No, China doesn't act like America, unfortunately. The JF-17 was designed and built when China was a nobody, so it had to put up with silliness like Pakistan buying foreign electronics to stuff in it - what a joke. No longer. China is far from a nobody now, and things are going to be changed. If Pakistan wants to have Turkish targetting pods and German ECM pods and French urine cups in its stealth fighter then it can design and build that stealth fighter on its own.
TFW an American talks to me about sovereign independence and vassalage. Sovereignty, like everything else, has a price; if one is unable to afford that price, then one must settle for less than perfect sovereignty.
lol.. First of all it doesn't infringe anyone's sovereignty at all; pakistan can freely make their own fighter jets. However, if they want cooperation with china, especially if the majority of the techs are also from china, then it's logical for china to get right to say on the project. Imagine it like a common majority shareholder having the most power on decision making on how to run a company ahead of the minority shareholder.
Joint venture agreements are not about logic but what are reflected in the agreement and any actions are grounded on those terms. China provided support to Pakistan not because it was being benevolent. Pakistan fitted into China's strategic interest to offset against India. It is an arrangement that serves each country's interest.
Furthermore, as has been pointed out by other member, you should start looking at the mirror on how western countries, especially the americans, are running their military business. From threatening unrelated economic sanctions to countries (egypt, indonesia just on top of my head, surely there are many more) that are buying russian fighters, to barring fellow nato turkey from the f-35 (they are also originally involved in the JSF development; a further parallel to this topic) for purchasing s-400, and finally going back to pakistan, restricting the usage of the already bought american f-16. It seems to me that buy or no buy you're still screwed when dealing with this 'benevolent superpower'
If you consider china is infringing pakistan' sovereignty and making pakistan a vassal state for merely opting out of the imaginary 5th gen joint development due to pakistan refusal of sticking with chinese techs, what do you think of the relation between your own country and the rest of the western hemisphere with US and its even more coercive behavior? A relation between
slaves and their master?
Yeah and how does this match with your accusation of china infringing on pakistan' sovereignty? With or without the next joint program the relation between china and pakistan is already very close that developing further fighter program just for increasing the ties is very unnecessary, especially if the program is negatively affecting china's personal interest by incorporating a nato member into it. The audacity of you suggesting that this is even remotely possible or equally beneficial to both sides is just astonishing.
I did by simply pointing out that what china could do in the scenario is way less coercive than what the typical norms of dealing with western/nato military business are. 'Dragging' the US into this is absolutely fine since it points out your double standard in observing china's normal behavior. The turkey's f-35 ousting is actually a perfect mirroring of the imaginary scenario that we're discussing (but again with more coercive reaction from the US), yet I doubt you will apply the same accusation you have done to china to the americans.
