Credit: French Air and Space Force

With geopolitics changing fast over the last three years, the French Air and Space Force now has a stronger focus on high-intensity combat and military space. Meanwhile, it also is gearing up to replace lost capacities, such as suppression of enemy air defenses, and defining a doctrine for uncrewed combat aircraft. European Technology Editor Thierry Dubois sat down with Air and Space Force Chief of Staff Gen. Jérôme Bellanger for a wide-ranging interview.

AW&ST: In April, the French Air and Space Force conducted the Pegase Grand Nord exercise in Sweden, Poland and Croatia. What lessons were learned? It contributed to our strategic show of force toward Russia and reinforced our partnership with Nordic countries, especially Sweden—a new NATO member. The idea was to deploy swiftly and, at the end of a raid, make some real shooting on the Swedish firing range. And then, after a refueling and rearming stop, take off again and perform another mission. That’s what we did as part of a joint exercise with the Finnish, Norwegian and Swedish forces. On the way back, we worked on our agile combat employment (ACE) skills—deploying a few fighters with a small logistics footprint. In the ACE framework, three [Dassault] Rafales made stopovers in Poland and then in Croatia.

In total, Pegase Grand Nord employed six Rafales, three [Dassault] Mirage 2000Ds, two Airbus A400M transports and one A330 multirole tanker transport (MRTT). We have proven, again, we can have a significant strategic impact with few resources.

Over the last few years, French forces have transitioned from counterinsurgency operations in the Sahel region of Africa to preparing for high-intensity warfare. Is that a fair summary, and what does that mean for training and flight hours? We never stopped training for high-intensity [missions]. One of our permanent missions, nuclear deterrence, has always shaped our entire activity. Our Operation Poker exercises, for instance, involve a large part of our resources. We simulate a raid of about 50 aircraft by night, with adverse ground-to-air defenses and aircraft, and we do it four times a year. The mission has shaped us for 60 years, centering on capabilities such as air-to-air refueling, electromagnetic warfare (EW) and deep strikes.

Indeed, our approach in African countries has been less about kinetic operations recently and more about partnerships, typically with Ivory Coast.

And what about flight hours? To be up to the task, and if you want to use all the potential of the Rafale—an omnirole aircraft that can do, in one mission, all the missions from air combat to ground strikes—a pilot needs 180 flight hours and 60 hr. on a flight simulator annually. A sense of flying can be gained in flight only. Meanwhile, in the simulator, you can use the entire potential of the aircraft—which you cannot always do in flight because the airspace is restricted or you do not have the right configuration.

Is the French Air and Space Force at the right size, relative to its missions?Our aviators are fit for the job because they benefit from operational preparations, such as Pegase. Not every air force can fly its nationals out of a country such as Afghanistan, Niger or Sudan.

It is not only about strategic transport; it is about the combination of the Rafale, the A400M, the A330 MRTT and special forces.

We are fit for the job, and our size is consistent, as the Ministry of Armed Forces has announced the Rafale’s target fleet is increasing by 30 aircraft. We have benefited from a doubling of the defense budget, and we have been able to modernize. Our fighters will evolve to an all-Rafale fleet around 2030-35.

That said, we have learned lessons from the war between Russia and Ukraine. In the 1990s, we gave up on two capabilities because we were not challenged in the air as we could be today. The first one was suppression of enemy air defenses (SEAD), and the next Rafale standard, the F5, will have a SEAD missile against surface-to-air missiles. It will be decisive in access--denial areas.

The second one was EW. We need to recover some capacities in offensive jamming and deception.

In addition, we want to develop uncrewed air vehicles (UAV) with remotely operated weapons, for EW and for saturation of an airspace. As for counterdrone capacities, we deployed some in quite a remarkable way during the Olympic Games in 2024.

On SEAD, what is the timeline? Against short-to-medium-range systems, the AASF future air-to-ground missile is aiming for 2030. Against long-range systems, we are talking about post-2030. MBDA is developing the RJ10 missile. The development’s main focuses are on the homing and targeting systems.

So is that a full-fledged program? It is for after the current military budget programming law, so we will keep pushing. We have specified the targeting and precision performance. We also want to give it a level of resilience against GPS jamming, for the inertial reference system and for the homing system.

