side-winder
Moderator
I guess there is no standard term for it. Every military has its own terms to refer to.
Pakistan-India Conflict 2025: News Updates and Discussion
- Thread starter Ali_Baba
- Start date
Bilal
THINK TANK: CONSULTANT
I assumed there would be some mil-std document outlining it.
AeronautIR
HemlockKhalid
I think its equivalent should be Continuity of Operations. We generally call it Contingency Plan.
Master Chief
Trusted Member
I agree with you. And I am not just saying this flippantly or to be some idle contrarian. You will find the forum is pretty evenly split between those who are satisfied with the revealed intel and those who expect more. I fully understand the reasons for both sides of the argument, but I prefer discretion, calm disposition, and professionalism from my military as opposed to reducing us to a propaganda factory.
In a similar vein, we must not stoop to levels of needlessly hiding losses, which we have not done, but India clearly has. This sort of behaviour would harm our collective morale. One can , only imagine what Indian soldiers feel in light of constant denial of any losses, not even "broken glass", from their spokespersons.
I view matters thusly - the more delusional the enemy qom is with regards to the outcomes of a battle, and the greater the disconnect between their populace and their military leaders about what that military can actually deliver, then the more likely that military-civilian nexus is to make a mistake either politically or militarily in terms of overreach.
Beyond this, some friends speak of informational victory, which is important to a degree, but I put it to those friends - a nation with an online presence of at least 10x our own that is furthermore prepared to obfuscate and distort reality to degrees seen in the Bollywood movie industry may cause far more informational harm to itself than we ever could.
AeronautIR
HemlockKhalid
Very well said.
Bilal
THINK TANK: CONSULTANT
It also a matter of benchmark that has been set post GW1. Live target pod feeds, tv bomb flying into targets, BDA images all are now expected baseline not extra privilege.
Even post swift retort feed from H4 was shown, so it’s not out of ordinary to expect the same.
hasssanali8998
Elite Member
can you talk more about it , like are we buying new systems , getting more of the old systems ?? . i really think IADs is where we should spend our money now , rafales threat has a solution ( until they get more , but that will take a long time ) . they wont really have 5th gen jet so no need to hurry on j35 acquisitions . next time you know they are just going to keep lobbying brahmos and other SOWs , hence the most important is upgrading our IADs and then looking towards acquiring similar weapons to brahmos
Oscar
Moderator
On the subject of reality versus perception - lets do a little bit of a drawn out dive.
I think a good way to think of it is what were the objectives of each side(nothing that those were not constant) and what was the overall "stash of gains" which isnt an additive as much as it is a spectrum on who values what more.
From a military standpoint what we have been able to construe and establish.
I will also put known or unknown from a common PDF or even Pak Mil "analyst" perspective because that is different from what a PakMil individual would know and even in those cases knowledge is compartmentalized.
1. India has a few key systems it can mass (known) - which include SEAD/DEAD drones(known) and Brahmos(known). The scale of the massing was not completely as expected(unknown). Despite the number of Harpy and Harop drones in service, the actual number used seemed to be very targeted and focused on creating specific shock and awe corridors. The same goes for Brahmos - despite the large number claimed they really were not deployed in the force quantities which suggests that either they were being held closer for tighter scaling later or that in addition to the "hold and wait" strategy there is also a deployment latency that Brahmos TELs and MKIs capable of deploying the system. India has been exaggerating its non-kinetic capabilities(known) but does not really have cohesive deployment doctrines in place beyond academics(unknown).
2. Pakistan has taken the Brahmos and standoff threat from 2019 and catered accordingly within its budget(known to be meagre). This includes a lot of focus on non-kinetic means(unknown from scale) but the limitations from kinetic means showed(known). Considering that many non-kinetic "kills" were allowed to go through and hit unimportant "targets" shows that scale of AD is still lacking and which in place could further reduce the damage taken.
3. The effectiveness of Meteor-Rafale, MKI-Iderby-Astra combo has been highly exaggerated(known) as typical. It echoes 2019 even more so , those of us from times as "old" as 2006 remember the typical bhaktoras which @Trailer23 likes to stalk talk all about how their MKIs will have immunity to anything that PAF has, talk in text flashes on HMDs and conduct cooperative targeting. Ironically in 2019 that MKI was hapless against the AMRAAM(whether the kill can be verified or not is now moot), the upgraded Mirages bugged out and the lone warrior in 60 year old Bison had to drink tea with typical claims made on photo verified missiles still hanging off their burnt rails.
