I think, if anything, Indonesia, Thailand, KSA and Qatar would be more prime candidates if it was not Pakistan
KSA, Qatar are confirmed F35 buyers, US won’t allow their F35 buyers to procure another stealth fighter platform from China for obvious reasons. However, they may fund a third country to buy J35 instead of themselves.
Indonesia is in deep economic crisis currently and I don’t believe they have the appetite atm for a sophisticated but expensive next generation fighter.
No sign Thailand will swing to China, given they continue to buy western JAS39 fighters over J10C, despite Thai JAS39 lost to J10C completely during China Thai air exercises.
Chinese SAC - FC-31/J-35 5th Gen Stealth Aircraft
As to which potential buyer of J35, this picture ( above link)in my view hints something: it says “ let the world know the advance of Chinese technology “, well, if this SAC technician travels to Pakistan who knows Chinese military technologies and capabilities very well, I don’t expect SAC would use this phrase to describe. More likely, this sac technician is traveling to a country that knows much less of Chinese military technologies & capabilities but relatively much more of other western modern military technologies.
That narrows down to either UAE, Egypt. Usually I don’t consider UAE as the buyer, given its close relationship to US and Israel, but since UAE denied F35 sales proposal from USA due to US request for remote control of all F35 to be sold to UAE, it remains possible UAE will buy J35, at least for the purposes of bargaining.
Egypt is also possible as its Air Force chief showed great interest in J35, and traveled to China for this less than 2 years ago.
