In this very thread, many a times, one feel that a large aircraft with 8-10 BVRs with large radar is invincible. If it has acquired and locked you say at 100km, you are dead.
Yah...I get the tenor of that often.
It depends on the mission of the day.
Let us take two situations: Contested airspace and controlled airspace.
In contested airspace, the odds of having enemy aircrafts are high. Why else would that area be 'contested', right ?
In controlled airspace, the odds of having enemy aircrafts are low. Obviously enough, we have dominance to the point where air traffic will be mostly friendly.
Which situation requires you -- the pilot -- to secure the identity of an unknown aircraft ?
The closer you need to be to the unidentified aircraft, the more reliant you will be upon close quarters combat skills. The gun and its ammo only increases weight, whereas each missile takes up limited hardpoints. The gun have only one range of operation, whereas the missile can be beyond or within visual ranges. If you have a missile loadout for beyond visual range but the mission of the day requires you to be closer to the target, you are actually at risk because the unidentified aircraft maybe hostile and its pilot maybe better armed than you for that situation.
In contested airspace, all aircrafts, especially friendlies, are well aware that if they do not respond to IFF queries, the odds of being fired upon at beyond visual ranges are very high. And if the area is highly contested, meaning there are constant or near constant enemy presence, there may not be any life saving IFF queries at all.
This is why mission planning takes hrs and mission commanders want so much intelligence regardless of airspace status.
...if both Pakistan and Indian air forces come face to face.
There are limits on using US airpower applications for reference.
For starter, US airpower is extraordinarily expeditionary. Simply put, who can turn US airspace into contested airspace ? Two great oceans forms very discouraging barriers to any military and given the fact that most of the planet is covered by water, any country must first be a naval power before it can entertain the idea of challenging the US on our soil. This means US airpower are pre-conditioned to be expeditionary in both concept and application. We bring the fight to 'you', whoever 'you' are, whether 'you' like it or not. In sporting terms, the US military is likely forever to be the 'Visitor' team.
So since Pakistan and India are literal next door neighbors, that means your respective airspaces can be either contested or controlled in hrs. Philosophically, your airpower doctrines must reflect that potentiality. Your air forces must be flexible in training and operations. When enemies are literal next door neighbors, friendlies are always at greater risk of fratricides, aka 'blue on blue' killings. Enemy air forces can penetrate and disappears before you can react and that will place a higher level of stress on identification protocols.
Border airspaces are likely to be contested, so if the mission of the day is over home airspace at the border or even cross border into enemy home soil, what kind of missile loadout for that day ?
As airspace withdraw deeper and deeper into home soil, most likely any area will be controlled, so if the mission for that day is patrol and security, what kind of missile loadout for that day ?
Questions like these are important even for the laymen who are interested in military issues, particularly for air force related issues.