The Archange, based mostly on the Dassault Falcon 8X, will exchange the 2 Transall C-160G Gabriel SIGINT plane prematurely divested in Might 2022.
The French Air and Area Drive’s (Armée de l’Air et de l’Espace/FASF) new devoted SIGINT (Indicators Intelligence) plane flew for the primary time on Jul. 25, 2025, from Dassault Aviation’s facility in Bordeaux-Mérignac, sporting a manufacturing unit primer paint. The primary flight of the plane, based mostly on the Dassault Falcon 8X as a part of the Archange program, was introduced by the Minister for the Armed Forces Sébastien Lecornu.
Archange is an acronym for Avion de Renseignement à Cost de Nouvelle Genération, or New Technology Intelligence Plane. Authorised below the Army Programing Legislation for 2024-2030, the Archange program foresees the introduction in service by the FASF of three airframes by 2030.
The brand new platform will exchange the 2 prematurely retired Transall C-160G Gabriel SIGINT plane, which had been divested in Might 2022, three years forward of schedule. The Archange plane might be assigned to the EEA01.054 (Escadron électronique aéroporté/Digital Squadron) “Dunkerque” on the Base Aérienne 105 (BA105), also referred to as Évreux-Fauville Air Base, in northern France.
L’Archange a réalisé son premier vol.
Construit sur la base d’un Falcon 8X de @Dassault_OnAir, modifié pour y intégrer des systèmes de pointes développés par @thalesgroup, notre futur avion de renseignement sera doté de capacités au plus haut customary pour la détection de… pic.twitter.com/i9qX46GBYB
— Sébastien Lecornu (@SebLecornu) July 25, 2025
Lecornu mentioned that French protection main Thales has modified the Dassault 8X and built-in superior techniques. “Our future intelligence plane might be outfitted with top-standard capabilities for detecting communication indicators and radar emissions,” Lecornu wrote in his X submit.
French stories have talked about the plane would meet the foremost functionality hole left behind following the C160G’s divestment, significantly earlier than Russia. The choice, taken in October 2021, left the intelligence companies methods to fill the hole till the substitute was declared operational.
The DGA known as the launch of the Falcon 8X’s flight testing for the Archange undertaking the “fruits of a number of years of collaboration between main producers and the DGA.”
Dassault 10X with CUGE EW payload for Archangel
The French Ministry of the Armed Forces selected Thales to develop the CUGE (Capacité Universelle de Guerre Électronique / Common Digital Warfare Functionality) system in February 2018. On Dec. 30, 2019, a contract was awarded to Thales and Dassault for the primary two Archange plane.
The contract additionally entails coaching, instruction for FASF crews together with in-service help for the three plane.It’s unclear if the DGA has already positioned an order for the third plane.
Dassault mentioned on the time of the contract: “The tri-jet Falcon 8X is the newest addition to the Falcon vary. The enterprise jet model can carry 8 passengers and three crew members over a distance of 6,450 nm (12,000 km). It has digital flight controls which stem immediately from Dassault Aviation’s expertise acquired with the Mirage 2000 and Rafale. It’s outfitted with an EASY digital flight deck and the completely unrivalled FalconEye mixed imaginative and prescient system (CVS).”
The CVS makes use of six fourth-generation multi-sensor cameras to seamlessly mix terrain, impediment, navigation, airport and runway in all-weather, day and night time situations on the HUD (Heads Up Show), explains the corporate.
The Falcon 8X will carry Thales’s CUGE system within the huge ventral bulge below the plane’s chin. The brand new system will permit the FASF to carry out the function of “assortment of ROEM (Electromagnetic Intelligence)” with improved functionality.
“These new applied sciences will allow the system to detect and analyse radar and radar indicators concurrently for the primary time, particularly due to Thales’s multi-polarisation antennas and the usage of its synthetic intelligence applied sciences to automate knowledge processing,” mentioned Thales describing CUGE. “The knowledge collected by the techniques will then be analysed by monitoring and intelligence specialists and fed into armed forces databases.”
Based on Opex360, CUGE “depends on revolutionary applied sciences, resembling multipolarization antennas and synthetic intelligence,” in addition to “very high-level sensors guaranteeing optimum efficiency.” AI helps autonomously determine, and provide jamming and spoofing options by analyzing parameters like pulse width, pulse frequency and spectrum evaluation.
Pour #Thales, le nouveau programme #CUGE viendra renforcer les capacités du renseignement d’origine électromagnétique pic.twitter.com/GycDP4lzOL
— APAT-Thales (@ApatThales) March 5, 2018
Current airborne EW functionality is ‘not sufficient’
France’s present airborne electromagnetic spectrum functionality embody the ASTAC (Tactical Sign Analyzer/Analyseur de signaux tactiques) pod utilized by the Mirage 2000D; the CERES (Capacité de Renseignement Electromagnétique Spatial/Area Electromagnetic Intelligence Functionality) satellites; the Beechcraft 350 ALSR (Gentle Surveillance and Intelligence Plane) for VADOR (Vector Airborne Designation Commentary and Reconnaissance) missions; the ESM (Digital Assist Measures) suite of its 4 E-3F AWACS; and a Saab 340 plane leased as a part of the SOLAR contract.
