After FCAS: Could an Indo-French Fighter Program Rise From the Wreckage? Plus Pro

In April 2018, days after India formally withdrew from the Su-57 Fifth Generation Fighter Aircraft (FGFA) program with Russia, Quwa published an analysis that identified the then-newly announced Franco-German Future Combat Air System (FCAS) as India’s most likely next-generation fighter pathway. At the time, the FCAS had existed for less than a week – Dassault and Airbus had announced their joint development agreement on 25 April 2018 – and the prevailing assumption was that India would pivot toward an American solution. Quwa argued otherwise, and laid out a specific case for why FCAS would absorb India:

Remarkably, the FCAS is well-positioned to takeover the FGFA. First, the FCAS intends to substantially improve upon the capabilities of the Typhoon and Rafale, thus justifying the expense of the program over existing solutions. Second, Dassault can leverage India’s potential scale to entice German approval, thus ensuring that a decline in orders in Europe do not make the FCAS unviable from a procurement standpoint. Third, Dassault can offer India the FCAS as a carrot to secure the current bid for 110 new multi-role fighters with the Rafale. Fourth, Dassault can even extend the FCAS to the Indian Navy – again, incentivizing India to procure additional Rafales while also guaranteeing scale for the naval FCAS variant. Fifth, leverage New Delhi’s fiscal strength to guard the program from potential fiscal lapses in Europe. Sixth, access to India’s scale and industry could make the FCAS more competitive in terms of cost, thus opening access to third-party markets in the Middle East and East Asia.

Eight years later, that forecast has come to pass almost perfectly – though in a form no one anticipated. FCAS is collapsing under the weight of Franco-German industrial disputes, and India’s Defence Ministry has told Parliament that the Indian Air Force intends to join one of Europe’s sixth-generation fighter consortia “right away.” All six dynamics Quwa identified in 2018 have since materialised or intensified. The question is no longer whether India will pursue a European sixth-generation partnership, but what shape that partnership will take – and whether France, having lost Germany, will accept the depth of co-development India demands. This article lays out how Quwa sees the situation evolving.

India’s Declaration

India’s Defence Ministry tabled a 152-page report on 2026 defence budget plans on 18 March. The report discloses that the Indian Air Force (IAF) will seek to join one of two sixth-generation fighter consortia – the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP), comprising the UK, Italy, and Japan, or the Future Combat Air System (FCAS), comprising France and Germany.

Defence officials told the Standing Committee on Defence that the air force will attempt to join “right away,” with the stated goal of ensuring India does “not lag behind in achieving the target for advanced aircraft.”

The declaration runs parallel to ongoing investment in the indigenous Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA). The AMCA is a fifth-generation fighter with a first flight targeted for 2028–2029 and induction projected for 2033–2035.

The IAF currently operates 29 combat squadrons – its smallest force since the 1962 Sino-Indian War – against a sanctioned strength of 42.

New Delhi approved the AMCA only in March 2024. The fact that it is already openly hedging against the program signals deep institutional scepticism about Hindustan Aeronautics Limited’s (HAL) capacity to deliver on time.

The Collapse of FCAS

India’s interest arrives at a moment when FCAS appears to be in terminal decline.

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz stated in a February 2026 podcast: “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.”