France is accelerating work on the Rafale F5 standard, bringing forward development of a major new configuration of its combat aircraft at a time when the country’s planned next-generation fighter with Germany has effectively collapsed in its original form. The contracts cover the equipment judged to have the highest technical risk, ahead of the overall development contract for the F5 standard, expected for the end of this year.

The French defense procurement agency, the Direction générale de l’armement (DGA), ordered the first upstream development work for F5 from Dassault Aviation, Thales, MBDA, and Safran. The contracts cover key areas including navigation, datalinks, radar, electronic warfare, and propulsion, laying the groundwork for the next configuration of the Rafale, which is planned to enter service with the French Air and Space Force and the French Navy starting around 2033.

#Commande | Rafale F5

La DGA commande les 1ers travaux en amont du prochain lancement en réalisation du standard F5 du Rafale

Ils concernent notamment :
la centrale inertielle
le moteur
le radar
la suite d’autoprotection de l’avion
pic.twitter.com/n3uhBYqIvi

— Direction générale de l'armement (@DGA) September 9, 2026

The most extensive modernization of the Rafale yet, the F5 standard was originally part of a longer transition toward France’s next-generation combat-air capability. But with the Franco-German New Generation Fighter (NGF) effort now effectively dead in its original configuration, the accelerated F5 program is taking on a much larger strategic role.

Rather than simply keeping the Rafale relevant until NGF arrives, France is now developing a version of the aircraft that is set to carry much of the country’s high-end combat-air capability well into the 2030s and potentially beyond.

The increasingly capable F5 could, in turn, reduce the urgency of finding a replacement for the Rafale — while potentially adding to the fighter’s export appeal. After a slow start, Dassault has recorded export sales of 299 new-build Rafales to eight nations.

The DGA’s contracts engage four of France’s principal combat-aircraft industrial players. Dassault Aviation remains responsible for the aircraft and its overall integration; Thales is involved in major sensor, electronic warfare, and communications capabilities; MBDA is responsible for much of the weapons system; and Safran is responsible for propulsion.

Previous Rafale standards have largely consisted of incremental upgrades, focusing on software and other improvements to the existing aircraft configuration. F5 is notably more extensive, addressing many of the critical systems that determine how the aircraft senses the battlespace, communicates with other platforms, conducts electronic warfare, and generates the power needed to operate increasingly demanding equipment.

The DGA has specifically identified the Thales RBE2-XG radar as one of the major technological advances associated with F5.

The RBE2-XG is expected to feature gallium nitride (GaN) semiconductors. Compared with previous technology, GaN generates less heat and has the capacity to operate at higher voltages, meaning that output power can be increased, while component size can be reduced. Overall, using GaN should help to get more power out of the radar without increasing its size.

According to the DGA, “This new radar will benefit from a substantial increase in power, and consequently in detection range, as well as improvements in the identification of targets with an extremely low radar cross-section (RCS). Its computing capabilities will also be enhanced to facilitate the integration of artificial intelligence.”

The RBE2-XG will also be “designed with collaborative combat in mind, featuring sensors capable of working together without the need for pilot intervention.” It is also planned to have enhanced resilience, including against cyber threats.

France is already working on the concept of a combat drone to accompany the Rafale, with the future F5 standard providing the crewed aircraft around which those systems can operate.

The new radar will be combined with more capable electronic warfare equipment, improved communications and datalinks, expanded processing capacity, and a more capable propulsion system.

To be developed by MBDA and Thales, the forthcoming F5 version of the SPECTRA self-protection suite is intended to significantly improve detection and jamming capabilities, the DGA says, “through a fully digital approach, enabling a complete overhaul of the core electronic warfare system to counter the increasing density and broadening of the threat spectrum, as well as the growing complexity of threat waveforms, expected by 2035.”

Thales will also be responsible for the new Inter-Vehicle Data Link (IVDL) system, described as a “stealthy and resilient datalink.” The DGA says the new datalink will expand connectivity “thanks to a new high-speed, discreet, and jamming-resistant waveform. IVDL will allow the Rafale to penetrate hostile areas where jammers are widespread, while maintaining optimal quality of communication and dialogue between aircraft.”

Safran will begin preliminary design work on the M88 T-Rex engine, which is planned to increase the turbofan’s thrust from around 16,500 pounds to nearly 19,850 pounds, an increase of roughly 20 percent.

In terms of armament, the contract announcement mentions the ASN4G missile, set to be introduced to service by 2035, which will allow the Rafale F5 to continue to serve as the airborne nuclear component. The munition remains in the early stages of development, but it will be capable of hypersonic speeds — defined as speeds greater than Mach 5 — with a range in excess of 1,000 kilometers (621 miles).

Other likely new missiles include a beyond-visual-range air-to-air missile to succeed the current Meteor. As you can read about here, France’s Comet program, apparently led by the French side of MBDA, is already looking into this requirement, with an apparent plan to introduce the weapon around 2030.

An older video from MBDA showing some of the company’s weapons integrated on earlier versions of the Rafale:

For France, the original logic behind the pan-European FCAS program was that Rafale would eventually give way to the NGF as its principal crewed combat aircraft, operating from land bases and aircraft carriers.