However, those of us who were expecting the Indian military to do a rapid turnaround of training and doctrinal changes(unknown) using 65-71 as a reference were severely disappointed because it seemed when it came to systems the IAF is still living in compartments instead of a system of systems mentality and lot seems to be "checkmarks and Ive done it sir".
Providing excuses on "intel failures" is the mark of lazy professionals almost like the "tortoise and the hare" mentality(known).
The results of the air skirmish were oddly somewhat expected(known) in terms of how the PL-15 would outperform the meteor and more importantly having more platforms that can deploy the system whereas the rest of the IAF fleet has to content with a mixed plate deployment of I-derby, Astra and MICAs(already shown to be insufficient against an AMRAAM threat).
4. That being said the inherent advantage which is played out by the PAF and through AFM articles seem to also show how "restraint" isnt now an operational excuse for when success is not guaranteed but has more things factoring in. Success doesn't necessarily translate to just a missile hitting a target but also predicted follow up actions post the engagement.
I use the term "Follow up" important because one thing that has been clear since the rise of Hindutva and the nationalist brigade is image perception drives more in India than actual strategic objectives or rather it can override those. One thing with Pakistan is that because the country is already been lambasted with a negative image for a long time due to economic and sociopolitical perception of being associated with terrorism, there isnt really much to lose from a "respect" perspective(known) so that isnt really an overriding priority on a national decision level(unknown). Pakistanis lambast Pakistan more than Indians can even begin to use their brain creativity for. More importantly, Pakistanis will lambast Pakistan, shake their heads and still continue their typical stressful day regardless because "it is what it is and Im out of here anyway" while based on the reactions of Bhaktoras on any slight to India they will consider their dinner and sleep wasted - wither validity or relevance. Biased comment yes but after 20 years speaking with all sorts of online Indians and also knowing different ones in reality - you know the type(known).
Why is this relevant? Because this translates to the constant "save face" excuse that is being given by the Pakistani leadership. The restraint doesn't just come from "We aren't able" (as I for the longest time believed) but also has to do with unpredictable responses which Pakistan either isnt prepared for or would cross thresholds which go beyond ladders that can be climbed down from. So what we assume is just fanboy mentality now is rooted in many individuals at the Indian leadership level.
That doesn't mean to say they aren't competent in their fields or have competence in areas but that the need for "respect and eminence" overrides their logical thinking. I would never have assumed this position until I bounced this off individuals in Pakistani foreign service(regardless of their own bureaucratic myopia) and military, US veterans who have trained with Indians and most importantly educated Indians from various fields specifically from states that aren't run by or who did not vote for the BJP. The consensus is that once you are part of this Hindutva nationalist cult(which existed in less widespread forms well before the British left) the typical "past glory victimhood" (also seen in many Pan Islamist parties) take over your identity regardless of whether you are a clerk at a call center, NOC engineer or PhD in Pharma.
Which means now - every jet you shoot down, every hangar you hit isnt just an operational issue it becomes a perception issue that impacts morale and judgement much more than what the impact normally would be.
5. The next part that is ignored or missed within the term "restraint" is also what Pakistan has ability to spend. I call it the national "energy" the same way pilots talk to energy in maneuvering. Energy isnt just made up of raw engine power but altitude, speed, direction relative to target and so on. On a national perspective that energy is your resources both from equipment, expendables(munitions) and consumables(fuel), humans(including skills across the board), Morale, support internally from population and externally from allies and nations more powerful than you which includes state to state and backchannel contacts. That is what determines what moves you can make versus the moves your adversary can make.
I used this example on another thread - South Korea making modifications to the Harpoon has very different consequences for South Korea, the US and Raytheon compared to Pakistan making them. Different perceptions, values and grading is applied to both countries and those countries have different "energy" they can spend combating those consequences including the narrative you build around your response.
