When Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida visited London in May, he suggested that the joint efforts of the UK and Japan on a Future Combat Air System could become the "cornerstone" of their bilateral relations. What had started in the mid-2010s as studies of radar technologies and a future air-to-air missile has since expanded into work on demonstrators for engine technologies and advanced radar sensors. And now that cooperation could broaden further, potentially making the UK the key foreign partner for Japan's future crewed combat aircraft for the 2040s, a dramatic pivot away from the U.S. as the collaborator of choice on fighter aircraft. UK Industry officials suggest that Japan's decision to seek a new partner in combat aircraft stems from previous industrial activities, which they say were often "shaped by the pace at which the U.S. side was willing to move." Development of the Mitsubishi F-2 operated with a "high degree of com- mand and control" from the U.S. and "restricted the pace with which the Japanese industry could learn and grow and deliver," the officials say. Membership in the UK-led FCAS- colloquially known as the Tempest- could make the Japanese "essentially equal partners... a developer of the capability, and allow them to bring their own industrial mass to bear," the officials say. The partnership could also bring Japan, along with Italy, to the program's top table. Today, the UK, Japan and Italy are exploring concepts of the core platform-the crewed fighter aircraft that will be at the heart of the FCAS program. Japan and the UK signed a memorandum of cooperation regarding fighter technologies in December. An announcement on the next steps for the Anglo-Japanese partnership could emerge by year-end, but industry is working to rapidly establish partnerships with their counterparts in anticipation of a broader relationship.
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