🇫🇷 Mirage 2000D stationed at Siauliai airbase flew digital reconnaissance mission with ASTAC pod✈️
We’re nonetheless defending the Japanese flank ✈️🇫🇷🇺🇦🌐#aviation #avgeek #adsb #NATO pic.twitter.com/W1XcAn0rDS
— Servez Julien (@ZaFly24) February 22, 2024
These capabilities nevertheless solely “partially fill” the hole left by the Gabriels’ retirement, OpexNews mentioned. There are reported limitations with the CERES satellites, operational since 2021 and meant for monitoring ESM emissions from area, and the ASTAC pods on the Mirage 2000Ds.
Opex360 quoted FASF chief Normal Jérôme Bellanger in a current parliamentary listening to, who mentioned that the SOLAR program’s capabilities had been “a notch beneath” these of the C-160G Gabriel. Nonetheless, he added that the service was nonetheless “flying just a few hundred hours a yr […] even when we’ve issues with the MTI SAR (Shifting Goal Indicator – Artificial Aperture Radar), which we compensate for with the ALSR.”
In feedback to France’s Nationwide Meeting on behalf of the Nationwide Protection and Armed Forces Committee in 2022, French member of parliament Jean-Jacques Ferrara mentioned “ the C160 Gabriel offered a selected functionality, to which satellites or drones can’t be substituted.”
Avec un joli pod d’écoute électromagnétique (ELINT) ASTAC, bien seen sous le ventre du 2000D pic.twitter.com/34UAKtLe0P
— Thomas Eydoux (@EydouxT) Might 12, 2021
Limitations
The Mirage 2000Ds with their ventral ASTAC pods and the ALSR Beechcraft 350 fly a majority of the FASF’s ROEM missions over the Black and the Baltic Seas. The Mirages with the ASTAC pod have been, the truth is, an virtually fixed presence over the Black Sea and have been noticed a number of instances.
The ALSR, operated by the Reconnaissance Squadron (ER) 4/33 on the 709 air base in Cognac-Châteaubernard, gathers COMINT in help of the land forces, and doesn’t collect ELINT. ER 4/33 at the moment operates two ALSRs, with a 3rd slated to be inducted by 2026, based on the FASF.
🇫🇷Dassault Mirage 2000 pic.twitter.com/SYr3YiSUVa
— 360°Radar (@wipljw) February 28, 2025
Based on Thales, the ASTAC pod displays the “electromagnetic setting and tactical digital reconnaissance, a perform together with real-time goal designation capabilities, updating the overall digital scenario and establishing the ‘digital order of battle’.” They’re nevertheless restricted to gathering ELINT/SIGINT at a tactical stage.
The FASF’s E-3F fleet itself is beset with issues just like the E-3 Sentry plane within the U.S. Air Drive, primarily arising from lack of spares within the out-of-production Boeing B707 passenger airliner. In addition to, an AEW&C (Airborne Early Warning and Management) plane with elementary ELINT and ESM capabilities can solely double up in a standoff digital assault perform.
The FASF due to this fact initiated the SOLAR undertaking and leased a Saab 340 plane with an AGOMS (Air Floor Operational Administration System) suite developed by CAE Aviation. The plane was first seen at BA105 Apr. 29, 2024, based on Scramble.
In a Jul. 9, 2025 report, Opex360, quoted Gen. Bellanger’s reasoning that the SOLAR undertaking helped “keep our human assets in airborne ROEM specialists as a result of we couldn’t depart them apart and ‘begin with new weapons’ with the arrival of ARCHANGE.” The objective was to “keep these expertise and make up for the C-160’s retirement,” ensuring that the information and expertise wouldn’t go misplaced till the brand new plane is prepared.
Une nouvelle mission a eu lieu en Mer Noire, nous avons observer une séance de ravitaillement en vol pour le mirage 2000D #CARNAC11 avec l’A330 MRTT #FAF4091 notons la présence de l’Awacs #FAF902 et d’un autre aéronef #TIGER10 alias #FAF7161 pic.twitter.com/n9X760Veh6
— Thierry CUQ (@Th__Cuq) February 27, 2025
C160G Gabriel
The C-160 was produced collectively by the Franco-German ‘Transporter Allianz’ (thus the abbreviation Transall) within the late Nineteen Fifties for each the FASF and the Luftwaffe as a twin-engine tactical cargo plane. The C-160G was a sub-variant of the C-160NG variant, of which two of the roughly 20 plane that the FASF operated had been transformed for the function.
Gabriel was an acronym for Groupement Aérien de Brouillage Recherche Identification Électronique, or Digital Identification Search Jamming Air Group.
The plane had giant antenna blades on the dorsal facet and wingtip pods for the ASTAC (Analyseur de Signaux Tactiques/Tactical Indicators Analyser) system, which detected and situated radio or radar transmissions. A ventral radome, which was prolonged whereas in flight, hosted the EPICEA COMINT system.
The Jul. 9 Opex360 report talked about earlier additional quoted former FASF Maj. Gen. Frédéric Parisot’s Jul. 2022 assertion to the Nationwide Meeting about advancing the C-130G Gabriels’ retirement: “I’m accountable for the shutdown of the Transall ‘Gabriel’ and I settle for accountability for it: ten Transalls value us greater than 80 million euros per yr, for an availability of 20%. Fairly than making cuts elsewhere, I selected to withdraw them from service.”