With the collapse of the Franco-German effort, France cannot simply wait for a next-generation fighter program whose industrial and political future is uncertain. Instead, the Rafale has to remain capable against rapidly evolving threats throughout the 2030s and beyond.

With the F5 standard, however, France is looking to incorporate some of the concepts envisaged for NGF. These include distributed architectures in which crewed fighters, uncrewed aircraft, remote carriers, missiles, and offboard sensors cooperate across a battlespace.

A highly upgraded Rafale operating as the crewed controller of uncrewed combat aircraft and remote weapons could perform some of the missions that France originally expected from NGF.

For now, F5 also sidesteps the central problem in the now-defunct Franco-German effort: whether the two countries could agree on the requirements, industrial structure, and workshare behind a new-generation combat aircraft.

Despite its advances, the F5 airframe remains derived from a design dating back to the 1980s, which first entered French service in the early 2000s. In particular, it falls well short of fifth-generation designs — let alone sixth-generation ones — in terms of low observability. This is one area where collaborative drones could potentially help compensate for the Rafale’s inherent limitations.

France has therefore bought itself some time with the F5 program. But it may eventually decide that it needs a future high-end crewed fighter to provide capabilities that an upgraded fourth-generation airframe cannot fully replicate, particularly in terms of survivability against advanced integrated air-defense systems, signature reduction, internal weapons carriage, and operations deep inside heavily contested airspace.

On an industrial level, F5 is also significant because it brings together the same French industrial heavyweights that would have formed the backbone of its FCAS effort. Dassault Aviation, Thales, Safran, and MBDA are now well-positioned to work together on whatever comes after F5, whether that is a crewed combat aircraft, uncrewed CCA-type platforms, or a combination of both. Based on its experience with the nEUROn program, France would be well placed to develop a UCAV that can work cooperatively as well as independently, taking over the deeper-penetrating fighter mission set, and potentially skipping a sixth-generation fighter altogether.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frNsu7g7r94

Meanwhile, success with F5 — and, in particular, with the wider combat ecosystem planned around it — could put France in an even stronger position when it comes to any future European fighter project.

For the time being, Britain, Italy, and Japan are pursuing the GCAP/Tempest pathway toward a new combat aircraft. Germany and Spain remain tied to the wider FCAS architecture, even as the original Franco-German NGF arrangement has fractured. Sweden’s position is less clear, with indications that it could collaborate with either France or Germany.

France, for its part, is now investing heavily in an increasingly sophisticated Rafale architecture while maintaining its own sovereign industrial base.

In terms of acqusition, France is expected to pursue a mixed approach, buying new-build Rafales while upgrading suitable aircraft already in service to the F5 standard. The oldest jets are unlikely to receive the full F5 treatment, however.

The irony is that the failure of the NGF effort may ultimately make Rafale F5 more important — and potentially more capable — than it was ever expected to be.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The post France Accelerates Rafale F5 Upgrade After Collapse Of FCAS Next-Gen Fighter Project appeared first on TWZ.

Hermeus is developing an expendable ramjet-powered aircraft, Ramjet-X, which will be air-launched from its reusable, F-16-sized Quarterhorse high-speed drone. The result aims to create a two-vehicle architecture intended to make high-speed flight testing less dependent on expensive, single-use test platforms. That would give Hermeus and potential customers a way to conduct repeated high-Mach flight tests without expending a large booster on every mission.

America didn’t lose ground in high-speed flight because of a lack of ideas. We slowed down because flight tests became too expensive, too rare, and too cautious.

Meet Ramjet-X. Air-launched from the Quarterhorse program, it’s a low-cost, repeatable test vehicle built to fly and… pic.twitter.com/rMed6NhcvD

— Zach Shore (@Zsshore) September 9, 2026

The company unveiled the concept today. Hermeus says the Ramjet-X will be carried beneath Quarterhorse and released at a speed of around Mach 3, at which its ramjet can begin operating. The smaller vehicle will then accelerate, climbing to around 100,000 feet, and a speed in the region of Mach 4. Quarterhorse will then return to base and be available for another mission.

Imagery released by Hermeus shows a Quarterhorse carrying a Ramjet-X mounted on a pylon under each wing, indicating that two different high-speed tests can be carried out in a single sortie. Intriguingly, the Quarterhorse is shown with no fewer than six underwing hardpoints in all, suggesting that other kinds of external payloads are envisaged.

Hermeus has not released detailed performance specifications for Ramjet-X, including its range, payload capacity, or the critical expected cost per flight. We have reached out to the company for more information.

Images released by the company show a relatively compact, missile-like vehicle with delta wings incorporating prominent dihedral. There are no horizontal tail surfaces, but a conventional vertical fin is complemented by a ventral fin. Axios reports that Ramjet-X is approximately 22 feet long and 7 feet wide.

In terms of appearance, and also thanks to its ramjet propulsion system, the vehicle is outwardly very reminiscent of the Lockheed’s D-21 Tagboard supersonic spy drone. However, at more than 40 feet long and with a wingspan of 20 feet, the D-21 was significantly bigger. Overall, the entire concept recalls the Cold War-era D-21 and its M-21 mothership, on a smaller scale.

The basic concept aims to address a longstanding problem with ramjet flight testing. Unlike a conventional jet engine, a ramjet cannot provide useful thrust from a standstill. The vehicle therefore has to be accelerated to a sufficiently high speed before the ramjet can take over.

