I don’t think I need to read an article to know that working with the French isn’t smart.
They want to design and produce an aircraft tailored to their needs and capabilities and that we are the ones who pay for it
France believes it still belongs to a league to which it stopped participating 1 century ago
We can provide them a special price on the Tempests when the time comes.
UK, Italy and Sweden
anyone got access to the article? It’s paywalled for me.
​
Edit: thanks both of you!
the author clearly fails to understand that the MCAS project is aimed to push EU defense integration. obviously france can build their own fighter and export it to countries with a dodgy record on the humanitarian side, but that’s not the point. the point is to slowly integrate EU defense programmes and systems. also, why germany would leave a programme with EU partners where it has veto rights to join a programme with the UK, a third country with significantly different foreign policy interests, where germany would end up not having veto rights is beyond me. if anything, this whole russia-ukraine thing showed that EU defense integration apart from NATO is even more important than ever. going with a UK-led programme means you got to sign up to US-UK foreign policy and defense principles, not something that is necessarily in the EU‘s interest. absurd.
An article like a tone deaf sales pitch…
Why is the flight stick a baguette?
It is exasperating. Everyone in France knows that we are wasting our time with the Germans, except our politicians.
>*Foreign Policy is an American news publication*
That’s why
​
I do not agree with this analysis. It is problematic for France to rely on exports to keep its defense industry at the top.
They talk about the successes, especially the planes, but the failures? The FAMAS? Very good rifle but only 1 user, the factories close. The Leclerc tank? Ahead of its time, only 2 users, parts are rare and expensive, minimal updates.
If France wants to do everything alone, it is possible, but it is very heavy in reinvestments without guarantee of commercial success.
I mean, we have to try no ?
What’s the point of being in a union if we never try to work together and sort out differences ?
At the end there need to be compromises on both sides.
But yeah, I guess there are easier thing to work with Germany than weapon manufacturing.
It’s really a kind of tragedy. France bet everything on the EU but its best partner left the union. Now we have to make deals with ‘block sales and send helmets’ Germany.
Either I or the article author are out-of-date.
>By contrast, Germany’s willingness to restrict arms sales and support for political reasons has increased in recent years. Berlin has blocked sales of numerous products from the European multinational Airbus—including the A330 MRTT refueling tanker, C-295 military transport, and H145 helicopter—to Saudi Arabia, among other places.
The French ambassador to Germany specifically complained about Germany doing this a few years back, had an open letter complaining about it being a serious problem. They didn’t want Germany to scare off FCAS export customers.
The next week or so, right after this, was some incident with Saudi Arabia, maybe the embassy killing, and Germany restricted exports of plane parts.
France was pretty unhappy about this.
I’d thought that they had announced some agreement for the FCAS where both countries had to agree for exports to be restricted. I think that this was prior to Spain’s involvement in FCAS, at least as an equal partner, so I don’t know how Spain factors in.
If that agreement is in place now, I think that the issue at the center of the article has likely already been addressed.
France really shouldn’t do military programs with Germany
13 comments
I don’t think I need to read an article to know that working with the French isn’t smart.
They want to design and produce an aircraft tailored to their needs and capabilities and that we are the ones who pay for it
France believes it still belongs to a league to which it stopped participating 1 century ago
We can provide them a special price on the Tempests when the time comes.
UK, Italy and Sweden
anyone got access to the article? It’s paywalled for me.
​
Edit: thanks both of you!
the author clearly fails to understand that the MCAS project is aimed to push EU defense integration. obviously france can build their own fighter and export it to countries with a dodgy record on the humanitarian side, but that’s not the point. the point is to slowly integrate EU defense programmes and systems. also, why germany would leave a programme with EU partners where it has veto rights to join a programme with the UK, a third country with significantly different foreign policy interests, where germany would end up not having veto rights is beyond me. if anything, this whole russia-ukraine thing showed that EU defense integration apart from NATO is even more important than ever. going with a UK-led programme means you got to sign up to US-UK foreign policy and defense principles, not something that is necessarily in the EU‘s interest. absurd.
An article like a tone deaf sales pitch…
Why is the flight stick a baguette?
It is exasperating. Everyone in France knows that we are wasting our time with the Germans, except our politicians.
>*Foreign Policy is an American news publication*
That’s why
​
I do not agree with this analysis. It is problematic for France to rely on exports to keep its defense industry at the top.
They talk about the successes, especially the planes, but the failures? The FAMAS? Very good rifle but only 1 user, the factories close. The Leclerc tank? Ahead of its time, only 2 users, parts are rare and expensive, minimal updates.
If France wants to do everything alone, it is possible, but it is very heavy in reinvestments without guarantee of commercial success.
I mean, we have to try no ?
What’s the point of being in a union if we never try to work together and sort out differences ?
At the end there need to be compromises on both sides.
But yeah, I guess there are easier thing to work with Germany than weapon manufacturing.
It’s really a kind of tragedy. France bet everything on the EU but its best partner left the union. Now we have to make deals with ‘block sales and send helmets’ Germany.
Either I or the article author are out-of-date.
>By contrast, Germany’s willingness to restrict arms sales and support for political reasons has increased in recent years. Berlin has blocked sales of numerous products from the European multinational Airbus—including the A330 MRTT refueling tanker, C-295 military transport, and H145 helicopter—to Saudi Arabia, among other places.
The French ambassador to Germany specifically complained about Germany doing this a few years back, had an open letter complaining about it being a serious problem. They didn’t want Germany to scare off FCAS export customers.
The next week or so, right after this, was some incident with Saudi Arabia, maybe the embassy killing, and Germany restricted exports of plane parts.
France was pretty unhappy about this.
I’d thought that they had announced some agreement for the FCAS where both countries had to agree for exports to be restricted. I think that this was prior to Spain’s involvement in FCAS, at least as an equal partner, so I don’t know how Spain factors in.
If that agreement is in place now, I think that the issue at the center of the article has likely already been addressed.
France really shouldn’t do military programs with Germany