{"id":49879,"date":"2026-07-03T15:21:13","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T15:21:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/49879\/"},"modified":"2026-07-03T15:21:13","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T15:21:13","slug":"poland-teams-up-with-spain-to-double-tanker-aircraft-purchase","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/49879\/","title":{"rendered":"Poland teams up with Spain to double tanker aircraft purchase"},"content":{"rendered":"

WARSAW, Poland \u2014 As the Polish government is advancing plans to purchase multi-role tanker transport aircraft for the country\u2019s Air Force, aiming to buy Airbus A330 MRTT<\/a> planes, the nation has teamed up with Spain to implement the acquisition.<\/p>\n

Poland initially planned to procure two aircraft using loans from the European Union, but the agreement with Madrid will allow Warsaw to increase its tanker order to four units.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for the Polish Ministry of National Defence told Defense News that Poland and Spain have signed a memorandum that obliges the two countries to carry out the acquisition together. The deal enables the Spanish government to share its delivery slots with the Polish ministry.<\/p>\n

By joining forces with Madrid for the procurement, Warsaw will receive the MRTTs by 2030. The agreement was signed in late June 2026 during an official visit to Spain by W\u0142adys\u0142aw Kosiniak-Kamysz, Poland\u2019s Deputy Prime Minister and National Defence Minister. During the visit, Kosiniak-Kamysz met with his Spanish counterpart, Margarita Robles.<\/p>\n

The Polish minister has announced \u201cthat, within two weeks\u2019 time, Poland will arrange with Madrid the details of the contract to buy tanker and transport aircraft. Poland will order four A330 MRTT tankers,\u201d the spokesperson said. \u201cWe are currently at the final stage of talks.\u201d<\/p>\n

Under the EU\u2019s Security Action for Europe (SAFE) scheme, the Polish defense budget is to absorb funds<\/a> of around \u20ac43.7 billion ($49.9 billion) in low-cost loans. The program is designed to allow member states to bolster their defense capabilities amid Russia\u2019s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, and Poland is to receive the largest share of the funds. The program stipulates that the loans must be disbursed by the end of 2030.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe order from European group Airbus will be financed through the SAFE mechanism,\u201d according to the defense spokesperson.<\/p>\n

The value of the planned purchase was not disclosed by the Polish ministry. In May 2026, Italy<\/a> unveiled plans to acquire six A330 MRTTs in a deal worth some \u20ac1.4 billion ($1.6 billion).<\/p>\n

Fighter jet race<\/p>\n

The latest development confirms that Poland has chosen the Airbus aircraft over the only competitor that had also been considered, Boeing\u2019s KC-46.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, U.S. and European manufacturers continue to compete for another major aircraft order in the pipeline. Poland\u2019s government is mulling plans to buy up to 32 new fighter jets, with some of the evaluated options including: Lockheed Martin\u2019s F-35<\/a>; Boeing\u2019s F-15EX<\/a>; and the Eurofighter Typhoon, a jet manufactured by a consortium of Airbus, BAE Systems and Leonardo.<\/p>\n

With deliveries of the first of the country\u2019s 32 ordered F-35s initiated last June, Lockheed Martin is encouraging officials in Warsaw to double down on the Polish military\u2019s commitment to fifth-generation jets. At the same time, the manufacturers of the two air superiority aircraft that are also in the race are looking favorably at recent statements by Brig. Gen. Tomasz Jatczak, the inspector of the Polish Air Force.<\/p>\n

On June 19, Jatczak and Kevin Fesler, Boeing\u2019s executive director overseeing business development and strategy for air dominance, participated in a panel discussion during the annual Warsaw Defense Fair event. The general stated he is \u201can advocate for air superiority\u201d as securing this capability could provide Poland with \u201ca key element of deterrence\u201d against Russia.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, in its campaign for the potential Polish deal, the consortium behind the Eurofighter is benefiting from the recent move by Business Centre Club, a Polish employers\u2019 organization, which backed the jet in the race. On June 23, the group issued an open letter to a group of decision-makers including Poland\u2019s president, prime minister and national defense minister, calling on them to select the Typhoon.<\/p>\n

\u201cA mixed fleet, combining the stealth capabilities of the F-35 with the kinematics and missile count of an air superiority aircraft such as the Eurofighter offers greater freedom of rational use, resistance to the exhaustion of combat assets, and greater operational flexibility than 64 aircraft of the same type,\u201d the Business Centre Club said in its missive.<\/p>\n

The open letter also argues that Poland\u2019s defense and aerospace industries could gain considerable benefits from involvement in the European jet\u2019s supply chain.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnother F-35 contract is one in which the Polish industry remains a customer, not a partner. The Eurofighter consortium \u2026 has already declared that Poland\u2019s participation in the program would mean that approximately 40 percent of the investment value would remain in Poland through the supply chain, not just the purchase of a finished aircraft,\u201d according to the organization.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the Polish authorities are also considering joining the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP)<\/a>, a tri-nation initiative spearheaded by Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom to develop a sixth-generation fighter jet.<\/p>\n

W\u0142odzimierz Usarek, a retired major general of the Polish Air Force, told Defense News that by joining the Eurofighter\u2019s supply chain alongside European partners, Poland\u2019s defense industry could gain access to technologies and capacities that would otherwise not be available to local companies.<\/p>\n

\u201cBuying the Eurofighter will put Poland in a preferential position to develop the sixth-generation fighter and jointly produce it with other countries instead of continuing to be other countries\u2019 client,\u201d Usarek said. \u201cWith the F-35, we will have the stealth capacity that is necessary to open up the enemy airspace to other aircraft. With air superiority fighters such as the Eurofighter, Polish pilots will be able to fight the adversary at an altitude that only such aircraft can access.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jaroslaw Adamowski is the Poland correspondent for Defense News.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WARSAW, Poland \u2014 As the Polish government is advancing plans to purchase multi-role tanker transport aircraft for the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":49880,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[6429,15844,8685,21870,21867,16278,10697,21869,868,17,21868],"class_list":["post-49879","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-spain","tag-airbus","tag-boeing","tag-circulated-defense-news","tag-defense-news","tag-dn-dnr","tag-eurofighter","tag-f-35","tag-mrtt","tag-poland","tag-spain","tag-tanker"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49879","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49879"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49879\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/49880"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}