That acceleration can traditionally require another propulsion system, including an expendable rocket booster. Hermeus is proposing to substitute a reusable aircraft for that initial boost. It is unclear if the Ramjet-X vehicles are similarly recoverable, but we have asked Hermeus for more details here, too.

As it stands, flight-test programs of this kind are often constrained not only by the cost and availability of test infrastructure, but also by the limited availability of suitable airspace and range access. A reusable carrier aircraft could help address both challenges, allowing multiple Ramjet-X vehicles to be deployed from airports near a designated test range as required and launched only once the vehicle is within the approved test area. That flexibility could reduce the need for a new large booster for every experiment while also making it easier to conduct tests, including at shorter notice, within increasingly constrained airspace.

Hermeus says Ramjet-X is being designed not just for its own development work but as a potential test platform for outside customers. The company is calling the concept “Flight Test as a Service,” with customers able to fly payloads including sensors, communications equipment, computing and autonomy systems, materials, and propulsion hardware.

The program reflects a broader push toward increasing the availability of commercial high-speed flight testing that has attracted U.S. government interest.

Hermeus was also selected by the Defense Innovation Unit for work under its Hypersonic and High-Cadence Airborne Testing, or HyCAT, effort. That program is intended to use commercial flight-test capabilities to expand the government’s access to relevant high-speed environments.

The company is also pursuing its own increasingly ambitious Quarterhorse aircraft. Its Quarterhorse Mk 2.1 completed an uncrewed supersonic flight earlier this year, reaching Mach 1.21 on its third test flight. The company’s roadmap calls for subsequent Quarterhorse variants to progressively increase speed and address the thermal and propulsion challenges associated with high-Mach flight.

Supersonic. Mach 1.21.

Quarterhorse Mk 2.1 is now the world’s first privately developed, unmanned supersonic jet and the fastest unmanned aircraft flying today.

This flight makes Hermeus the fastest company in aviation history to go from founding to supersonic flight – exactly… pic.twitter.com/wjoIcdiEOj

— Hermeus (@hermeuscorp) May 26, 2026

The imagery released for Ramjet-X shows a different Quarterhorse configuration than the 2.1 version, including beefed-up landing gear with twin nosewheels. The requirement for release of the Ramjet-X at Mach 3 suggests that its launch platform will be the Quarterhorse Mk 2.3, which will be the first to reach this kind of speed. This summer, Hermeus confirmed that its second supersonic aircraft, the Quarterhorse Mk 2.2, and the Mach 3-capable Mk 2.3 aircraft were under construction.

For its future Quarterhorse Mk 3, Hermeus has been developing Chimera, a turbine-based combined-cycle propulsion system. This is intended to transition from turbine operation to ramjet operation as speed increases.

Ramjet-X effectively separates part of that problem into another aircraft and the system could also be useful for experiments that do not require an entire hypersonic aircraft.

For example, an organization developing a high-temperature material might need to know how it behaves in an actual high-speed flight environment, rather than only in a ground test. The same could apply to weapons, sensors, communications systems, guidance hardware, onboard computers, or other components intended for high-speed vehicles.

So far, however, it’s not clear what kind of flight profiles Ramjet-X will provide. Hermeus has mentioned a cruise phase lasting “tens of minutes.”

But a short-duration dash through a high-Mach regime is not equivalent to sustained flight at those speeds. The duration available to an experiment, thermal loads, acceleration, vibration, available electrical power, telemetry, maneuverability, and payload mass will all determine what can actually be tested.

The company says it is already testing the Ramjet-X propulsion system at its High Enthalpy Air-Breathing Test facility in Jacksonville, Florida. High-temperature structures are also under development at its El Segundo, California, headquarters. Integrated vehicle testing is currently planned for 2027.

The HEAT facility itself is part of Hermeus’ effort to establish high-speed propulsion test infrastructure. The company says the facility is being developed to eventually provide continuous high-Mach airflow for more flight-like ground testing.

Ramjet-X has yet to fly, but if it performs as intended, it could help lower one of the major barriers to obtaining real-world flight data at high Mach numbers. At the same time, the company is entering a market that is attracting growing interest from other aerospace firms, which are also expanding their high-speed flight-test capabilities, especially to capitalize on the broader hypersonics boom, including Stratolaunch.

There is fairly clear potential weaponization of this concept, for strike and surveillance missions, as well, although there has been no indication of that being in the works at this time.

The planned 2027 integrated testing should provide the first meaningful indication of whether the concept can progress to become a practical high-speed test capability.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The post Hermeus Unveils Air-Launched Ramjet Test Vehicle for High-Speed Experiments appeared first on TWZ.

General Atomics has given us the first look at its new Wildfire drone design. The company is developing this armed medium-altitude, long-endurance (MALE) uncrewed aircraft in response to new U.S. Air Force requirements for a lower-cost successor to the MQ-9A Reaper.

A rendering of Wildfire was included in a video montage, seen below, which General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. division (GA-ASI) released earlier today. GA-ASI first announced work on this new drone last month. The Air Force, in partnership with the Pentagon’s Defense Innovation Unit (DIU), formally kicked off its new search for a Reaper successor, currently called the Massed Modular Aircraft (MMA), in July. GA-ASI also developed the MQ-9A, which is now out of production.