What about regaining EW capabilities? Are we talking about a dedicated program? There are several programs at Dassault Aviation, MBDA, Safran, Thales and others. In our own organization, we have reinstated EW in a visible way. We have dedicated officers in operational units, and we have a general in charge of developing EW capacity at our air warfare center. The Rafale F5 will have an upgraded Spectra self-protection system. And we now have the Black Crow exercise, where crews train against electromagnetic defenses.

When you talked about UAVs, were you alluding to remote carriers? Yes, but not only. I am also referring to low-cost UAVs and the entire arsenal, up to the uncrewed combat air vehicle (UCAV) that will accompany the Rafale F5. It will feature capabilities such as stealth, a weapon bay and collaborative combat. Remote carriers will be part of that combat sphere in flight. Then you have low-cost UAVs in the medium--altitude, long-endurance category with electromagnetic, kinetic or observation capabilities. Their role is to wear down adverse defenses and enable the weapon—an expensive one—to reach its target. The combination will enable the mission to be effective.

Can you elaborate on the role of the UCAV flying along with a Rafale F5? It is about having a UCAV in charge of facilitating entry force [the capacity to be the first to enter a disputed area against enemy forces] and possibly the first strike. The Rafale comes just behind, with its own weapons. It can bring along remote carriers with a direct kinetic role.

So it is a major step toward the Future Combat Air System (FCAS)? Yes, a very important one. It will include FCAS bricks. The F5’s collaborative combat capability will enable us to be on time on the FCAS. Some sensors and the evolution of the M88 engine will include technologies the FCAS’ New-Generation Fighter will use.

Is the FCAS program progressing as you expect? It is making progress, of course with the challenges you can encounter when several partners are involved. We want to work on interoperability, especially with other in-devel-op-ment aircraft in the U.S. and the UK, to avoid what happened with the Lockheed Martin F-35. The F-35’s interoperability could be better.

At the government level, NATO has seen ups and downs over the last few months. What have you seen on your end? The activity is unchanged, with excellent synergy at our level. We continue to have the NATO air chiefs conference four times a year, and France will lead the Allied Reaction Force exercise in 2026. With our NATO partners, we have a common legacy, and we share the same vision.

Look at what has been done in preparation for a potential ceasefire in Ukraine and accompanying security guarantees. That would be under a dual France-UK leadership, and we managed to gather 23 nations, outside the NATO framework but with a majority of NATO member states, to discuss those guarantees. When you want to discuss plans at a broader level than NATO, European and NATO air chiefs easily get together.

In space, what are the capacities you would like to add? The militarization of space is a new challenge. It is not just about air and space, in our view. We include the higher airspace, so we are talking about a continuum. Henceforth, an aviator should not just think that Flight Level (FL) 500 [or 50,000 ft.] is the ceiling; they should consider the airspace up to FL 3300 and the space beyond.

I mean, we want to develop capacities in space, as well as from space and toward space, such as overpowering a satellite by jamming or directed--energy weapons. Russia and China already have such anti-satellite arms.

We need such capacities as patrol satellites under the Egide program [preceded by the Yoda demonstrator in geostationary Earth orbit]. Time is of the essence; we want to have such a capacity as soon as possible, even if it is not perfect.

For low Earth orbit, the Toutatis demo is well underway. With the IRIS²program [creating a sovereign EU secure communications constellation], we will need such capacity.

What about higher airspace operations? It is quite new, [and] a bit of a Wild West. We want to be able to do what a U.S. F-22 did when it shot a Chinese balloon. We have done trials, and we are carrying on. Our capacities may include balloons or high-altitude platforms comparable to gliders.

Can you elaborate on the Balman maneuvering balloon program? It is taking years, although it is much less sophisticated than a space launcher or a combat aircraft.

The difficulty is about piloting the balloon at an altitude of 25 km (82,000 ft.). You do not want to let it drift randomly, and then you have to organize the recovery. The next demonstration flight will take place late this year.

What about responsive launches with smaller rockets? Access to space is a major issue, and I very much believe in responsive launches. They will enable us to be faster than our competitor, whether it be for capacity in the higher airspace or space, in a given period or for a specific theater of operations. Right now, we do not have that capacity.

I see a number of projects, and that is a good thing. You have established players [such as ArianeGroup] and startups, and we need both. It is high time we accelerate if we want to use the increasingly crowded low Earth orbit. 

Quelle: AVIATION WEEK