5. So now if we consider what is termed restraint - it serves in the overall narrative of saying either "things didnt work out as expected"(known) to also "We were too anxious of their response to push any harder"(unknown). Lets put that to what happened in the hours and days. From the aerial shootdowns where you targeted only aircraft actually firing weapons(known-ish) or trying to lock you(known-ish).
6. So if we take what is "intangible" factors into the decision to send a kill contract to a fighter group - we have the perception that ACM was making these decision on his own(likely) but then what guidelines did he put mentally to take these decisions? Where did those come from? Was it a combination of FM, ACM and SS?(unknown). What were the decisions(unknown) made to hit targets in BuM based on what they saw as damage from Indian strikes?(known). We do need to ask these questions purely from a empirical view instead of lambasting "restraint" from a "Garbage in, Garbage out" emotional thought process.
7. Data sources: What is the OSINT available? Once the jets were going down where the primary focus is to prevent damage, we see no concerted effort for CSAR beyond the general movement of troops to verify aircraft downed from the Indian side(so their blue on blue memory is still ingrained). Second, this being at night any and all accounts of downed aircraft are from civilian sources and those too seem to be from ones where civilians both made it to the locations and also pushed it to social media. India has much greater control on Social media than Pakistan(despite the ironic claims) and the content moderation teams from Meta and X(mostly out of India) quickly started culling the imagery post the first 36 hours(known because we were monitoring the trickle and tone change constantly here at PDF). On the flip side due to the nature of Pakistani infrastructure mostly mixed in with civilian population the vicinity and lack of control on social media means any damage, miss or even operational moves were being put to the internet by the like addicted Pakistani population. It's a national disease to want to "see" and "gossip" - what was being made light of in terms of resilience ignores the signs of "normalcy bias" for dangerous situations in Pakistanis.
So Pakistani claim sources given publicly are on two fronts - one is OSINT(known), the other is ELINT(unknown),HUMINT(OSINT known, Pakistani military claims unknown) Imagery(unknown) and the remaining is "We say so"(Unknown).
Lets look at where and how much is used by both sides.
Pakistan claims a combination of ELINT, OSINT and HUMINT for the A2A kills on the first night. This is fairly verifiable for at least 50% of the claimed aircraft because very early unaltered images of wreckages are available which can be cross referenced with aircraft types and parts.
They claim combination of ELINT and OSINT on kills on Indian missiles - a lot of this is verifiable because we have wreckage scattered throughout Pakistan in places which are not of any importance. But we also have OSINT on damage which while appearing severe early on such as Nur Khan was in later images seen to be linked more to fuel rather than actual mass damage to equipment.
The Indian claims are all based on Images when it comes to damage conducted - there is no OSINT available from Pakistani sources for Indian strikes other than Nur Khan. I wont even humor their claims for air kills on Pakistanis because it goes to a level of "trust me bro" that is even less concrete than UAP Alien visitor claims.
8. Now coming to BuM, the OSINT on Pakistani systems being used against India is plenty, from the YIHA diversions to Fatah series but there is little showing actual concrete damage. Which brings the question to two aspects - what was the goal of these strikes and more importantly what damage was done that either was superficial enough to be "removed from sight" or ineffective that when Indians finally did BDA and Pakistan did BDA it turned out naught?
We talk about the S-400 being taken out - which has its own debates but lets also ask what was the goal of the strike?
Was it SEAD or DEAD - if the idea was to provide BuM strikes a clean air corridor - absolutely, there was no S-400 coming online post that.
The same can be asked of the result of the Pakistani air skirmish - if the result was to damage the IAF so badly that it refused to fly other than in piecemeal sorties covered by A-50s and hugging the terrain - sure - it basically took the IAF out of the mix and left Brahmos as the only viable "constant" being used.
Have we even considered the results on LoC? There was no more "barrage of mortars" as was seen in 2016 but whatever tactics were used led to much less intense Indian arty than expected although the claims of utter vacillation are also false because AJK civilians did suffer severe casualties from constant firing by the IA.
Have we considered that the IN simply did not show up? Was it the lack of air cover? Was it their subs still getting caught in PN nets as claimed? Was it PN remaining in PAF cover and A2/AD nets which the Indians were either waiting to test or were not prepared to test?
So what is the perception? More over - what goals were intended as part of perception?