A good idea spreads like Wildfire.#UAS #Airpower pic.twitter.com/eIONVDjZ1n

— General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc (GA-ASI) (@GenAtomics_ASI) September 9, 2026

Wildfire’s pusher-prop design shown is clearly an extension of the existing MQ-9 family, with an overall planform that is extremely similar to that of the Reaper. Like the latest versions of the MQ-9A, the new drone has a sensor turret under the nose and a large blade antenna under the rear fuselage.

Wildfire does notably lack the Reaper’s distinctive hump on top of the forward fuselage. On the MQ-9A, this feature contains the drone’s satellite communications (SATCOM) antenna. What this might mean about how Wildfire is controlled and otherwise communicates is not immediately clear, but it points to the use of a smaller, lower-cost SATCOM terminal. That, in turn, would most likely be tied to a network like Starshield, the government-focused cousin of SpaceX’s Starlink. We could also see greater semi-autonomous control here, or at least a greater reliance on it.

The resulting shape of the forward end of the fuselage is vaguely reminiscent of GA-ASI’s Gnat series of drones from the 1990s, which evolved into the iconic Predator. The MQ-9 family, in turn, is an outgrowth of the Predator.

The rendering of Wildfire also depicts the drone armed with four Joint Strike Missile (JSM) cruise missiles, with two loaded on what appears to be a single pylon under each wing. The stealthy JSM can be employed as an anti-ship or land-attack weapon. GA-ASI has released renderings of MQ-9s in the past with similar loadouts. The Air Force is already acquiring stocks of JSMs, primarily to arm its F-35A Joint Strike Fighters. Stand-off munitions like the JSM have long been seen as an increasingly important, if not critical, addition to the non-stealth Reaper’s arsenal, helping to keep the drones further away from potential threats.

TWZ has reached out to General Atomics for more details.

“General Atomics is looking at it and asking ourselves, ‘What can we really do? No kidding, no BS, actually do,’” GA-ASI spokesperson C. Mark Brinkley did tell us back in August when asked about Wildfire. “Let’s be honest with ourselves first. How do we come out of the box, day one, with a 10,000-nautical-mile ferry range? Can we carry four LRASMs [AGM-158C Long Range Anti-Ship Missiles]? Can we swarm 100 aircraft under semi-autonomous control? Can we fuse all of that data into a highly effective common operating picture? Can we do that at scalable, affordable mass?”

“So that was the assignment, and our engineers sharpened their pencils and got to work,” he added. “What came out the other side was our new Wildfire UAS. That thing is a beast, and no one who actually does this for a living, and is honestly concerned about America’s warfighting edge, can look at it and not want 100 of them as fast as we can make them.”

Wildfire “addresses all of the concerns posed by the MMA solicitation. We can deliver years earlier and maintain the same high quality. You can have everything that makes Reaper special, plus more, at a price that doesn’t break the bank,” Brinkley also told Breaking Defense for a story published last week.

In terms of what the Air Force has said it is looking for with the MMA, as we have previously written:

“[The service] …wants the MMA drone to perform the same general intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) and strike missions as the MQ-9A. To that end, stated program requirements to date include a speed of at least 200 knots true airspeed, a munition and sensor payload capacity of at least 2,800 pounds, an unrefueled combat radius of at least 2,300 nautical miles with payload, the ability to self-deploy one-way at least 8,000 nautical miles, and the ability to operate from runways no longer than 6,000 feet. The MMAs also need to be highly modular and use open architecture mission systems to make it easier to integrate new capabilities and functionality down the line.”

The Air Force also shared last week that it is targeting a roughly $10 million unit cost for the MMA drones, not including sensors and certain other systems. As mentioned, the Reaper is out of production, but the price tag on a fully-equipped Reaper today is widely reported to be between $30 million and $50 million. The Air Force has itself used the $50 million figure as a reference point in discussing its latest plans for what comes after the MQ-9.

It is unclear how Wildfire might achieve this cost goal while retaining so much obvious Reaper DNA, but even a major 30 to 50 percent reduction in the price tag compared to its predecessor would be a huge deal. In the past, General Atomics’ Brinkley has openly questioned just how cheap an MMA drone could realistically be while still offering comparable capabilities to MQ-9.

The original timeline for the MMA program envisioned the Air Force reaching initial operational capability in 2031 after receiving 20 of the drones. The service is now looking to accelerate that schedule by around two years. The Air Force expects to eventually acquire around 180 MMAs.

The Air Force has tried, without success, to develop a successor to the MQ-9 on several occasions in the past. However, a key driving factor now is huge losses of Reapers in the course of the ongoing conflict against Iran. The service’s MQ-9 fleet has already shrunk dramatically in recent years, in part due to additional losses during operations targeting Iranian-backed Houthi militants in Yemen last year.

“Although we have plenty of MQ-9As today, we are going through them at a rate that is concerning to us,” Air Force Lt. Gen. Christopher Niemi, the service’s Chief Modernization Officer, told reporters at a roundtable at the Pentagon last week, according to Air & Space Forces Magazine. “There’s not a lot of good options to immediately replace those aircraft.”

