A new High Visibility Project for the Airbus A400M was recently announced at the NATO Summit Defence Forum, launched by the governments of:

• Belgium
• Croatia
• France
• Poland
• Spain
• Türkiye
• United Kingdom

This program offers nations the ability to operate Airbus A330 MRTT owned by NATO within a pooling arrangement. This offers benefits like:

• Commonality
• Cost efficiency
• Global interoperability

Key goals of the project include developing an end-to-end solution that fulfills NATO and national requirements and improving operational flexibility in capabilities like:

• Air-to-air refueling
• Disaster relief
• Medical evacuation
• Firefighting

The initiative aims to build upon the Multinational MRTT Fleet (MMF) by offering airlift solutions to European allies and establishing a Multinational Fleet of A400M aircraft.

The new efforts will involve pooling and sharing among nations taking part in the project during various stages, such as:

• Maintenance
• Training support
• Infrastructure
• Procurement

Airbus Defence and Space UK Chairman Ben Bridge said, “The selection of the A400M for this multinational fleet underlines its key strategic airlift capabilities.”

Bridge continued, “With more than 135 aircraft in operation and more than 270,000 flight hours achieved by the global fleet, the A400M has become the backbone of Air Mobility for the largest European NATO countries.”

Bridge added, “With its future capability roadmap, its role will become even more essential for decades to come.”