The CESMA, the Aerospace Military Studies Centre part of the Italian Air Force Association, organised in Milan, at the Italian Air Force Air Fleet Command/1st Air Region Command, a conference titled “Global Air Combat Programme: sovereignty and cooperation, technology and industry”, in cooperation with the Institute of International Affairs. Representatives from institutions, Academia and industry discussed Global Air Combat Programme (GCAP) issues from different perspectives
In its introductory speech Lt.Gen. (IT AF) Alberto Biavati, the Commanding General of the Air Fleet Command, underlined the importance of the Air Force choice of the F-35 that is considered a key step towards a 6th generation aircraft. He also highlighted how the future generation air system will be a system of systems, made of high-end/low-end components. “We concentrated too much on high technology platforms, which numbers will not be sufficient to saturate the battlefield,” so lower end, lower cost systems should be part of the mix, a significant example being the target set by Ukraine to produce 170 drones per day.
The starting point of the conference was the presentation of the IAI document titled “The New Partnership among Italy, Japan and the UK on the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP)”, which had been previously presented in Rome last March. While it was made clear that Government, Armed Forces, and industry are all three committed to the programme, defence and industry putting their best elements on the GCAP project. It is to note that in the public domain the programme is having a lighter opposition compared to that for the JSF/F-35, the reason being probably that for the latter anti-militarism added with anti-Americanism.
What remains an issue, at least for the time being, seems the financial engagement; Italy allocated 8.9 billion Euro to the GCAP, however this is on a 25 years span, which means slightly over 350 million Euro per year as average, Japan having invested 800 million in 2025, more than the double. This might affect industry, the three partners being considered equal, but in practice systems will be selected according to the “Best Champion” principle, therefore from a national industry standpoint, a strong investment in the early phase is mandatory to develop those technologies that will allow Italian industry to play a key role in the programme. Some Italian industrial companies are already leaders in some subsystems, but it is important that the whole supply chain of SMEs, start-ups, research centres, Italian university excellences, will be involved, to improve the Italian defence industry ecosystem technological base.
One of the founding principles of the three-nations partnership is that GCAP will provide all partners with Freedom of Action and Freedom of Modification, which was clearly not the case with the F-35, that the UK, Italy and Japan all have in line. The co-leadership means commitment, and an ownership that goes well beyond the date of the signature.
Good news came just one week prior the conference; on June 2nd the European Union formally approved the creation of the multinational venture between the three GCAP lead systems integrators, BAE Systems (UK), Leonardo (Italy) and Japan Aircraft Industrial Enhancement Co. (Japan), the joint company acting as prime contractor and systems integrator for the GCAP.
The first discussion panel included the GCAP programme Deputy-Director, Lt.Gen (It AF) Giandomenico Taricco, and representatives from the three major Italian companies involved in the GCAP, Leonardo, AvioAero and ELT Group. Gen. Taricco, who in the past has been the first Italian director of the Tempest programme office, underlined how time has become an issue, underlining that the
The Establishment of the Global Combat Air Programme – International Government Organisation, GIGO in short, took less than one year, compared to previous programmes where the agreements were implemented after five or more years. This is not the only difference: “in previous programmes the cost-share principles were in some way guaranteed, in the GCAP the principle of parity applies, but one has to earn it because the competition that arises between the three countries stimulates each one to put its best skills on the table.” Although the United Kingdom started first to develop new technologies and skills, even ahead of the launch of the Tempest programme, the other two nations are picking up pace, and especially Japan is strongly pushing on the timeline, as it faces both major pier opponents, Russia and China.
With its headquarters based in the UK, the GIGO is composed of a Steering Committee and of the GCAP Agency, “which has the capacity to operate and therefore develop all those procedures and processes that are necessary for the smooth running of the activities. The agency is growing, at the end of 2024 we were less than 20 and now we are almost 100 and we are growing rapidly,” Gen. Taricco said. “Despite these small numbers we have given ourselves the goal to sign the first international program contract within the year which will be the real enabler to actually start the programme,” he added. The GIGO will also have branches in the partner countries to support and facilitate its activities.
This said, the general underlined that Italy has already developed 105 leading technologies that are relevant and coherent in supporting the national participation to the GCAP system of systems, the programme deputy-director explained.
The Leonardo representative underlined the radical differences between the GCAP model and the Eurofighter and F-35 ones. “It is not a model with a strong prime like the F35, where there is a recognized industrial leader that outsources the work to junior players and maintains a unitary technical leadership, and it is not even a consortium model like those of the Tornado or the Eurofighter. It was decided to go for a different model to have full sovereignty,” something which is definitely not true in the case of the F-35. The new industrial venture will be equally owned by the three partner leading companies, will be headquartered in Reading, UK, “and the national elements that will work operationally on the design and development of the system will be fully owned by the joint venture, therefore the joint venture will in-house technical and technological forces to design the aircraft,” Zoff pointed out. “So, the JV has full sovereignty and technological mastery over the product, which has the Intellectual Property Rights, therefore the technological ownership of what it does, which is obviously divided between the three nations, and it is the technical-physical mechanism that guarantees what is described as Freedom of Action,” he added.