GA-ASI has long had a monopoly on MALE combat drone sales in the United States, and is clearly looking to extend that now with Wildfire. However, this market space has been expanding, and other companies are already competing for what could be a very lucrative new deal with the Air Force. Winning the MMA contract could open doors to opportunities elsewhere within the U.S. government and with foreign countries. Variants and derivatives of the MQ-9 are also in service today with the U.S. Marine Corps, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and several additional air arms globally.

More information about Wildfire, as well as its competitors, is only likely to continue emerging as the Air Force pushes ahead with new and aggressive plans to finally acquire a follow-on drone to the venerable Reaper.

Update: 2:15 PM ET –

General Atomics spokesperson C. Mark Brinkley has now shared additional details about Wildfire with TWZ.

“You’re not imagining it. These new Wildfire renders do lack the dorsal hump you see on Reaper, MQ-9B, Gray Eagle, Mojave STOL and many copycat aircraft,” Brinkley explained. “General Atomics has pushed proliferated low-earth orbit controls onto many of our existing aircraft and pioneered that integration across unmanned aerospace. That is a relatively new technology that we already have great experience integrating, and it makes sense to bring that into Wildfire.”

“Proliferated low-earth orbit” (abbreviated variously as pLEO and P-LEO) refers to distributed constellations of hundreds or potentially thousands of satellites in that orbital region. SpaceX’s constellations supporting the aforementioned Starlink/Starshield networks fall into this general category.

“Wildfire is going to leverage ongoing advancements in autonomy on Day One. We envision networking dozens of Wildfires for true combat mass,” according to Brinkley. “Again, not a hypothetical. We’ve been pioneering many advancements in autonomy, AI, and machine learning across the FQ-42A program and using our own MQ-20 Avenger as a CCA [Collaborative Combat Aircraft] surrogate connected to F-22 and F-35. That’s proven, not concept.”

The FQ-42A, also known as the Dark Merlin, is one of two designs now in development under the first phase, or Increment 1, of the Air Force’s CCA program, the other being Anduril’s FQ-44A Fury. The service announced in June that its initial CCA force would be a mixed fleet of FQ-42As and FQ-44As.

“Four JSMs tells you something about Wildfire overall. We can’t just look at overall external weight limits. You have to consider individual hardpoint capacity,” Brinkley continued. “We’ve concepted four JSMs on MQ-9B before, as a concept, but we’ve never done that on Reaper. Wildfire can absolutely do that, from a hardpoint capacity and also an overall MGTOW [maximum gross takeoff weight] perspective.”

“We’re showing two LRASMs on Wildfire, which is twice as much as the DIU solicitation asked for. If you’re going to build a flying weapons truck, give it some teeth,” he added. “These longer-range missiles also give you increased standoff compared to other weapons you associate with the MQ-9, so that also gives you some flexibility. Wildfire can carry two LRASMs for meaningful combat distances.”

The AGM-158C LRASM (Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile) is a derivative of the AGM-158 Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM) family of land-attack cruise missiles, and is also in the Air Force’s inventory today.

Brinkley also said that Wildfire’s ferry range will exceed the MMA’s target of 8,000 nautical miles.

“We can deliver way ahead of the original FY 2031 schedule [for MMA]. We can deliver more than twice as many aircraft as requested in the same amount of time, because our manufacturing is real. Our network of suppliers, subcontractors and partners is real,” he added. “The obvious question is always cost, and I struggle to discuss costs because no one ever wants to compare apples to apples. There are stated price targets out there, and we’ll hit those. We’ll do it with an aircraft you can trust. We have nearly 10 million flight hours and more than 1,600 aircraft delivered. This is what we do.”

Speaking more generally, Brinkley also highlighted General Atomics’ extensive experience in developing and producing armed MALE drones, including the MQ-9.

“It’s important to remember that Reaper made its first flight 25 years ago and was so far ahead of everything else that it still defines the entire category of medium-altitude, long-endurance strike aircraft worldwide. When you build something new to do this kind of work, it rolls out into the Reaper’s shadow,” he said. “I don’t have to defend MQ-9 because the track record speaks for itself. It’s been called the MVP of Epic Fury [the U.S. military’s nickname for the initial phase of operations against Iran this year] for good reason, and I think it has squashed all questions about the relevance of MALE ISR and strike.”

“So that brings us to questions of affordability versus attrition, cost-per-effect, and the true price of combat operations. It also brings up questions of reliability and mission availability, and Reaper excels at both of these, so you can’t replace it with junk and expect to get the same effects,” he continued. “That’s where Wildfire comes in. Our team went to the graph paper and started sketching out what they would do differently and what they would keep the same. Where are the tradeoffs, and what do you change? No one knows this category of aircraft and missions like we do. We’re not guessing and hoping.”

“I can’t get into deep specifics on Wildfire yet, because it’s too early for that and the goalposts seem to move every time I say something publicly. What I can say is that Wildfire takes all of the known quantities of Reaper, blends them with some cutting-edge technologies and manufacturing advancements, and incorporates our more than three decades of lessons learned about large, unmanned combat aircraft to drive cost-per-effect math down.”

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

The post First Look At General Atomics’ Wildfire, Its Successor To The MQ-9 Reaper (Updated) appeared first on TWZ.

