Japan Confirms 2035 Timeline for New Sixth-Generation Fighter With UK and Italy.

Japan’s defense leadership has reviewed budget plans and development progress for the Global Combat Air Programme, the next-generation fighter being jointly built with the UK and Italy. The program is shaping how Japan plans to fight for air control in the Western Pacific while reducing reliance on US-only combat aircraft pathways.

According to information published by the Japan Ministry of Defense, on December 26, 2025, Defense Vice-Minister Masahisa Miyazaki convened the 11th Next-Generation Fighter System Development Promotion Committee and received briefings on the FY2026 budget proposal and development progress for Japan’s next-generation fighter, alongside the budget and review status for unmanned aircraft intended to operate in direct coordination with it. Tokyo reaffirmed that Japan, the UK, and Italy will push the program forward as a single fighter system enterprise, with the first operational aircraft still targeted for deployment in FY2035, a schedule that is now shaping both the industrial rhythm and the technical risk-reduction priorities.
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Japan's GCAP fighter combines deep stealth, powerful sensor fusion, and advanced electronic warfare with manned-unmanned teaming, allowing it to control combat drones, employ a wide range of allied weapons, and secure air superiority in highly contested Indo-Pacific environments (Picture source: Army Recognition Group).

The aircraft at the center of the trilateral effort is the Global Combat Air Programme, a merger of Japan’s former F-X ambition with the UK-Italy Tempest pathway. Politically, GCAP has already crossed a threshold Western readers sometimes overlook: it is built on a treaty framework that established a standing international government organisation, with the program headquarters in Britain and a leadership structure deliberately split across the three nations to keep momentum and balance. For Japan, this is also a strategic industrial pivot, moving beyond its traditionally US-centric combat aviation partnerships to lock in sovereign design influence over the platform that will replace the Mitsubishi F-2 in the mid-2030s.

GCAP is being pitched as a sixth-generation class air-superiority platform designed around stealth, supersonic performance, and an onboard mission system that treats data as the primary weapon. UK briefings have highlighted a next-generation radar family able to generate orders of magnitude more information than current fighter sensors, with Leonardo describing its Multi-Function Radio Frequency System concept as producing “over 10,000 times more data” than existing systems, a clue to how aggressively GCAP is leaning into sensor fusion and electronic warfare in the same aperture. That matters tactically because a radar with extreme bandwidth and processing headroom can act as a multi-role emitter, supporting search, targeting, jamming, and communications while complicating an opponent’s passive geolocation efforts.

The operational promise for Japan’s Air Self-Defense Force is not just a cleaner replacement for the F-2, but a new way of fighting for air control in the Western Pacific’s dense missile and sensor environment. GCAP is being engineered to fight as a “system of systems, pairing a crewed stealth fighter with unmanned collaborative aircraft that can extend sensing, carry additional weapons, or absorb risk in the opening hours of a high-end conflict. Program officials have also pushed for a weapons bay architecture that is deliberately permissive, avoiding lock-in to a narrow national inventory. It is a design choice that would let Japan surge compatible stocks in coalition operations while adapting loadouts as cost-per-kill pressures change over time.

Propulsion is emerging as the pacing technology, and Tokyo’s committee-level focus on FY2026 budget and progress tracking reflects that. In September 2025, Rolls-Royce, Avio Aero, and Japan’s IHI announced an expanded, fully integrated partnership to accelerate the GCAP power and propulsion system, building on a new engine demonstrator and shifting from nationally separated contracting to a single consortium model aligned with the program’s industrial prime. Japan’s broader budget narrative reinforces the same emphasis, pointing to continued airframe basic design work alongside detailed engine engineering, with Japanese officials aiming for a first flight around 2030.

Industrial governance is where GCAP is trying to outpace its Western peers. Edgewing, the joint venture bringing together BAE Systems, Leonardo, and Japan Aircraft Industrial Enhancement Co. Ltd., has been launched as the design authority intended to carry the platform beyond 2070, while European regulators have already cleared the structure that will act as prime contractor and lead systems integrator. That maturity contrasts with Europe’s parallel FCAS effort, which continues to experience recurring political and industrial friction over governance and the core fighter pillar. In the US, meanwhile, Washington has moved NGAD into an Engineering and Manufacturing Development phase with Boeing’s F-47 award, setting up a natural comparison: GCAP’s edge is coalition-driven interoperability and exportability, while NGAD is optimized for US-only concepts of employment and scale.

For Japan, the payoff is clear: a stealthy, network-dominant air-superiority fighter designed from inception to command unmanned teammates, integrate broader allied weapons options, and preserve domestic freedom to upgrade sensors, mission software, and electronic warfare without waiting on another nation’s priorities. Tokyo has also loosened export constraints specifically to enable overseas sales of the jointly developed fighter to approved partners, a move meant to improve production volume economics and long-term sustainability. The remaining test is whether trilateral technology transfer and workshare stay politically stable under schedule pressure, an issue already surfacing in European commentary on GCAP cooperation.