I cannot give a conclusion here - because those goals aren't just "level Ambala" but also more macro to "provide deterrence to escalation" and so on and so forth.
I think a good way to think of it is what were the objectives of each side(nothing that those were not constant) and what was the overall "stash of gains" which isnt an additive as much as it is a spectrum on who values what more.
From a military standpoint what we have been able to construe and establish.
I will also put known or unknown from a common PDF or even Pak Mil "analyst" perspective because that is different from what a PakMil individual would know and even in those cases knowledge is compartmentalized.
1. India has a few key systems it can mass (known) - which include SEAD/DEAD drones(known) and Brahmos(known). The scale of the massing was not completely as expected(unknown). Despite the number of Harpy and Harop drones in service, the actual number used seemed to be very targeted and focused on creating specific shock and awe corridors. The same goes for Brahmos - despite the large number claimed they really were not deployed in the force quantities which suggests that either they were being held closer for tighter scaling later or that in addition to the "hold and wait" strategy there is also a deployment latency that Brahmos TELs and MKIs capable of deploying the system. India has been exaggerating its non-kinetic capabilities(known) but does not really have cohesive deployment doctrines in place beyond academics(unknown).
2. Pakistan has taken the Brahmos and standoff threat from 2019 and catered accordingly within its budget(known to be meagre). This includes a lot of focus on non-kinetic means(unknown from scale) but the limitations from kinetic means showed(known). Considering that many non-kinetic "kills" were allowed to go through and hit unimportant "targets" shows that scale of AD is still lacking and which in place could further reduce the damage taken.
3. The effectiveness of Meteor-Rafale, MKI-Iderby-Astra combo has been highly exaggerated(known) as typical. It echoes 2019 even more so , those of us from times as "old" as 2006 remember the typical bhaktoras which @Trailer23 likes to stalk talk all about how their MKIs will have immunity to anything that PAF has, talk in text flashes on HMDs and conduct cooperative targeting. Ironically in 2019 that MKI was hapless against the AMRAAM(whether the kill can be verified or not is now moot), the upgraded Mirages bugged out and the lone warrior in 60 year old Bison had to drink tea with typical claims made on photo verified missiles still hanging off their burnt rails.
However, those of us who were expecting the Indian military to do a rapid turnaround of training and doctrinal changes(unknown) using 65-71 as a reference were severely disappointed because it seemed when it came to systems the IAF is still living in compartments instead of a system of systems mentality and lot seems to be "checkmarks and Ive done it sir".
Providing excuses on "intel failures" is the mark of lazy professionals almost like the "tortoise and the hare" mentality(known).
The results of the air skirmish were oddly somewhat expected(known) in terms of how the PL-15 would outperform the meteor and more importantly having more platforms that can deploy the system whereas the rest of the IAF fleet has to content with a mixed plate deployment of I-derby, Astra and MICAs(already shown to be insufficient against an AMRAAM threat).
4. That being said the inherent advantage which is played out by the PAF and through AFM articles seem to also show how "restraint" isnt now an operational excuse for when success is not guaranteed but has more things factoring in. Success doesn't necessarily translate to just a missile hitting a target but also predicted follow up actions post the engagement.
I use the term "Follow up" important because one thing that has been clear since the rise of Hindutva and the nationalist brigade is image perception drives more in India than actual strategic objectives or rather it can override those. One thing with Pakistan is that because the country is already been lambasted with a negative image for a long time due to economic and sociopolitical perception of being associated with terrorism, there isnt really much to lose from a "respect" perspective(known) so that isnt really an overriding priority on a national decision level(unknown). Pakistanis lambast Pakistan more than Indians can even begin to use their brain creativity for. More importantly, Pakistanis will lambast Pakistan, shake their heads and still continue their typical stressful day regardless because "it is what it is and Im out of here anyway" while based on the reactions of Bhaktoras on any slight to India they will consider their dinner and sleep wasted - wither validity or relevance. Biased comment yes but after 20 years speaking with all sorts of online Indians and also knowing different ones in reality - you know the type(known).
