Originally posted by Captian Neo
I can only laugh on " IAF fixed wing air superiority over Pakistani skies in a minimum of 4-5 days and a max of a fortnight".
And why is that?
It is important to note that as of today (and this will change by 2010), absolutely no PAF aircraft has operational BVR missile capability, as opposed
to over 300 IAF aircraft.
So this means that if war was to break out today, or tomorrow, or in a year from now even, the PAF would :
1)not be able to conduct interdiction sorties beyond forward Indian installations (200km).
2)not be able to provide CAP/CAS at distances closer than 50km to the border. This instantaneously means air supremacy and therefore ground supremacy
in that region. Once air supremacy in that region is achieved, the next 50-100km will be invalidated due to the BVR umbrella possessed by IAF
aircraft. This pattern will inevitably continue till PAF aircraft are forced to scramble in order to protect strategic targets, or until they move
essential aircraft beyond sovereign Pakistani soil (note that PAF Star fighters were moved to Iran in 71, to avoid strikes by the IAF). In either case
air superiority in a week and supremacy in a fortnight is quite difficult to deny in such circumstances.
According to bahratraksha.com (the official Indian Defense site) IAF lost 75 birds in Indo-Pak war of 1965 & again 75 birds (what a similarity in
stats) in 1971 Bangladesh Civil war while PAF lost only 24 & 43 respectively.
Please visit the following link see by yourself.
www.bharat-rakshak.com...
Well its not an 'official' site per say, but Indian military enthusiasts, 'space cadets', and 'over enthusiasts' do frequent there. One can
glean good information from there though.
Your figures for the 65 and 71 war are quite accurate; no denying that. Reasons behind those figures are :
1) PAF pilots were not pushovers; PAF tactical air command was certainly quite adept at drawing lines of Combat Air defense, CAP and CAS.
2)Most air battles were fought over Pakistanis territory with the PAF mostly doing CAD/CAP/CAS. There were very little interdiction and deep strike
missions carried out by the PAF. This gave the PAF a definite regime of air combat, with simple boundaries. It was a controlled environment. The IAF
on the other hand flew large amounts of deep interdiction sorties, most of them were either fighter-bombers (Hawker Hunter, De Havilland Vampire,
Dassault Mystere, Sukhoi Su-7) or bombers (Canberra) that flew with little or no interceptor support (Folland Gnat etc) purely because these small
aircraft did not have the range for deep interdiction CAS.
You will notice that a majority of the aircraft shot down in air combat were either PAF F-86 Sabres shooting down IAF fighter-bombers or bombers on
deep interdiction missions.
However this air war victory by the PAF seriously jeopardized the overall war
objective due to lack of CAS/CAP for the Pakistan armored and infantry divisions. Scores of tanks and troops fell to repeated strafes and bomb runs
by IAF fighter-bombers and bombers. Ground losses by the Pakistani army due to Air attacks by the IAF reached astronomical values.
There were many rifts that were created between the Pak army and the PAF due to this lack of CAP/CAS to the Pak Army.
Though there was a heavy loss of deep interdiction fighter bomber/bomber aircraft (mostly on the return) for the IAF, these interdiction missions
caused heavy industrial and military infrastructural damage to the Pakistani ground installations and supply chains. This eventually resulted in
Pakistani Armored movements to be severely impaired or even irreparably halted.
The end result of the 65 war was that India held fertile regions of Lahore, Sialkot and Kashmir (~700 sq miles) while Pakistan held desert regions of
Chhamb, Kutcch, and Thar (~200 sq miles).
Indian armored divisions had marched past the Ichogil canal and into Lahore, while Pakistan did not hold any major Indian city at seige.
Pakistan lost over half its armor, while India did not lose more than a fourth of what it committed to the war.
The end result of the 71 war was the separation of East Pakistan from its western counterpart, and the birth of Bangladesh and hence effective loss of
55,000 sq miles of territory.
USA - Aviation week & space technology - December 1968 issue.
"For the PAF, the 1965 war was as climatic as the Israeli victory over the Arabs in 1967. A further similarity was that Indian air power had an
approximately 5:1 numerical superiority at the start of the conflict. Unlike the Middle East conflict, the Pakistani air victory was achieved to a
large degree by air-to-air combat rather than on ground. But it was as absolute as that attained by Israel.
Not 5:1 but 3:1. In any case the IAF a/c deployed on the Pakistani side were proportional , i.e. 1:1 or 1.5:1 due to the IAF requiring precautionary
deployments on the Chinese border especially during the 71 war.
One must also note that all American publications were quite supportive of Pakistan during the 65 and 71 wars, purely because the Americans were
openly supporting the Pakistani cause. This was to the extent of calling the USN 74th task force on its way back from Yankee station Nam' Ops to the
Bay of Bengal for strategic nuclear posturing against Indian forces liberating Bangladesh.
So American publications (as all propagandistic publications in any war) do tend to be a little biased from that era, esp regarding Indo-Pak
conlficts.
Anyhooo, an analogous comparison to Israel is flawed as Israel won those wars due to a comparable and equally commendable effort by its armored and
infantry corps (read Ariel Sharon amongst others)
Not to mention PAF claim of 117 air kills against IAF in 1965 war. According to the autobiography of Gen. Chuck Yeager (yes, the one who broke the
sound barrier), who 'refereed' the 1971 war and flew up and down the region collecting wreckage of IAF aircraft shot down by the PAF. Here is what
he says, "the Pakistanis scored a three-to-one kill ratio knocking out 102 Indian jets and losing 34 of their own. I am certain about the figures
because I went out several times a day in a chopper and counted the wrecks below. I counted wrecks, documented them by serial numbers, identified the
components such as engines and rocket pods"
True. Chuck Yeager was in face serving as the Air Attache at the American Embassy in Islamabad, and personally interrogated (most amicably of course
) IAF pilot PoWs on new Soviet aircraft in the IAF (namely Su-7, MiG-21 FL etc etc.) that the Americans didn't have much on.
Moreover, Chuck Yeager is known to have had a personal grudge against the
IAF because the latter seems to have totally destroyed his personal aircraft (beechcraft/cessna?)
during one of those deep interdiction raids at Sargodha(or was it Chaklala? :puz
All's fair in love and war. Obviously there were no personal intentions behind the destruction, it was a part of the raid on that airbase
.
PAF also sent its pilots to many Arab nations during the Six-Day War recording 3 confirmed kills against the Israeli Air Force without losing any of
their own plane.
True. True.
During Yom Kippur War During the war 16 PAF pilots volunteered to go to the Middle East in order to support Egypt and Syria but by the time they
arrived, Egypt had already been pushed into a ceasefire. Syria remained in a state of war against Israel. Eight (8) PAF pilots started flying out of
Syrian Airbases; they formed the A-flight of 67 Squadron at Dumayr Airbase. The Pakistani pilots flew Syrian Mig-21 aircraft conducting CAP missions
for the Syrians & shoot down an Israeli Mirage in air combat.
Not sure about this, but yes, the PAF contribution to the Arab-Israeli wars was significant.
continued in next post.....
[edit on 2-7-2008 by Daedalus3]
