Which Aircraft Should PAF opt for? [Recent F-16 deal news, etc]

[adsH]

Re: Pakistan's air chief says U.S. may sell it F-16s

I fail to understand why people can't stop dreamming. If and that is a big if US goes ahead to release F-16s , these will be the ones that were built already for us or they will be from there reserves i.e old model A and B's and that is not bad at all in the current situation.
And the numbers we are talking about is 18 not 70 or like that (just read that in DAWN).

if you do your reading and read the Prsd Bush Speech text, when Prsd Mushraf was there in the US meeting him, you can pick out key points when he said if and thats if Pakistan get any new F-16 they would have to bid for new ones.

those F-16 are long gone PAF was compensated for them, so its end of story for them. So stop dreaming about them.

 

[Wajahat]

Re: Pakistan's air chief says U.S. may sell it F-16s

KARACHI, Sept 14: Pakistan may expect some F-16s from the US while delivery of two of the six C-130s is expected in December. This was stated by the air force chief Air Marshall Kaleem Sadat in a briefing at the Ideas 2004 exhibition of military hardware here on Tuesday.

He said that Pakistan had asked for 70 F-16s but the Americans had indicated that they might settle for 18 but that might happen after the US Presidential elections. Referring to the difficulties Pakistan had to face due to stringent political decisions by the US administration, he said that the Pakistan Air Force was looking for various options to meet its high-tech requirements[/quote]

From todays DAWN news paper.
Why would I dream for A, B,s.
If it was in our hands of course we would like to have nerwer versions. But do you think that US is putung 18 F-16s on the table that are of the newer version. No.
And nither would that suite us. It will pose a mantainence headache for PAF. We will take whatever will come our way and under the present circumstace even earliear blocks F-16s from Beligium are like mana from heaven. You see although we would like this and we would like that (I have heard people on this forum talking about Eurofighters and so on) that is not the reality on ground. Reality is that any and I mean any F-16 version will do us fine (that is if they are ever made available).

 

[lalith prasad]

Re: Pakistan's air chief says U.S. may sell it F-16s

18 doesnt seem to be a pretty big number. by the way india doesnt need to worry about f-16s they are studying them thoroughly.singaporean f-16s are coming .and indian su-30 and israeli f-16s would be excercising next year.by the way israeli f-16s are amongst the most sophisticated f-16s in the world.iam sure india will learn quite a bit of tactics from the israelis their f-16s are top of the line and their fighter pilots are amongst the best.it was great the way they bombed the osirak.india should learn it from them.

 

[jupitor]

Re: Pakistan's air chief says U.S. may sell it F-16s

"
Sadat explained that JF-17 Thunder fighter aircraft, co-produced by Pakistan and China, were expected to be inducted into the air force some time in 2006. "The JF-17 Thunder is aimed to replace Mirage 3 and 5, A-5 and F-7 aircrafts," he said. He said the medium-technology aircraft matched the Mirage in performance, but its avionics and weapons were better".


which mirage it matches in performance Mirage-3 or mirage-2000
hopefully not mirage-3

 

[highsea]

Re: Pakistan's air chief says U.S. may sell it F-16s

I have heard a little buzz that possibly the US might do a MLU and bring the PAF F-16 fleet back up to the original number of 40 AC. I have not heard anything above that, though, and LM has not said anything publicly about being in negotiations.

A lot will be determined by who wins in November. If Kerry wins, I wouldn't be expecting too much if I was Musharraf.

I think ToT is unlikely right now, anyway. Honestly I don't see why the US would even consider it. JMO. The DOD is still smarting over the F16/Lavi/J-10 business. That's another reason why I don't think Israel will ever get F-22's.

The sentiment in Congress, I think, is no ToT for anyone who doesn't sign development agreements first, as in the JSF deals. Even then, it's countries who have tech to offer in return, like Australia, that get preference.

-CM

 

[P.A.F]

Re: Pakistan's air chief says U.S. may sell it F-16s

if pakistan has the go ahead to buy these f-16's then why not. but i can't see that happening for a long time. so i think we should stop dreaming so much about them. but then again you never know. bush might change his mind :

 

[SABRE]

Re: Pakistan's air chief says U.S. may sell it F-16s

"
Sadat explained that JF-17 Thunder fighter aircraft, co-produced by Pakistan and China, were expected to be inducted into the air force some time in 2006. "The JF-17 Thunder is aimed to replace Mirage 3 and 5, A-5 and F-7 aircrafts," he said. He said the medium-technology aircraft matched the Mirage in performance, but its avionics and weapons were better".


which mirage it matches in performance Mirage-3 or mirage-2000
hopefully not mirage-3

No not Mirage-3 or 5. It might just come close to Mirage2000 but dont see it competing with it. Mirage-2000 would still be a great jet. JF-17 can only make it some what near to it with western tech on board. But would still lack behind. It can come to equality if French agree to go into a joint venture for some other version of JF-17 or totaly new Jet JF-18 (Pak, France & China) but it doesnt seem likely. French wont upgrade some on elses Jet to compete with one of its own, so Pak must look to some one else.

Anyways lalith prasad, I hate to admit but Israelis have good jets n pilots but with similar F-16s Pakistan would be no less. India can play war games with any country they like but when it comes to a real thing its a different story. & I think India know what PAF pilots r capable of when they r placed into a good flying machine. About singapore they have good Jets but their pilot capability is still not well known, PAF pilots have fought against best of Israel's Jets in 1970's n all returned home safely with some good score against the Israelis. I dnt wana go into history cause of the rules of this forum but thts the way it is. So I think the new F-16s of Block C/D 50/60 will give a sharp edge to PAF over our rivals but I still believe tht what ever the version its time for F-16s to go number 2 in the line. Bring in some other front liner, Gripen, EF-2000 or Rafale may be. Any one would be good. BTW the gripen is also under negotitations right now. There is a thread, find n read it.