Coming to what Leonardo will bring to the project, he underlined that compared to the other two major partners the Italian group has a broader horizontal span of skills, as it is not only an airplane designer and manufacturer, but it is also active in electronics, cyber, and space, “and let’s not forget that due to the very strongly integration of the CGAP with everything that happens above 20 km altitude space is a key element.” Not much was said about low-TRL technologies currently under development, while Zoff highlighted the Leonardo capacity to closely work with national SMEs.
The Italian champion that will have a key part in the propulsion of the CGAP manned platform is definitely AvioAero (1), which CEO, Riccardo Procacci, attended the conference as a speaker in the first panel. Describing the path followed by the company, from production under license, to design and production of key parts, that brought the Turin-based company to design and produce the turbine that is heart of the GE9X, which is considered the most powerful commercial engine with its nearly 600,000 kN of thrust, partly using additive printing. Although not a military, it shows the company capability, which allows Avio Aero to sit down at the table with good cards to play. The only EU company in the propulsion field part of GCAP, “we also managed to obtain some funding from the European Defence Fund to support the technological development of this programme,” Procacci underlined.
“The GCAP is also a starting point, as it will leave a new generation of engineers capable of collaborating on a much broader spectrum than the previous generation did,” developing dual technologies that will benefit both commercial and military platforms. Not only, “the GCAP programme will open new horizons considering unmanned systems that will fly in swarms and will probably have completely different propulsion requirements compared to manned platforms, especially sacrificial ones, where we will need propulsors with a performance-to-cost ratio that today do not exist and must be developed.”
Replacing his CEO, Domitilla Benigni, who could not make it to Milan, Giovanni Zoccali, Vice President Corporate Marketing and Sales represented the ELT Group, electronic warfare and the electromagnetic spectrum at large being a key issue in a system-of-systems such as the CGAP.
“The sixth generation will make the transition from a platform-centric approach to a data-centric approach, this is in our opinion the main leap forward in new generation systems,” he stated. Without managing the electromagnetic spectrum no operation will be possible. Sixth generation systems will have to exchange data with previous generation platforms, unmanned platforms, as well as with systems operating in the other domains, space, sea, and land, all within a cyber-protected scenario. “We believe that defence electronics and cyber will play a fundamental role, they will be fundamental enablers capable to guarantee the management of the system-of-systems. The new perspective must be shared, trusted and secure data,” Zoccali explained.
ELT Group, then Elettronica, has been in the programme since the Tempest era, in 2018; “from the start we aimed at having an aligned industrial, military and political strategy, precisely to be able to sit on equal terms at the programme table.” One of the major challenges is time. “We aim at developing a programme in half the time of the previous ones, Tornado, Eurofighter, etc. The technological leap must then happen very quickly. We must train new human resources that probably have a basic level of preparation, but also a way of life completely different from that of the same operators of twenty years ago. So also need new teachers, capable of entering their minds, to involve them to the maximum, not only to achieve results but also to maintain the passion to develop throughout the programme. But I think the most important and most difficult challenge is to be able to change mindset, as the GCAP is a totally different program compared to previous ones.”
ELT Group will be involved in the development of what is known as ISANKE & ICS (Integrated Sensing and Non-Kinetic Effects & Integrated Communications Systems). The difference compared to the past is that this is no longer an integration of federated systems, as now these systems are being designed in an integrated manner since the beginning. “This means that the other challenge is to start thinking in an integrated way from the beginning with Mitsubishi Electric Corporation Japan, with Leonardo UK, with Leonardo Italy,” Zoccali underlined. Here too the UK started earlier, however EDR On-Line understood that finally an agreement was reached, and the UK accepted a joint co-leadership in what is considered one of the key subsystems, that is the electronic warfare suite.
As we saw the theme of raising manpower with a new mentality was mentioned by some of the speakers, and was further developed in the second panel, titled “International positioning through skills, innovation and supply chain” which saw the participation of Academia and SMEs.
“It will not be easy task to make the GCAP better than the F-35 without the presence of the United States,” Gen. Biavati said in its wrap-up of the meeting. “It will be tough, but I am absolutely convinced, also from what I heard today, that our Academia, our industry, and our Armed Forces are capable of developing something far superior to what we have now with the F-35.” Something that will be totally different and that should absolutely be fully integrable with multidomain assets, with the FCAS, with the F-47, as the UK, Italy and Japan will never be able to confront a peer enemy on their own.” Some things may look simple but in real they are not; “shared, trusted and secure data is easy to say, but I can assure you, and we see it with the F-35, that when we want to make two different platforms talk on Link 16, it’s a feat.” The supply chain is another key issue; “We have currently huge supply chain problems, we have them at home with our domestically produced aircraft, we have them with the F35,” the Italian Air Force Air Fleet Commander said, adding that “logistics is an integral part of any system, let’s not forget in the design of our next system- of-systems to include strong logistics, capable logistics, resilient logistics.”
(1) In mid-2013 General Electric finalised the acquisition of the AvioAero aviation business.