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🎬 It’s the year 2040: “A pack of Mitsubishi F-X “Godzilla” next generation fighter jets paired with AI-empowered autonomous UCAVs (unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicles) of the JASDF (Japan Air Self-Defense Force) practice a manned-unmanned teaming operation near Japan’s Mount Fuji.”

The Mitsubishi F-X fighter, nicknamed “Godzilla”, is Japan's next generation (sixth generation) fighter jet that is to be further developed in collaboration with the UK and Italy in what is known as the “Global Combat Air Program (GCAP)”, a merger of the UK’s Tempest program and the Mitsubishi F-X program.

The GCAP is one of three known sixth-generation aircraft programs — the other being the American Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) and the Franco-German-Spanish Future Combat Air System (FCAS), while China may also have a serious sixth generation aircraft program, though no such program has been officially confirmed to exist. After the NGAD program, the GCAP is the most promising, involving some of the biggest and most experienced defense manufacturers in the business, and backed by three major world economies that are also one of the world’s most technologically advanced countries. In other words: on paper GCAP has the best odds to deliver a sixth-generation aircraft that should be able to nearly match the sixth-generation NGAD fighter jets currently being developed in the United States.

And the program has an ambitious timeline, with Japan rumoured to unveil a prototype of the new 6h-generation stealth fighter platform somewhere this year, and large scale production of the F-X slated for 2031, with the future F-X fighter jet expected to replace the JASDF’s existing fleet of 91 MHI F-2 multirole fighter aircraft by 2035.

Description

🎬 It’s the year 2040: “A pack of Mitsubishi F-X “Godzilla” next generation fighter jets paired with AI-empowered autonomous UCAVs (unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicles) of the JASDF (Japan Air Self-Defense Force) practice a manned-unmanned teaming operation near Japan’s Mount Fuji.”

The Mitsubishi F-X fighter, nicknamed “Godzilla”, is Japan's next generation (sixth generation) fighter jet that is to be further developed in collaboration with the UK and Italy in what is known as the “Global Combat Air Program (GCAP)”, a merger of the UK’s Tempest program and the Mitsubishi F-X program.

The GCAP is one of three known sixth-generation aircraft programs — the other being the American Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) and the Franco-German-Spanish Future Combat Air System (FCAS), while China may also have a serious sixth generation aircraft program, though no such program has been officially confirmed to exist. After the NGAD program, the GCAP is the most promising, involving some of the biggest and most experienced defense manufacturers in the business, and backed by three major world economies that are also one of the world’s most technologically advanced countries. In other words: on paper GCAP has the best odds to deliver a sixth-generation aircraft that should be able to nearly match the sixth-generation NGAD fighter jets currently being developed in the United States.

And the program has an ambitious timeline, with Japan rumoured to unveil a prototype of the new 6h-generation stealth fighter platform somewhere this year, and large scale production of the F-X slated for 2031, with the future F-X fighter jet expected to replace the JASDF’s existing fleet of 91 MHI F-2 multirole fighter aircraft by 2035.