@MastanKhan It is true that financing capital hardware - e.g. fighter aircraft, ships, etc, - is similar in many respects to financing a home and car. Mechanisms actually do exist that enable even countries such as Egypt to engage in major acquisitions, and some of these mechanisms have been available to Pakistan as well. For many years, this has basically been the method through which the PAF and PN have financed their programs: Agosta 90B, F-16s, JF-17s, Chinese submarines, and even the propose Mirage 2000/-5.
Unfortunately, while it is possible to meet some of the requirements - e.g. cash down payment - there are other aspects that heavily impact our ability to procure arms. For example, a lot of the major arms financing mechanisms are in part influenced by the likes of the U.S. and U.K. In the late 1970s, when the U.S. was not so hot about selling the PAF F-16s, it had actually proposed to basically make term financing arrangements for the M2K and Mirage F-1 possible. Egypt - despite having an economy as bad as ours - is benefiting from a slew of strategic support, from aid to shadow guarantors to the U.S. not politically interfering (if not outright backing deals).
In the 1990s, that backing mechanism (for the Agosta 90Bs and M2K) came from the French and British governments, which were basically trying to pick up influence in Pakistan following the U.S.' departure at the time. Yes, the PAF could have just put up with the overarching corruption, and that's a valid point in the aspects you raised. But at the end of it, I doubt we would have raised enough to produce spare parts for the fighter, or to keep its production line alive much past 2007. In the end, we'd be in a position of having a fighter with an increasingly limited support base in terms of spare parts, and would have to raise capital to buy increasingly scarce spare parts and attrition replacement.
As for financing. Unfortunately these days, Pakistan does not have this support. On the one hand, we have the U.S. who are not in the mood to see India get upset of our acquisitions (hence dissuading those who might lend or even sell to us). On the other hand, the likes of the U.K and France are trying to appease the Indians, so they're not in the mood to rock the boat. Russia just needs hard cash, and enough of it to offset whatever hissy fit the Indians might play.
That just leaves the Chinese, who we are utilizing as much as possible (in terms of financing support) in order to procure arms. But it appears there's a limit to the dock in what Beijing is willing to put on our tab at any given time.
All that said, we did spend national funds on the 18 Block-52+. In truth, it would have been more prudent on the PAF's part to not have parted with those funds on the new built F-16s. Rather, it ought to have sought a higher number of used airframes and upgraded them, so as to hold the fort for the short and medium-term. The national funding, even a $1bn or so, could have been reserved for another fighter type, or for earlier investment in a next-generation platform (if not accelerating JF-17 Block-III).
