briefing, Berlin revealed that it is considering Swedish defense firm Saab’s airborne early warning and control platform (AEW&C), Global Eye. France has already opted for the surveillance and command plane.   

“Yes, that is also an option for Germany,” Pistorius said.  “We are working on it. We haven’t made a decision yet, but I would say it is in pole position, to put it cautiously.”

The NATO E-3A AWACS, stationed at Geilenkirchen, Germany, has been the cornerstone of alliance strategic airborne surveillance for decades. However, the aging fleet is receiving a final modernization push to extend its operational life until 2035, with retirement expected shortly thereafter. Without a new system, Germany would lose its national airborne early warning and control capability, relying fully on allied support. Jonson welcomed Berlin in exploring Global Eye as an option. 

“This is for Germany to decide which airborne sensors they want to procure,” he said. “We welcome it because it will deepen our cooperation, but it’s for Germany to decide what suits Germany’s needs.”

Mattias Rådström, head of media relations at Saab said in a statement that the company is “constantly promoting GlobalEye to potential customers around the world, however, we will not comment [on] specific activities.”

Elsewhere, both ministers emphasized the strength of the German-Swedish partnership within NATO, highlighting joint efforts in supporting Ukraine, enhancing Baltic security, and bolstering the alliance. 

Additionally, they are jointly procuring IRIS-T SLM air defense missiles, all under the umbrella of the European Sky Shield Initiative. 

Germany and Sweden will also sign a new Memorandum of Understanding on defense cooperation in November, building off a prior pact that dates back to 2009.

Constantly evolving aerial threats demand training that adapts accordingly

Modern combat training still relies heavily on live exercises, but virtual simulation and constructive training are also key to mimicking real-world challenges in virtual and artificial intelligence-driven training environments. Such LVC (Live, Virtual, Constructive) training prepares trainees for operations in varied scenarios, including multi-domain operations without the cost and time commitment required for live training.

We spoke with Nick Yates, former Air Force division chief for operations training infrastructure now with CAE USA Defense & Security, about how the organization’s training systems are evolving to adapt to new threat environments.

Breaking Defense: What are the threat scenarios necessitating the need for LVC training?

Yates: The potential adversary is no longer predictable. Unlike previous decades, where adversaries operated within predicable integrated air defense systems, today’s threats are decentralized and agile. This shift requires us to be adaptable, flexible and responsive – in real time.  

Nick Yates, former Air Force division chief for operations training infrastructure now with CAE USA Defense & Security

The need to be able to shift quickly and dynamically is similar to a football game when the defense changes its game plan mid-quarter and the offense needs to adjust. Unpredictability combined with advancing capabilities of potential adversaries is a complete change to today’s training approach versus what we did 10-20 years ago.

The Air Force conducts live training all the time in exercises like Red Flag and Agile Flag.  Why are they not sufficient?

I want to stress that live training is extremely important to the overall training ecosystem. It must include airmanship, the ability to integrate with the joint force in a common/shared/collaborative environment, and tactics such as getting aircraft to the tanker for refueling are essential. You have to train for all potential events and requirements.

There is absolute value to conducting live training for the mentioned, but as our technology advances we have outgrown many of our physical airspaces and ranges. There are some alternatives – locations with the range and space to train, which are cost and time prohibitive. We need to overcome the challenge of multi-force training exercises.

The answer is in the virtual environment, where we can build out an actual real-world replica where airspace constraints are not a factor. We can create an environment that reproduces the actual situation in quality, quantity and depth by using a virtual, synthetic environment. The goal is to provide the warfighter his or her first 10 combat sorties before they get into the cockpit so they’re totally familiar and experienced when they get into the actual aircraft.

CAE talks about how the LVC environment is dependent on good data. Explain.

Every event that we run and every parameter and performance criteria measurable plays into ensuring we are accurately reproducing the environment. Every piece of information needs to be assessed, synthesized, organized and stored so it can be exploited as data. Constant inputs dynamically impact to make continuous adjustments to mirror the live and virtual for a fully realistic shared experience.

It’s about educating all of our systems using the data harvested from all participants, elements and factors. The same for all domains. Data from all domains and environments will combine into a training ecosystem for a true, collaborative LVC environment.

Image courtesy of CAE.

We haven’t talked about constructive training. Tell us about it.

With LVC, entities that are not physically there but are presenting accurately to the warfighter.  This enables planning, training and rehearsal of multiple and complex scenarios including red forces from all domains.

Constructive training is the third arm of LVC which uses computer-based simulation to replicate real-world scenarios without deploying actual troops or equipment. The simulated environment is digitally modeled and is integrated into the overall environment which includes the “live” and “virtual” elements and participants. It enables the operating theater to incorporate an almost endless number of entities.