New imagery appearing out of China provides the best look yet at one of the country’s most enigmatic aircraft: the very large, low-observable, flying-wing drone widely referred to as the WZ-X. Seen previously primarily in satellite imagery, TWZ broke the story of the existence of this monster high-altitude, long-endurance drone. The new views that emerged today help clear up one of the most puzzling aspects of the aircraft’s appearance, namely the unusual shape of its enormous wings.

The aircraft was first identified in satellite imagery collected in May 2025 showing the People’s Liberation Army Air Force’s (PLAAF) sprawling test facility at Malan in Xinjiang. At the time, it was difficult to determine whether some of the apparent discontinuities in the wing planform were genuine features, visual countermeasures, or artifacts of the imagery.

The new photograph, seen at the top of the article and below, as well as a new satellite image, shows that the aircraft has a broader-chord inner wing section that transitions into a substantially narrower outer section. Rather than tapering continuously from the center section toward the tips, the wing effectively becomes much more slender over its outer portion in a ‘step down’-like fashion. The resulting planform gives the aircraft an exceptionally long, narrow outer wing. The wing arrangement differs from the B-2 and other stealthy flying wing designs because it has two outer wing sections, in addition to its diamond-like central fuselage, instead of just one.

We still can’t say for sure if this feature is just the way the aircraft’s wing was designed or if it also is due to some other exotic feature, such as wing folding or removable outboard sections. While a more novel explanation is possible, it is somewhat improbable at this point.

Seen from behind, the aircraft has a relatively shallow central fuselage section, with extremely long wings extending outward from it. The landing gear is extended, revealing large main undercarriage doors and substantial landing gear consistent with an aircraft of this size. Split rudders are visible toward the outer wing areas, broadly reminiscent of those used on the B-2.

As in previous imagery, the rear of the center section of the aircraft may also reveal slot-like exhaust openings, supporting the assessment that it is twin-engined.

For an aircraft intended to spend long periods operating at high altitude, a very long overall span combined with a relatively narrow outer wing could be advantageous. Such an arrangement would increase effective aspect ratio and reduce induced drag during efficient cruise, potentially improving endurance and high-altitude performance.

It may also allow the designers to concentrate structural mass and internal volume closer to the center of the aircraft while still achieving a very large span.

There is a potential low-observable tradeoff, however. A significant change in chord introduces additional planform geometry and potential edge-alignment discontinuities that must be reconciled with the requirements of a stealth aircraft. The transition will influence radar reflections depending on its precise shape, orientation, and relationship to the aircraft’s other edges and surfaces. This will also be highly dependent on the aspect the radar is viewing the aircraft from. Modern very low observable designs try to minimize these exact types of features, with large continuous structures being the most advantageous to radar signature. This philosophy can be seen in the design of the B-21’s planform, which was also how the B-2 was supposed to look originally. You can read all about this here.

Regardless, the WZ-X does indeed have a semi-sawtooth trailing edge due to this intriguing feature.

The overall scale of the aircraft is also becoming increasingly apparent. Our initial analysis of satellite imagery put its wingspan at approximately 170 feet, roughly comparable to the 172-foot span of the B-2. That would make it considerably larger than other Chinese flying-wing drones identified to date.

Andreas Rupprecht, an analyst specializing in Chinese military aviation and TWZ contributor, assesses that the WZ-X is likely a twin-engined design similar in configuration to the supposed U.S. RQ-180, but considerably larger.

Rupprecht estimates a length of approximately 46 feet. He also assesses the aircraft as having a relatively spacious central fuselage and a dorsal satellite communications antenna. His estimates of a range exceeding 12,000 miles and a normal cruising altitude of somewhere between 59,000 and 66,000 feet remain unconfirmed.

The WZ-X is notably different from China’s smaller flying-wing designs. The CH-7, for example, has a deeper and more curved center section and is substantially smaller. The WZ-X’s broad, relatively flattened center body and enormous span instead appear particularly compatible with high-altitude endurance.

Its apparent configuration also makes a long-duration surveillance mission plausible. The central body and inner wing section would provide substantial space for fuel, sensors, and communications systems, while the outer wing, combined with its lifting central body, could support highly efficient flight at high altitude.

A low-observable platform of this size could potentially conduct many types of wide-area surveillance and networking assistance while operating in or very near contested airspace where conventional high-altitude UAVs would face greater risks. A strike capability cannot be ruled out, particularly given China’s broader development of combat-capable flying-wing UCAVs, but the aircraft’s proportions appear especially well suited to persistence and reconnaissance.

While the location of the latest imagery is unconfirmed, Malan has developed into a massive center for Chinese drone testing, with satellite imagery showing extensive expansion of its infrastructure in recent years. The facility has been associated with multiple flying-wing designs, including the WZ-X and the similarly mysterious and also very large GJ-X. This substantially different flying-wing aircraft with a cranked-kite planform is also undergoing flight testing. That aircraft is estimated to have a wingspan of around 137 feet, underscoring the breadth of China’s experimentation with large low-observable uncrewed aircraft.

China is pursuing tailless/flying-wing designs across an increasingly wide range of sizes and missions, alongside larger crewed aircraft programs including the J-36 and J-XDS and, eventually, the H-20 stealth bomber.

