Germany is buying three more Poseidon maritime patrol and anti-submarine aircraft for €1.1 billion bringing the total Marineflieger fleet to eight P-8As.
The aging Orion MPA aircraft, acquired by Germany from the Netherlands in 2006, has been experiencing increasing operational problems. The original plan was to extend the aircraft’s service life, including by repositioning the wings, and put it into service in the 2030s. By then, a joint programme with France called the Maritime Airborne Warfare System (MAWS) was intended to replace both the German P-3C and the French Breguet Atlantique ATL2 MPA.
Berlin therefore saw the purchase of five Poseidon as a “temporary” solution until MAWS became operational and provided additional aircraft. Marineflieger’s total requirement for the MPA component is twelve aircraft. This figure is needed to fully replace all Breguet Atlantique ATL1s that the German Navy was forced to retire in the early 2000s.
A proposal to procure up to seven new Poseidon for Germany received a short-term boost in 2022 following the outbreak of the Ukraine-Russia conflict. Thereafter, Chancellor Scholz proclaimed a “Zeitenwende” (turning point) for defence spending, refocusing Germany on increasing its contribution to NATO, including a one-time $100 billion fund for the purchase of new military equipment.
Nevertheless, the German Navy is unlikely to be able to purchase the full number of aircraft required. Instead, the recently published “Zielbild Marine 2035+” document laid out a requirement, now fulfilled, of eight P-8As for naval aviation.
The addition of three aircraft does not meet the optimal target for Marineflieger, but it will fully recapitalise the existing Orion fleet. Consequently, the original formulation of an “interim” procurement goes from questionable to highly questionable. Integration of the US P-8A into a Franco-German naval warfare system of any nature is hardly possible without US agreement on the relevant technical aspects, not to mention the likely very significant costs of doing so.
With the acquisition of the Poseidon, Germany has already joined a number of other users (the U.K. and Norway) that offer interoperability capabilities in a European context.
Portugal, in contrast, will acquire the remaining six German P-3Cs, including all associated equipment, and will use them to support the operation of its own fleet of five Orion, which it also received from the Netherlands in 2010.
Despite the increase in the P-8A fleet, the German Defence Ministry did stress in a statement today that the Poseidon purchase is a temporary measure. Berlin still intends to work on the MAWS system with France.
However, the extent of such co-operation seems increasingly questionable. Once a full P-8A capability and infrastructure is in place, any attempt to abandon it in favour of a still very uncertain programme looks highly unlikely.