For a couple of significant exercises in the INDOPACOM theater, we successfully integrated simulators on the ground, live aircraft, ships from the US Navy, live threats that are actually airborne, and constructive red and blue players. The ability to combine the Air Force, Navy and Army with missile defense helps bolster success to effectively reproduce the real-world conditions and dynamic operating tempo of today’s threat environment for effective training and optimal mission readiness.

Army shaking up new autonomy initiative, pivoting away from ISVs: Sources

WASHINGTON — The Army is looking to change up a program meant to add autonomous navigation to Infantry Support Vehicles, potentially by removing the vehicles from the equation altogether and letting industry provide other platforms to host the software, according to a senior defense official and an industry official. The service may also expand the program to new industry players, they said.

The senior official said exact details of the revamped plan are still being worked out, but the new Unmanned Systems (UxS) autonomy initiative “is changing for sure.”

“The focus will be mission autonomy” with the goal of letting companies bring in the best robots rather than trying to automate more ISVs, the defense official added.

One industry source close to the program told Breaking Defense that Army officials in Detroit on Tuesday confirmed that they were pivoting away from the ISV, while noting that the program was in a holding pattern until new acquisition guidance is signed out.

A spokesperson for the Army did not provide a comment for this report as of press time.

Neither the defense official nor the industry source provided a rationale for the change. However, a second industry official following the UxS program cited a few potential challenges with the initial plan that including “underlying deficiencies” that do not make the ISV ideal for taking it unmanned, potential safety risks and the low price point of the UxS contract awards.

In late August, the service tapped Forterra, Overland AI and Scout AI to receive a total of $15.5 million to “rapidly integrate” their commercial autonomy solution onto existing ISVs and deliver prototypes to Army soldiers for demonstration and evaluation in May 2026.

For now, those same three teams will proceed with the revamped indicative, the defense official explained, but the service plans to “make room” for more entrants.

The UxS shakeup comes as the Army is grappling with how to proceed with fielding a fleet of ground robots. After several false starts creating a Robotic Combat Vehicle, it abruptly opted not to proceed with a plan to award Textron Systems with a new RCV contract, and instead realign funding toward higher priorities. Then in August, the service released about taking another crack, but with plans to cap the per unit cost at $650,000.

“The Army seeks UGCRV [Unmanned Ground Commercial Robotic Vehicles] prototypes to meet emerging requirements in the form of desired characteristics in support of future operations on the battlefield,” a request for information obtained by Breaking Defense said. 

In addition to UGCRV and UxS, the Army has other autonomy initiatives underway including a potential deal to integrate commercial solutions into two platoons of ground robots under its Human Machine Integrated Formation initiative, and plans to make an autonomous launcher under the Common Autonomous Multi-Domain Launcher (CAML) umbrella.

Modernizing the nuclear triad with a new cornerstone ICBM

As the US modernizes its nuclear triad, the Sentinel program is key to providing a land-based deterrent that outperforms existing missiles and defensive systems. Breaking Defense discussed the Sentinel program with Ben Davies, corporate vice president, and president, Northrop Grumman Defense Systems, who shared updates on the program’s design and testing progress.

An ICBM update and Space Force in focus: AFA day 2 [Video]

Day two of the Air and Space Forces Association conference is a wrap, and Breaking Defense’s Aaron Mehta and Michael Marrow are here to talk about the biggest news from the show — including news about Sentinel and comments from Space Force boss Gen. Chance Saltzman.

Make sure to check out our AFA landing page for all our stories, and our multimedia page for daily video roundups and photos from the conference.

RTX, Shield AI picked to give Collaborative Combat Aircraft autonomous capabilities

AFA 2025 — The Air Force has selected defense giant RTX and startup Shield AI to supply the autonomy capabilities for the service’s first round of drone wingmen, two sources with knowledge of the process confirmed to Breaking Defense.

RTX will supply the autonomy software, essentially the computer pilot for the drones known as Collaborative Combat Aircraft, to General Atomics’s YFQ-42A. Shield AI will similarly provide autonomy for Anduril’s YFQ-44A, the source said. Aviation Week first reported the wins by RTX and Shield AI.

The Air Force previously disclosed that the service had winnowed the pool of autonomy vendors to five unnamed companies, though officials have since declined to disclose specifics. One source said that ensuing competition knocked out Anduril, which was competing for the autonomy deal separate from its aircraft offering.

An Air Force spokesperson declined to comment, saying only that “all subcontractors are protected by enhanced security measures.”

Anduril, General Atomics, RTX and Shield AI all referred queries to the Air Force.

The Air Force previously awarded contracts for the drone wingmen airframes to General Atomics and Anduril last year, marking the first “increment” of the CCA program. General Atomics’s YFQ-42A more recently took to the skies for its first flight. Anduril’s YFQ-44A is expected to follow in October, Air Force Secretary Troy Meink told reporters in a roundtable on Monday.