Why is this relevant? Because this translates to the constant "save face" excuse that is being given by the Pakistani leadership. The restraint doesn't just come from "We aren't able" (as I for the longest time believed) but also has to do with unpredictable responses which Pakistan either isnt prepared for or would cross thresholds which go beyond ladders that can be climbed down from. So what we assume is just fanboy mentality now is rooted in many individuals at the Indian leadership level.
That doesn't mean to say they aren't competent in their fields or have competence in areas but that the need for "respect and eminence" overrides their logical thinking. I would never have assumed this position until I bounced this off individuals in Pakistani foreign service(regardless of their own bureaucratic myopia) and military, US veterans who have trained with Indians and most importantly educated Indians from various fields specifically from states that aren't run by or who did not vote for the BJP. The consensus is that once you are part of this Hindutva nationalist cult(which existed in less widespread forms well before the British left) the typical "past glory victimhood" (also seen in many Pan Islamist parties) take over your identity regardless of whether you are a clerk at a call center, NOC engineer or PhD in Pharma.
Which means now - every jet you shoot down, every hangar you hit isnt just an operational issue it becomes a perception issue that impacts morale and judgement much more than what the impact normally would be.
5. The next part that is ignored or missed within the term "restraint" is also what Pakistan has ability to spend. I call it the national "energy" the same way pilots talk to energy in maneuvering. Energy isnt just made up of raw engine power but altitude, speed, direction relative to target and so on. On a national perspective that energy is your resources both from equipment, expendables(munitions) and consumables(fuel), humans(including skills across the board), Morale, support internally from population and externally from allies and nations more powerful than you which includes state to state and backchannel contacts. That is what determines what moves you can make versus the moves your adversary can make.
I used this example on another thread - South Korea making modifications to the Harpoon has very different consequences for South Korea, the US and Raytheon compared to Pakistan making them. Different perceptions, values and grading is applied to both countries and those countries have different "energy" they can spend combating those consequences including the narrative you build around your response.
5. So now if we consider what is termed restraint - it serves in the overall narrative of saying either "things didnt work out as expected"(known) to also "We were too anxious of their response to push any harder"(unknown). Lets put that to what happened in the hours and days. From the aerial shootdowns where you targeted only aircraft actually firing weapons(known-ish) or trying to lock you(known-ish).
6. So if we take what is "intangible" factors into the decision to send a kill contract to a fighter group - we have the perception that ACM was making these decision on his own(likely) but then what guidelines did he put mentally to take these decisions? Where did those come from? Was it a combination of FM, ACM and SS?(unknown). What were the decisions(unknown) made to hit targets in BuM based on what they saw as damage from Indian strikes?(known). We do need to ask these questions purely from a empirical view instead of lambasting "restraint" from a "Garbage in, Garbage out" emotional thought process.
7. Data sources: What is the OSINT available? Once the jets were going down where the primary focus is to prevent damage, we see no concerted effort for CSAR beyond the general movement of troops to verify aircraft downed from the Indian side(so their blue on blue memory is still ingrained). Second, this being at night any and all accounts of downed aircraft are from civilian sources and those too seem to be from ones where civilians both made it to the locations and also pushed it to social media. India has much greater control on Social media than Pakistan(despite the ironic claims) and the content moderation teams from Meta and X(mostly out of India) quickly started culling the imagery post the first 36 hours(known because we were monitoring the trickle and tone change constantly here at PDF). On the flip side due to the nature of Pakistani infrastructure mostly mixed in with civilian population the vicinity and lack of control on social media means any damage, miss or even operational moves were being put to the internet by the like addicted Pakistani population. It's a national disease to want to "see" and "gossip" - what was being made light of in terms of resilience ignores the signs of "normalcy bias" for dangerous situations in Pakistanis.
So Pakistani claim sources given publicly are on two fronts - one is OSINT(known), the other is ELINT(unknown),HUMINT(OSINT known, Pakistani military claims unknown) Imagery(unknown) and the remaining is "We say so"(Unknown).
Lets look at where and how much is used by both sides.
Pakistan claims a combination of ELINT, OSINT and HUMINT for the A2A kills on the first night. This is fairly verifiable for at least 50% of the claimed aircraft because very early unaltered images of wreckages are available which can be cross referenced with aircraft types and parts.
