In just three short years they’d be forcing the nominally most powerful South Asian Air Force to ground itself for two whole days.
Pakistan Military News, Reports, Data, etc.
- Thread starter A.Man
- Start date
In just three short years they’d be forcing the nominally most powerful South Asian Air Force to ground itself for two whole days.
How many JF-17 built in 2025 and if all were Block III? Is there any credible count and type report?
More photographic evidence of meteor on BS-001.
There's no doubt India had Meteor missiles in May 2025. They considered officially lying about that and ran with it for a few weeks before pining on the whole "our ROEs hurt us".
They sent Mig-29s, Su-30MKIs and Rafales tasked with patrol and escort roles within an air to air focused capacity. There were Rafales tasked with firing SCALPs only and there were surely Rafales tasked with air to air escort only.
In India's defense, they were playing a harder position. They had to fly high to maximise the range of their air to ground weapons particularly when they decided to not break through to Pakistani airspace. This forced them to be very visible from very far away. Pakistani fighters were able to loiter low and take shots at the Indians without being seen themselves. It's very easy to terrain mask against IAF by flying near the ground. Indian radars from way up high simply cannot accurately determine the situation.
Perhaps in this sense, India's ROE were indeed to blame. Reverse the positions and J-10CE flown by Pakistan releasing air to ground weapons from high and if you have Rafales terrain masking and shooting from undiscovered positions with the aid of AWACS cuing, I think the same result would eventuate, just reversed. The main miscalculation by India was not breaking through Pakistani airspace and also underestimating effective range of PL-15 and its electronic capabilities. These missiles were likely only realised by India when they became active. Even then PL-15's LPI AESA seekers may not even have alerted the Indians despite being active.
They sent Mig-29s, Su-30MKIs and Rafales tasked with patrol and escort roles within an air to air focused capacity. There were Rafales tasked with firing SCALPs only and there were surely Rafales tasked with air to air escort only.
In India's defense, they were playing a harder position. They had to fly high to maximise the range of their air to ground weapons particularly when they decided to not break through to Pakistani airspace. This forced them to be very visible from very far away. Pakistani fighters were able to loiter low and take shots at the Indians without being seen themselves. It's very easy to terrain mask against IAF by flying near the ground. Indian radars from way up high simply cannot accurately determine the situation.
Perhaps in this sense, India's ROE were indeed to blame. Reverse the positions and J-10CE flown by Pakistan releasing air to ground weapons from high and if you have Rafales terrain masking and shooting from undiscovered positions with the aid of AWACS cuing, I think the same result would eventuate, just reversed. The main miscalculation by India was not breaking through Pakistani airspace and also underestimating effective range of PL-15 and its electronic capabilities. These missiles were likely only realised by India when they became active. Even then PL-15's LPI AESA seekers may not even have alerted the Indians despite being active.
With AWACS in play, terrain masking is basically irrelevant.
With AWACS in play, terrain masking is basically irrelevant. Conditionality, PL-15's were fired at very long ranges so that is only possible if J10's were flying fast and at high altitude as firing from lower altitude would significantly reduces the AAM range. This was no ambush. It was well planned operation, Indians just underestimated PAF & PL-15 (Chinese Weapons doesn't work according to them).
The J-10s had to fly even higher and faster to give their PL-15s enough energy to reach 150+ km, so this excuse doesn't work.
That's not entirely accurate because tracking a low flying object is harder from a high position due to background clutter from the ground behind/beneath it. If the J-10 flew high, enemy airborne radar's return signal is more accurate due to a cleaner sky/horizon background behind the J-10.