Although Anduril missed a target to fly the drone by the summer, Diem Salmon, the company’s vice president for Air Dominance and Strike, said the firm is still “well ahead of the program schedule” to achieve its maiden flight. 

“There’s just a little bit more on the software development side that needs to get wrung out. So that’s what’s currently driving our schedule right now,” Salmon said during a briefing with reporters on Monday. “But again, I think that’s going to allow us to kind of leapfrog the overall test plan, because we are kind of tackling that hard part first.”

Details about the second CCA increment are still not known. Meink said Monday the Air Force is still in the “learning phase” for the CCA program, where efforts under the first increment will inform its subsequent iteration.

Day 2 of AFA’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference [Photos]

AFA 2025 — It’s space day at AFA!

Space Force leaders past and present offered a look at where America’s newest military service is headed as competition in the cosmos heats up. “Delivering today’s systems is critical, but we’re also building the architecture of the future and making sure we’re prepared for what our adversaries might do next,” said Gen. Chance Saltzman, the Space Force’s top officer.

Take a look at some of the main stage speakers from day two, plus more aircraft on display downstairs.

Chief of Space Operations Gen. B. Chance Saltzman gives his keynote address at the Air and Space Forces Association’s 2025 Air, Space & Cyber Conference at National Harbor, Md., Sept. 23, 2025. (Jud McCrehin/AFA)Jay Raymond (left), former Space Force chief of space operations, and David Thompson, former vice chief of space operations, speak on a panel moderated by Nina Armagno, former Space Force staff director, Sept. 23, 2025. (Jud McCrehin/Air & Space Forces Association)A model of Saab-Boeing’s T-7 Red Hawk jet trainer, Sept. 23, 2025. (Daniel Woolfolk/Breaking Defense)A 1/6th-size model of the Hermeus supersonic jet sits below a live feed of the company’s production line in Atlanta, Ga., Sept. 23, 2025. (Aaron Mehta/Breaking Defense)Shield AI’s V-BAT vertical takeoff-and-landing drone, sits on display, Sept. 23, 2025. (Daniel Woolfolk/Breaking Defense)Griffon Aerospace displays its Valiant vertical takeoff-and-landing drone, designed for field reconnaissance on the go, Sept. 23, 2025. (Aaron Mehta/Breaking Defense)Trac9 shows its Advanced Deployable Aircraft Mobile System, a portable hangar, Sept. 23, 2025. (Aaron Mehta/Breaking Defense)

Navy preparing for future X-Band Radar competition

WASHINGTON — The Navy today announced it plans to issue a competitive solicitation to design, build and integrate its Future X-Band Radar, a key capability for allowing the service’s surface fleet to detect and track incoming missile threats.

The solicitation for work running from fiscal 2026 through 2033 will be to “design the Future X-Band Radar (FXR), and to build, integrate, and test FXR Engineering Development Models (EDMs) and deliver multiple low-rate initial production (LRIP) units,” according to a Navy notice on the government’s contracting website. The notice does not provide a timeline for when the formal request for proposals will be published.

X-band radars operate using a different frequency and the technology is capable of tracking small objects due to its increased sensitivity.

The future X-band radar would replace the service’s current AN/SPQ-9B Anti-Ship Missile Defense radar, which is installed on a number of amphibious ships, destroyers, cruisers and carriers, and complements the capabilities of the SPY-6(V) family of S-band radars made by Raytheon. The SPQ-9B has been in service since the 1990s and contracts to replace it could be worth billions.

“The AN/SPQ-9B scans out to the horizon and performs simultaneous and automatic air and surface target detection and tracking of low flying Anti-Ship Cruise Missiles (ASCMs), surface threats and low/slow flying aircraft, UAVs and helicopters,” according to Naval Sea Systems Command.

In general S-band radars are commonly used for surveillance and are capable of operating in severe weather conditions.

Such a competition to outfit the Navy’s fleet could include contractors around from the globe. American defense prime Raytheon is already under contract to provide the service with its SPY-6(V) family of radars. Meanwhile, Italy-based Leonardo, France-based Thales and Sweden-based Saab all have their own offerings used by armed forces in their home countries, by NATO nations, and elsewhere around the globe.

Uncertainty over satellite constellation means alternate-GPS capability up in the air as well: Official

AFA 2025 — The Space Development Agency’s (SDA) plans to provide US military operators with positioning, navigation and timing (PNT) signals in situations where GPS is unavailable now are up in the air — as the Space Force reconsiders pushing forward with the agency’s next set Transport Layer data relay satellites.