They claim combination of ELINT and OSINT on kills on Indian missiles - a lot of this is verifiable because we have wreckage scattered throughout Pakistan in places which are not of any importance. But we also have OSINT on damage which while appearing severe early on such as Nur Khan was in later images seen to be linked more to fuel rather than actual mass damage to equipment.
The Indian claims are all based on Images when it comes to damage conducted - there is no OSINT available from Pakistani sources for Indian strikes other than Nur Khan. I wont even humor their claims for air kills on Pakistanis because it goes to a level of "trust me bro" that is even less concrete than UAP Alien visitor claims.
8. Now coming to BuM, the OSINT on Pakistani systems being used against India is plenty, from the YIHA diversions to Fatah series but there is little showing actual concrete damage. Which brings the question to two aspects - what was the goal of these strikes and more importantly what damage was done that either was superficial enough to be "removed from sight" or ineffective that when Indians finally did BDA and Pakistan did BDA it turned out naught?
We talk about the S-400 being taken out - which has its own debates but lets also ask what was the goal of the strike?
Was it SEAD or DEAD - if the idea was to provide BuM strikes a clean air corridor - absolutely, there was no S-400 coming online post that.
The same can be asked of the result of the Pakistani air skirmish - if the result was to damage the IAF so badly that it refused to fly other than in piecemeal sorties covered by A-50s and hugging the terrain - sure - it basically took the IAF out of the mix and left Brahmos as the only viable "constant" being used.
Have we even considered the results on LoC? There was no more "barrage of mortars" as was seen in 2016 but whatever tactics were used led to much less intense Indian arty than expected although the claims of utter vacillation are also false because AJK civilians did suffer severe casualties from constant firing by the IA.
Have we considered that the IN simply did not show up? Was it the lack of air cover? Was it their subs still getting caught in PN nets as claimed? Was it PN remaining in PAF cover and A2/AD nets which the Indians were either waiting to test or were not prepared to test?
So what is the perception? More over - what goals were intended as part of perception?
I cannot give a conclusion here - because those goals aren't just "level Ambala" but also more macro to "provide deterrence to escalation" and so on and so forth.
puttputt
Registered Member
Brother, we shouldn't conflate India's poor decision-making and management with its actual capacity. The actual capacity does exist, it's what's driving their economy by attracting FDI, exporting manufactured goods, and supporting their defence needs.
There's no doubt that HAL is mismanaged and had a lot of issues with running the Tejas programs, fair, but this same HAL had also delivered 220+ Su-30MKIs with 50%+ indigenous inputs without any real hiccups. That isn't a HAL victory, but a victory for the ecosystem of small and medium-sized Indian manufacturers that feed into the system (most of whom are in the South, which is actually a key thing our establishment should exploit, i.e., dividing the North from the South over the long-long-term).
India's problems with procurement are mostly attributed to their poor decision-making, internal politicking between competing or redundant groups, and so on, not the actual economic state and industries.
Moreover, India has the propensity to create strong leaders from time to time, and we went through that lesson in 1971.
Basically, don't underestimate these bastards.
AeronautIR
HemlockKhalid
I don't ask details because then I have to be careful and think before speaking because you never know what has been deemed confidential.
So I actually don't know the exact details. I know it is from China so maybe more LOMADS like HQ- 16 or HQ-17 SHORADS.
PAF spent weeks in debrief just after May conflict ended and plan to plug any identified loopholes was immediately set in motion.
AeronautIR
HemlockKhalid
Ok, so let's wrap it up because now we have gone from IAF threat to 1971 and Indian economy.
Each one of them is a separate topic and may or may not be related to our discussion.
Underestimating the enemy is a fatal mistake and it has been committed by India time and again, not Pakistan. Their delusions of grandeur are a blessing for us.
I can talk about HAL'S license production a lot but to save time, I will just quote 1 example with data.
Just look at the crash rate of HAL manufactured aircraft. There are many more examples like Dhruv helicopters and Mig-21 etc. but I think let's call ot a day on this back and forth.
Attachments
side-winder
Moderator
I do know atleast one system and the expected delivery timeline however, better not to talk at this time.
AeronautIR
HemlockKhalid
The reason why I don't probe about such plans.
I am sure things are being taken care of. 
Bilal
THINK TANK: CONSULTANT
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