The WZ-X appears to be part of a much broader effort to develop highly integrated, low-observable aircraft optimized for different combinations of range, endurance, payload, and survivability.

For now, its official designation, manufacturer, propulsion system, performance, and intended mission remain unknown.

However, its configuration appears well suited to the requirements of a very large high-altitude endurance aircraft, although the trade-off between its performance and its stealth characteristics remains equally mysterious.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

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The U.S. Navy’s newest stated requirements for its Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) effort point toward a drone that sounds very much like an advanced uncrewed combat air vehicle (UCAV), rather than a smaller and less capable autonomous ‘loyal wingman’ intended to economically augment crewed fighters. Overall, the new requirements serve as a tacit admission that the Navy is still looking for the kind of drone that it previously explored with extreme promise in the X-47B and Unmanned Carrier-Launched Airborne Surveillance and Strike (UCLASS) program. The UCLASS requirements were abruptly shelved and replaced with an uncrewed carrier-based tanker effort, which resulted in the MQ-25 Stingray. This act was seen by some as one of the most controversial and puzzling procurement decisions in modern naval aviation history.

The traditional loyal wingman or CCA concept generally envisions uncrewed ‘fighter’ aircraft whose primary purpose is to complement crewed companions. This typically involves extending the crewed platform’s sensor reach, carrying additional weapons, and opening up a greatly expanded tactics playbook. An advanced UCAV, by contrast, is fundamentally an independent combat aircraft in its own right, designed to deliver weapons and other effects similar to what a crewed platform can provide without requiring a crew onboard or nearby. As such, it is more capable, survivable, and an overall ‘exquisite’ asset with a heavier payload, more capable of taking the place of a crewed aircraft in certain roles, rather than augmenting them, although there is nothing keeping them from working in a loyal wingman type role if required.

Yesterday, Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) released a new Request for Information (RFI) that lays out an unusually demanding set of requirements for a CCA Increment 1 prototype. Among other things, the Navy wants an aircraft capable of operating from its aircraft carriers, carrying plentiful weapons, conducting strike missions in highly contested environments, and operating both independently and as part of a larger crewed-uncrewed team.

The combination of these requirements provides a much clearer picture of what the Navy wants its future carrier-based combat drones to be capable of.

Perhaps the most striking requirement concerns weapons carriage. The Navy says the Increment 1 CCA must have the ability to carry four externally mounted weapons weighing up to 2,500 pounds each throughout the target flight envelope and during carrier certification activities. That equates to a potential external weapons load of 10,000 pounds, although it should not necessarily be interpreted as the aircraft’s normal operational configuration. By way of comparison, a very heavily loaded F/A-18E/F Super Hornet might launch with close to 17,000 pounds of weapons and stores — though that is far from common.

Meanwhile, the kinds of drones that the U.S. Air Force is currently exploring under its own separate CCA Increment 1 effort, namely the General Atomics YFQ-42A Dark Merlin and Anduril YFQ-44A Fury, are air-to-air optimized. Their primary loadout is widely expected to be a pair of AIM-120 AMRAAM missiles, which is just a fraction of the Navy’s newly stated payload requirement.

The RFI NAVAIR put out yesterday also specifically asks respondents to address internal weapons carriage, with both capacity and survivability among the factors the Navy will consider. Internal stores carriage would offer obvious advantages in reducing an aircraft’s radar signature and preserving aerodynamic performance.

The Navy also wants the aircraft to have a substantial combat radius while carrying its required weapons load, as well as the ability to spend at least 30 minutes on station while retaining sufficient fuel reserves to return to the carrier.

For a CCA, carrier operations add another layer of complexity. The aircraft must be capable of catapult launches and arrested landings from both Ford and Nimitz class carriers, while operating within existing carrier deck, elevator, hangar, and support constraints.

Autonomy is similarly central to the concept. The Navy wants mission and flight autonomy that can support the aircraft from launch through recovery, along with the ability to incorporate third-party mission software. The prototype is also expected to demonstrate both individual and multi-aircraft autonomous operations. While crewed-uncrewed teaming is a fundamental part of the concept, the latest requirements make it clear that the aircraft will not depend on a crewed aircraft continuously supervising its actions.

The video below from Collins Aerospace offers a notional look at what crewed-uncrewed teaming involving carrier- and land-based CCA-type drones might look like in the future.

In terms of the survivability requirement, the Navy specifically wants the aircraft to operate in highly contested environments and is asking industry to provide approaches for assessing and managing survivability during collaborative operations. The consideration of internal weapons carriage is another indication that signature reduction and survivability are important design considerations, pointing to a low-observable (stealthy) platform.

All of this begins to blur the distinction between the Navy’s Increment 1 CCA plan and a traditional survivable UCAV concept.

That does not necessarily mean the Navy is abandoning the CCA concept entirely in favor of resurrecting the carrier-based UCAV concept. Rather, it suggests that the distinction between the two becomes blurred as requirements overlap. There also remains the strong possibility (or more likely probability) that the Navy will seek to explore CCA designs closer to what the Air Force, as well as the U.S. Marine Corps, are pursuing. This could potentially include development of carrier-based versions of one or more of those designs under a future increment.

The new RFI is also consistent with the Navy’s broader Air Wing of the Future effort (AWOTF).