Anyways if both gripen n F-16 deals go through PAF should aquire both of them. May be thts why PAF wants 18 F-16s so they can make purchase of possible gripen sells.

 

[mysterious]

Re: Pakistan's air chief says U.S. may sell it F-16s

My educated guess would be that if PAF decides to get some new F-16s, it would be a very limited amount 'cuz they know that Indian Airforce is now going to be doing some exercises with Israelis and Singaporeans, both of whom would pit their F-16s against Indian jets and so its not worth getting a huge number of F-16s anymore. Perhaps the PAF is thinking somewhere around the line of 200 Jf-17s, atleast 50 F-16s and one really advanced high-tech front line jet of which it could acquire 50-80 jets. That would be enough for PAF as it would have 'qualitative' numbers and only three different platforms to operate (as the older Mirages would be out of the PAF by atleast 2010) with, which would be quite cost effective!! :smokingc:

 

[adsH]

ok i hear alot about these war game business, well to be completely honest, indian war gameing with f-16 operators doesn't really give alot to india. India has probably gained allot more insight on the F-16 by observing them in battle when ever PAF has engaged IAF targets. Its the pilots they should fear not the platform. the Custom kits like EW systems are all different the weapons loads are differnt. the War doctrine is different, the pilots right upto the mission planners are different. India focuses too much on its weapons and there high tech toys it should work on its pilot training and its doctrines. No offense intended here, Its like a not too Rich man who has suddenly won the lottery and he decides to go out and buy the most expensive luxury items but he doen't know how to get the most out of them . it takes time to settle into a new pair of shoes. India should give it a rest for the time being!!

 

[Aussie Digger]

Re: Pakistan's air chief says U.S. may sell it F-16s

Too right ADSH. India will no doubt get a fair level of insight into F-16 combat capabilities with these exercises, but that doesn't mean too much. PAF's F-16's WILL be different in things like EW, tactics, weapons etc, so the Indian's won't get too much of an advantage...

Besides military forces NEVER display their full level of capability on an exercise with interntational participants. Why would they? What benefit are they going to get from that? They would only be handing an advantage to someone else then, it's like "keeping an ace up your sleeve". Things like Radar Frequencies, EW signatures etc are legitimate national secrets. No right minded Air Force general would ever willingly give up something like that...

 

[srirangan]

In real war it's never a single Pakistani F16 versus a single Indian Mig29 scenario. So just because the IAF has closely seen the F16's in action doesn't mean they'll necessarily have an advantage. Actual combat has far too many other dependencies on the outcome.

 

[ashoaib]

Re: Which Aircraft Should PAF opt for?

Well I am a firm beleiver of F-16s theory coz they suite Pak. more than any, we have a lot of experience on them also we have already develop engineering and tech. facilities to maintain F-16 this is the reason we are still flying F-16 without getting any parts from US. Some of them suffered from sanctions but PAF maintain to keep them up in the air.

 

[P.A.F]

Re: Pakistan's air chief says U.S. may sell it F-16s

and besides that i was watching ary digital news and the airchief said that he would prefer to look for more better and competitive jets. so the f-16 in my eyes is a very grim choice.

 

[P.A.F]

Re: Which Aircraft Should PAF opt for?

yes ashoiab i respect your view. but the PAF has to move on sometime and in my point of view now is the time to move on for pakistan. they should go for better such as rafale gripen and so on.

 

[adsH]

an F-16 is only an option if the Americans throw inn the AMRAMs. i bet they would, since the americans have a policy not to introduce a new defense system in a region, India has BVR missiles and the americans have asked Pakistan to not integrate Chinese or russian variants of the BVR missiles.

 

[P.A.F]

Re: Pakistan's air chief says U.S. may sell it F-16s

i wonder why america has gone so moody all of a sudden. for the last few years they have been denying us the F-16's and now all of a sudden they say yes. maybe pakistan was about to finalize another deal maybe swedish or frence or what ever and then america come along saying you can have f-16. :

 

[adsH]

there is abit of haggling going onn but i doubt its because the US needs the business. they just need to keep abit of control. thats all, they like the influence they have on Pak Armed forces.

 

[yasin_khan]

I hope it will be right but we should be very carefull because they have trickied us before.If they give us the F-16s then they will not give us the latest air-air or air-surface missiles and the spare parts for the plans.

 

[P.A.F]

Re: Pakistan's air chief says U.S. may sell it F-16s

well if thats the case then we simply are not going to buy them. pakistan wants a good deal and if they don't get it then they wouldn't buy them.

 

[SABRE]

Re: Pakistan's air chief says U.S. may sell it F-16s

I would buy F-16s with my eyes closed, it would be foolish but still I would. Just look at its plateform. Easy to upgrade, always a room for improvement, can jump from one generation to another. Few of them wont hurt. We should buy at least 3 new squadrons of it. But I would want them to be second in the lead, as a secondary Fighter. For frontline primary purpose PAF will have to buy the Jets it has been eyeing.

USA I think has started to feel a slip away of big Asian market for its arms n now it wants to pull it back. Pak must ask for ToT, if the USA doesnt give ToT for the Jet than they should atleast provide ToT for the weapon system.
I think USA should give away F-16 technology to Pakistan. We can handle them now. Besides USA is going to get rid of F-16s when F-35 rolls out, so why not share it than through it out.

Anyways have Belgians gotten boored of their F-16s yet or not. They have been flyin them 4 long time , they too need a change.