KIEV, UKRAINE: The latest conflict between India and Pakistan lasted a few days, but has already gone down in history as one of the greatest air battles of our time, attracting a great deal of attention from defense analysts throughout the world, wrote Ukraine’s national news agency Ukrinform.
The news agency citing defense analysts said, in addition to the political and territorial implications, the conflict highlighted another important aspect, that is, the first ever large-scale combat deployment of Chinese weapons systems, in particular the JF-17 Block III and J-10C fighters, the PL-15E air-to-air missiles, as well as the HQ-9, HQ-16 and HQ-7 air defense systems.
“Beijing has long referred to Islamabad as its Iron Brother, and, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), about 81 percent of the weapons imported by Pakistan over the past five years were Chinese-made. These are modern fighter jets, missiles, radars, and air defense systems that were supposed to show off their effectiveness in real combat confrontation.”
“Obviously, it was China who has won the “three-day war” between India and Pakistan, actually. And this is not about the combat clashes proper, but about information support for them. Beijing exploited the conflict to advertise its weapons. Advertise not on exhibition stands, but on the real battlefield — the right move for one of the largest arms exporters in the world – ‘advertising is the engine of trade.’”
“According to publicly available sources, Pakistan has been intensively using Chinese JF-17 Thunder and J-10C Vigorous Dragon fighters. In particular, the Pakistani side claimed to have shot down several Indian fighters, including a French-built Rafale. Some analysts suggest that the Chinese PL-15 air-to-air missiles, capable of ranges of 200-300 km, supposedly played a major role in this.”
“The question of the effectiveness of Chinese weapons has become a key one in the ‘post-conflict’ discussions. Were they really that advanced, or were there other factors of Pakistan’s successes?”
“In this context, Oleksandr Kovalenko [Ukrainian analyst] draws attention to the human factor and tactical training: “I saw reports about the poor actions by the Indian aviation… Indeed, you can be a pilot of the most modern and expensive fighter, but without proper training and experience this does not guarantee superiority in air combat through a purely technological edge. This is a long-known truth: the decisive factor is not only the equipment, but also the quality of the pilot’s training, his ability to work in real combat conditions.”
