Ukraine’s €2.5 billion Gripen deal bypasses France

Ukraine’s next fighter jets are set to come not from France, but from Sweden. Kyiv will buy 20 Gripen E/F aircraft from Saab for €2.5 billion, while Sweden will separately donate 16 older Gripen C/D jets worth €1.9 billion. The deal, announced on May 28 at Saab’s Linköping facility, is the largest single weapons purchase financed through EU borrowing. It also sends the money to Stockholm, not to Dassault’s Rafale or the now-collapsed Franco-German FCAS project.

A Grant Dressed as a Loan

The purchase will run through the EU’s Ukraine Support Loan, a €90 billion credit line adopted in February 2026 under enhanced cooperation. That is the EU mechanism used when a group of willing member states wants to move ahead without all 27 on board. Here, 24 countries took part, allowing them to get around Hungary’s veto. Of the total, €60 billion is for military procurement and €30 billion for budget support.

The loan is generous enough to be something else in practice. Ukraine’s finance ministry says the EU will cover all interest payments, while repayment of the principal is tied only to Russian reparations, money that may never materialise. Legally, it remains a loan. Politically, it looks much closer to a grant.

The Commission still keeps control over each weapons purchase before funds are released. Drones are first in line, in June. The Gripen agreement would be the largest transaction by a distance.

FCAS Collapses, Saab Steps In

The timing suits Saab. Two weeks before the Gripen announcement, Airbus Defence chief executive Michael Schöllhorn named Saab as a possible partner for a next-generation European combat aircraft during a speech in Stockholm. FCAS, the Franco-German sixth-generation fighter programme, is effectively finished as a manned aircraft project. Dassault chief executive Éric Trappier ended negotiations with Airbus in April. Airbus is now proposing two separate fighters, one for French needs and one for German ones.

Saab is not arriving cold into German defence. It already has a €1.2 billion contract for its Arexis electronic warfare system on the Eurofighter. What it lacks is combat proof. The Gripen has never been tested in a shooting war. If it performs over Ukraine, Saab’s case to Airbus becomes far harder to dismiss.

Saab chief executive Micael Johansson says there are no formal discussions with Airbus. Even so, the direction of travel is plain enough.

What Hasn’t Been Solved

There is still no signed contract. Sweden’s donation of 16 C/D aircraft depends on the E/F purchase going through. The newer Gripen E uses a General Electric F414 engine, which means every export needs US approval under ITAR, the American International Traffic in Arms Regulations. That approval has not been publicly confirmed.

Production is the other hard limit. Saab builds about 15 Gripens a year and wants to raise that to 20-30. The wider framework covers 100-150 aircraft. Even at maximum output, that is five years of production, assuming other customers wait their turn.

The most important part of the package may not be the aircraft, but the missile. RUSI analyst Justin Bronk argues that Meteor is the only Western air-to-air missile with enough range to threaten Russian Su-34s launching glide bombs from 60-100 km behind the front line. Sweden’s defence minister included Meteor in the weapons package, but its integration on the older C/D aircraft has not been confirmed.

France helps produce the Meteor. Its Rafale also fits EU-origin procurement rules more neatly than a Gripen powered by an American engine. Yet no senior French official has publicly commented on EU money financing a Swedish competitor. Paris spent years building the EU defence instruments now being used. The first major purchase they enable is heading to Stockholm.

Two questions decide whether the deal closes: whether Washington approves the GE engine export, and whether Saab’s single production line can deliver quickly enough.