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as part of the future air combat system (fcas), sweden's saab is working on a supersonic unmanned stealth wingman, and wind tunnel photos have been leaked. the aircraft has no official name yet. the drone seems to be tailor-made for supersonic maneuvers and stealth design. it has a smooth wing-body blend shape, a sharp arrow-shaped front fuselage with small side strips, and a carefully cut polygonal swept wing with a prominent sawtooth shape on the trailing edge, and a large control surface area.

its stealth design has a wedge-shaped air intake located above the front fuselage, and the outward-tilted v-shaped tail is installed on the protruding crossbars on both sides of the rear fuselage. the aircraft does not have a traditional horizontal tail. large weapon bays are installed on both sides of the lower fuselage, and the traditional tricycle-style landing gear can be retracted into the fuselage. according to saab's early computer design models, the aircraft's engine exhaust is completely hidden in the rear fuselage, and the wings do not present complex polygons, but rather a pointed trapezoid. the overall design of this drone is obviously biased towards supersonic air combat missions.

as early as 2020, saab and italy's leonardo wanted to join the uk's team tempest future fighter program to share costs and inject more diverse technological elements into the project. later, team tempest was renamed fcas, and the british tempest fighter prototype also appeared. now the latest name of this project is the global combat air program (gcap), with the goal of developing a true sixth-generation air combat platform in 2035. but in november 2023, saab suddenly withdrew from gcap and seemed to be planning to start anew. this is not surprising, because the swedes have always liked to develop fighters on their own, which has been the case for decades, and saab also has this ability.

non-stealth fighters like the gripen can benefit more from advanced loyal wingman drones than stealth fighters. loyal wingman drones can provide the gripen fighter with the ability to penetrate enemy lines and launch attacks in depth, greatly expand tactical flexibility, and greatly enhance the survivability of the gripen fighter itself. compared with the expensive development of high-performance stealth manned combat aircraft, the cooperation between drones and gripen is more cost-effective, and there is no need to spend a lot of energy to train stealth fighter pilots. for a country like sweden, this is the best solution.

in the foreseeable future, sweden is likely to rely on 60 of the latest gripen e fighters to defend its own airspace. the innovative avionics architecture of the gripen e can quickly accommodate new hardware and software applications to quickly adapt to new missions, which also means that the drone's own avionics system can be quickly integrated with the gripen e's avionics system. in air-to-air combat, the drone's bomb bay should be able to accommodate the relatively large meteor beyond-visual-range air-to-air missiles, and the gripen e can use its own sensors to provide target aiming information to the drone. the drone can also provide target information to the gripen e, and the gripen e can remain electromagnetically silent to avoid exposing itself.

the swedes are quite accomplished in air combat data links. as early as the 1980s, saab's viggen fighter was equipped with data links and participated in the monitoring of the us sr-71 blackbird high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft. for more information about the viggen fighter, please see: nordic raytheon: detailed explanation of the swedish saab ja37 viggen fighter (old article, new post, friends who have already read it don't need to read it again)

it is worth noting that turkey has also displayed a loyal wingman that appears to focus on supersonic maneuverability. the aircraft looks very much like a smaller version of the j-20, but it is not known what manned aircraft it will be paired with.