High-tech fighter jointly developed by Japan, UK and Italy, Saudi-financed purchase ‘de-America’
Advanced fighter jets were jointly developed by Japan, the UK, and Italy, and Europe and Japan began to break away from the US aviation-dominated defense industry through a large-scale purchase system invested by Saudi Arabia.
In the Expo bid, Japan and the UK supported Saudi Arabia from the beginning, but it appears that the joint development project for advanced fighter jets was carried out against the background of Italy giving up the competition.
Reuters reported on the 6th that the Global Combat Aviation Program (GCAP) will be headquartered in the UK, and Japan's Masami Oka, an advisor to the Ministry of Defense, is likely to join the initial project management team.
Reuters reported that Japan and the UK dominated GCAP with a share of about 40% each in the three-country joint development, but Italy called this "speculation" and said it would renegotiate.
Reuters reports from officials that Japan, Britain and Italy will sign a treaty in Tokyo next week to establish a joint development organization and industrial group for advanced jet fighters. The first executive will retire in July as Vice Minister for International Affairs, and will now be taken over by an advisor to Japan's Ministry of Defense, it said.
The intergovernmental body for the advanced jet fighter project is Britain's BAE Systems PLC, Japan's Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Italy's Leonardo, which have formed industry groups to distribute work to teams in different parts of the Global Combat Air Program (GCAP), such as engines and avionics. It becomes a system that does.
GCAP is a “junior partner” to other countries, with Saudi Arabia investing tens of billions of dollars in initial costs and expected to be the main buyer, providing both financing and profitability in the project, Reuters said.
Companies participating in the GCAP project include European missile manufacturer MBDA, Japanese avionics manufacturer Mitsubishi Electronics, and fighter engine manufacturers Rolls-Royce PLC, IHI Corp, and Avio Aero, etc. participating in engine development.
This agreement is a military agreement that must be ratified by each country's parliament, and becomes the first defense industry cooperation between the two countries as Britain and Japan have been pursuing joint development of next-generation fighter jets for a year.
The joint development of advanced fighter aircraft by Japan, the UK, and Italy was launched in June last year in response to the war in Ukraine, resulting in the Global Combat Air Program (GCAP), which combines the UK's Future Combat Air System project (Tempest) and Japan's F-X program.
Japan mass-produced Mitsubishi Zero fighter jets in World War II, and after its defeat in the war, Japan was limited to the US defense industry system, but jointly developed with the UK to develop a next-generation aircraft that combines the flight systems of the US F-22 airframe and F-35 fighter jet. It moved away from Lockheed Martin's support system and switched to producing its own next-generation fighter jet.
As for the advanced fighter jet, Britain's BAE Systems PLC, Japan's Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Italy's Leonardo will lead the design of aircraft with advanced digital capabilities in artificial intelligence and cyber warfare, Reuters said.
Immediately after the outbreak of the war in Ukraine last year, defense companies from France, Germany, and Spain began building next-generation fighter jets that will be operational from 2040, followed by the ‘joint development of advanced fighter jets’ between the UK, Japan, and Italy.
Regarding the jointly developed fighter jet with Japan and Italy, the UK said, “Other countries may also participate in this project,” and added, “This fighter jet, which will replace the Typhoon fighter jet and complement the US F-35 Lightning squadron, will be used by other North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) partners.” “It will be compatible with the fighter jets they fly,” he told Reuters.
“We don’t need another partner,” Charles Woodburn, CEO of BAE, told reporters in June last year. "The three countries are everything we need to make this program very successful," he told Reuters when asked by a reporter about the possibility of the British, Japanese and Italian projects joining forces with rival European projects in the future. In other words, it announced a change to an independent European aircraft system from the US-dominated fighter system.
<Refer to Japan, the U.S. and ‘global security expansion’, released from the shackles of international anti-Japanese sentiment, January 14, 2023>