Key Points – At the Paris Air Show this week, the CEO of the Eurofighter Typhoon consortium, Jorge Degenhardt, announced plans to increase production from 14 jets per year to 20 or even 30, citing the “total madness” of the current geopolitical situation.
-This move marks a significant reversal for the program, which saw production decline after initial partner nation orders were filled and it failed to secure major export contracts.
-The war in Ukraine has shattered old assumptions about defense procurement, creating an urgent demand for more air power. This production ramp-up reflects a broader European trend of increasing defense output to counter new threats.
Eurofighter Typhoon Is Back
L’aéroporte Le Bourget, Paris – Many years ago, while working for a major defense industrial firm in the US, I had a colleague with a collection of humorous sayings tacked up on the wall of his office. One of my favorites among them, which I will never forget, was, “The problem with engineers is that during moments of stress, they tend to blurt out the truth.”
That anecdote would seem to explain the statements made by the recently-appointed CEO of the Eurofighter Typhoon consortium, Jorge Degenhardt, during a press event here at Le Bourget. The CEO announced that Eurofighter production was now planned to increase from 12 to 20 aircraft per year, potentially up to as many as 30 per year. This increase would be at least partially based on how future sales growth for the twin-engine jet.
When asked later about the decision to potentially almost triple the current production tempo, Degenhardt replied, “the total madness” of the current geopolitical situation to be one of the primary motivations for the ramping up in the assembly of new jets.
The CEO’s statement may have been prompted by a combination of the worse-than-normal frantic pace of activity at this year’s Le Bourget, the pressure that all major weapons makers are now feeling to increase their factory output faster than ever before, and this year’s record unbearable heat.
But the fact remains that with the current US administration’s at times-ambiguous stance concerning NATO and a war in Ukraine that is increasing in intensity by the day, the heat was on at this year’s air show—in more ways than one.
Eurofighter Typhoon: Declining and Expanding Production
For comparison purposes, the peak of Eurofighter production occurred in 2010, with 60 aircraft produced per year. Once the initial deliveries to the consortium’s founding partners in the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, and Spain were completed, the production tempo began to progressively decrease.
The manufacturing numbers then bottomed out at close to 14 aircraft per year by 2023–2024. This rather dramatic decline was due to final deliveries of the Tranche 3 aircraft finally being realized and a dearth of follow-on orders from the original consortium partners.
Additionally, the export orders anticipated for the aircraft in the early 2000s never materialized. Campaigns for major procurements as large as India’s Medium-Multirole Combat Aircraft (M-MRCA) program and as far away as Singapore, Australia, and Japan were unsuccessful. Even smaller purchases by nations in Europe, which is home to the four nations that are the original program partners, have gone to other suppliers.
One forecast from more than six years ago was remarkably prophetic, concluding:
“Eurofighter’s biggest problem at this stage of the program is that the potential market for new heavy twin-engine fighters is limited mostly to a few Persian Gulf states and wealthy Asian nations, many of which have already contracted for advanced fighters and are now out of the market. Each new sale makes securing the next one harder.”
Eurofighter Typhoon: Future Sales and the Pressures of War
“Sales efforts will also be complicated by an expected surge of used Eurofighters onto the secondhand market as partner nations reduce their fighter fleets,” continued the same assessment.
“For example, the UK is planning to retire at least a portion of its Tranche 1 fighters in coming years. These air superiority fighters will be available on the used market, potentially competing with sales of new Typhoons.”
However, the concept that “each sale of a used aircraft is a new aircraft sale now lost” is a standard lament within both the European and US military aerospace communities. This equation is also hardly ever borne out by empirical data. Used aircraft have been employed more than once in history to entice a buyer to a later procurement of new models.
But in the present day, none of this seems to matter as countries are realizing they need more air power rather than less—and they need it as soon as possible.
Nonetheless, sources close to the US firm Lockheed Martin have previously told National Security Journal that there was opposition to sending used F-16s to Ukraine by the Aeronautics Division, specifically for that reason.
“There are those within Aero who are or were against sending second-hand aircraft to the Ukrainians,” said two former company execs. “They are saying ‘we only make money when we sell new aircraft,’ so do not send used ones.”
“But new aircraft take years to be delivered,” said one of the same two execs. “In the meantime, the Ukrainians need something to fly—not something coming six or more years from now.”
As a result of the Ukraine war, the calculus of new versus old fighters is now dramatically increasing Eurofighter Typhoon production—as it is changing many previous assumptions about defense marketing that no longer apply.
In early April, US European Command (EUCOM) commander Gen. Christopher Cavoli announced, “There are more F-16s prepared to be deployed in there [Ukraine]. There are more pilots in the training pipelines,” he said, confirming that as many used models as possible are being sent into the fight.
Given the ferocity with which the war in Ukraine is progressing, these attitudes are not the current-day thinking. Ukraine currently operates not only used F-16s but also second-hand Mirage 2000s, and there is even talk of used Saab JAS-39 C/D model Gripens being donated to Kyiv as well.
Could Eurofighter Fighters someday join the mix—some of the earlier Tranche 1 models?
“With the current pressures on the industry to supply more weapons to both Ukraine and their own domestic customers, almost anything is now possible,” said a European defense executive here at Le Bourget.
About the Author:
Reuben F. Johnson is a survivor of the February 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine and is an Expert on Foreign Military Affairs with the Fundacja im. Kazimierza Pułaskiego in Warsaw. He has been a consultant to the Pentagon, several NATO governments, and the Australian government in the fields of defense technology and weapon systems design. Over the past 30 years he has resided in and reported from Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Brazil, the People’s Republic of China and Australia.
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