SDA Director Gurpartap “GP” Sandhoo told reporters Monday that the agency’s Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA) of communications and missile tracking satellites in low Earth orbit will have “organic” PNT capability to ensure the constellations themselves can operate “in case GPS is denied” by adversary jamming.

But there’s a question as to whether SDA will be able to transmit those alternate PNT signals to warfighters on the ground if the Tranche 3 Transport Layer is cancelled, Sandhoo said.

“I don’t have an answer for that,” he during the annual Air and Space Forces Association conference at National Harbor, Md.

SDA originally planned to buy 140 T3 Transport Layer satellites in three different configurations to provide worldwide routing of high volumes of data with low latency, with launching to begin in 2028. SDA in January put out a draft solicitation for 40 of the first variant, called Upsilon, asking for industry responses by Feb. 10.

With regard to PNT, the agency’s planned Navigation Layer would be based on using the laser links among the PWSA satellites, by “leveraging two-way time transfer (TWTT) and ranging” provided, according to an SDA post on LinkedIn. It would have three purposes: maintaining “continuity of operations” for SDA’s satellites, pinpointing GPS jamming and providing that data to Space Force operators, and providing “space-based PNT Services” through a dedicated signal, the agency explained.

The SDA Warfighter Council last August approved the inclusion in Tranche 3 of the “Light Weight Service” developed by the Air Force Research Laboratory to provide the alternate PNT signal, according to the abstract of a paper co-authored by two agency officials among others and submitted to the Institute of Navigation for its upcoming June conference.

The laboratory did not respond to a inquiry from Breaking Defense about the concept.

However, as part of the budget drill for fiscal 2026, the Department of the Air Force and the Space Force now are in the midst of an analysis of whether to replace the T3 birds by buying commercial services from SpaceX’s Starshield network under a mysterious program called MILNET.

The service put $277 million in its first public budget request in FY26 budget request, although there have been multiple reports from Space Force and congressional officials that the program already is underway.

Rutte holds back on Poland’s drone shoot down plan

BELFAST — NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte insisted today that the alliance and Poland are aligned on how to counter drone incursions over allied territory amid Warsaw vowing to unilaterally shoot down “objects” that enter its airspace without permission.

“We all agree that when there is an incursion, when that takes place, we have to act decisively and quickly, exactly as we have done in the Polish case, in the Estonian case and every other case,” Rutte told reporters following a meeting of the North Atlantic Council, called under Article 4 at the request of Estonia. The clause can be invoked if the “territorial integrity, political independence or security” of a member is at risk.

NATO fighter jets shot down Russian drones over Polish airspace earlier this month, an incident that prompted the alliance to launch its Eastern Sentry operation, aimed at bolstering defenses along the Eastern flank — primarily through the deployment of British, Danish, French and German “assets.”

Last week, three Russian MiG-31 fighter jets violated Estonia’s airspace, though Rutte said that an alliance assessment determined that the aircraft posed “no immediate threat” and a decision was consequently made to escort them away from the Baltic nation’s airspace.

The North Atlantic Council in a statement today said Russia’s series of drone incursions across Europe in recent weeks were “escalatory” and “must stop.”

Senior Polish officials have signaled that they will take more assertive action in future incursions over its airspace. Poland’s prime minister Donald Tusk said, “We will make a decision to shoot down flying objects without discussion when they violate our territory and fly over Poland,” according to the Guardian newspaper.

Rutte said he had listened to Tusk’s remarks. “I think what [Tusk] he said is that, if necessary, yes, we will shoot down a plane,” but refused to comment further when asked if Warsaw could act alone or is bound by a common set of rules of engagement that apply to all 32 NATO members.

“You can be assured we will do what is necessary to defend our cities, our people, our infrastructure, but it doesn’t mean that we will always immediately shoot down a plane,” said Rutte, appearing at odds with Poland’s position.

Radosław Sikorski, Poland’s foreign minister, told an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council in New York on Monday, “If another missile or aircraft enters our space without permission, deliberately or by mistake, and gets shot down and the wreckage falls on NATO territory, please don’t come here to whine about it.”

Additionally, Lithuania’s parliament approved a plan today for the country’s armed forces to shootdown drones that violate its airspace, reported Reuters.

Meanwhile, Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said she could not rule out possible Russian involvement related to a drone incursion that led to the closure of Copenhagen airport for several hours on Monday. 

Rutte said that he had been in contact with Frederiksen but because Danish officials are still making an assessment of the incident, it is “too early” to say if there is a link to it and the other drone incursions carried out by Russia.

Posting on X today, Former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen called for the establishment of a European drone wall immediately. “Russian drones enter our skies. We complain. They return. We delay. They escalate. We hesitate. Enough,” he added. [I]f we don’t stop Moscow’s tests, one day they won’t be tests.”