An earlier NAVAIR sources-sought notice released in July outlined an expansive vision for future carrier-based uncrewed aircraft covering missions including surface warfare; strike warfare; anti-submarine warfare; air warfare; electronic warfare; intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance and targeting (ISR&T); mobility; and logistics. That notice also pointed toward aircraft capable of attacking targets at least 1,000 nautical miles from the carrier without requiring aerial refueling, while leaving open the possibility of extending that reach with tankers.

Intriguingly, the new RFI does not include an explicit maximum range target, but based on the payload requirements alone, this would be very considerable, reflecting the Navy’s concerns about fighting a future conflict across the vast distances of the Pacific. Traditional advanced UCAVs usually have a combat radius measured in thousands of miles, not hundreds, far exceeding the reach of their crewed fighter counterparts.

Whatever the possible range target, the planned weapons load also points to a substantial airframe. Indeed, the deck-space requirement outlined in the RFI is relevant here. The CCA’s “spot factor” cannot exceed that of an existing fourth-generation fighter, meaning that it could potentially be as large as an F/A-18E/F.

Otherwise, however, the latest CCA Increment 1 RFI is considerably more concrete.

The Navy wants a first flight of a prototype within 24 months of a contract award and carrier certification during a three-year development effort. It also wants a path toward an affordability target of around $30 million per aircraft. This kind of price point would put it at the top end of the CCA concepts we have seen so far, and is fairly ambitious for a higher-end UCAV.

Navy officials said in 2024 that the CCA’s unit cost target was around $15 million, reflecting the idea that the aircraft would be sufficiently inexpensive to be expendable under some circumstances. The new RFI instead asks industry to outline a path toward an affordability target of $30 million per aircraft. That is still a fraction of the cost of a modern carrier-based fighter, but it suggests the Navy is willing to pay considerably more for an aircraft with substantially greater weapons capacity, range, autonomy, and survivability.

As to the companies that might respond to the RFI, in August of last year, the Navy confirmed that Anduril, Boeing, General Atomics, and Northrop Grumman were all on contract for “conceptual” CCA designs. At that time, the service also said Lockheed Martin had been hired to work on a common control architecture for the drones. Lockheed Martin is already the prime contractor for the control stations and associated software the service is integrating onto its carriers now to support the MQ-25.

The new RFI, however, marks a shift from the conceptual studies described last year toward a specific prototype effort. The Navy is seeking industry input as it shapes the acquisition strategy, with responses due September 18.

In the past, the Navy has said it is aiming for the total makeup of carrier air wings to eventually be 60 percent or more uncrewed, although the precise balance is still to be determined and will certainly be informed by the lessons of Navy CCA Increment 1. Exactly how the CCA might fit in with the Navy’s sixth-generation crewed fighter – known as F/A-XX – is another intriguing prospect, but would clearly be optimized to work alongside that platform.

Now, back to the Navy’s earlier effort to develop a high-end, stealthy, carrier-based UCAV capability. Northrop Grumman built two X-47B demonstrators for that program, both of which underwent extensive flight testing, including carrier operations and aerial refueling. The aircraft flew from 2011 for around half a decade. As of 2022, both X-47Bs had been earmarked for eventual public display at museums.

The two X-47Bs had offered far more than a glimpse of what a carrier-based UCAV capability might look like, and the base design was set to evolve into an operational type. These were large, stealthy UCAVs with thousands of pounds of payload and endurance that far outstripped crewed naval fighter aircraft. The follow-on UCLASS program aimed to see the capabilities the X-47 demonstrated put into operation via a new aircraft procurement effort. However, it transformed into the radically different, less ambitious, tanker-focused Carrier-Based Aerial-Refueling System (CBARS) program in the mid-2010s. This, as noted, led to the MQ-25 Stingray.

To this day, the cancellation of UCLASS remains a very sore spot and is widely seen as a nearsighted and even reckless decision. This mirrored earlier moves by the USAF, which had demonstrated how revolutionary UCAV capabilities could be, only to entirely walk away from the concept. In fact, that service went even further, appearing to erase those developments from recent memory. You can read all about this bizarre and troubling inflection point in American air power history and the glaring questions surrounding it in this past feature.

Fast forward to today, and the Navy is getting the MQ-25, which is primarily a tanker, but clearly, that was not the only mission set that influenced its exotic design. In fact, these Navy requirements could open the door for the Stingray platform to potentially fulfill at least parts of the Navy uncrewed combat drone role in a ‘cleaned-up,’ stealthier configuration, something we have explored in depth in the past.

Overall, the takeaway here is that the Navy’s latest CCA requirements raise the intriguing possibility that its earlier UCAV ambitions are resurfacing, this time under the CCA banner. This is happening as China is moving very quickly with its own stealthy UCAVs, a number of which are in testing, and one of which is very mature and is navalized for shipboard operations – the GJ-11 Sharp Sword. The GJ-11 sounds very similar to the Navy’s requirements wish list, including its ability to act independently and teamed with crewed counterparts, as well as its general size and need for survivability.

While an RFI only represents an early part of the contracting process, in practical terms, it looks like the Navy is asking whether industry can finally make good on the past promise of a U.S. Navy UCAV.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

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