PAF for more than five decades has been successfully operating various fighters, and their variants from three major destinations namely the
Chinese,the
Americans and the
Europeans(French) . This tri nation combination has borne PAF major dividends in terms of costs,availability and reliability regarding the platforms. PAF in my opinion will always seek new/refurbished fighters from three sources without tilting the balance to other two.
On this forum we Pakistanis have debated to death ,the various options PAF can exercise for its future needs and replacements. It is widely accepted that the Block3 and further, will be the best options available for the future upgrades for the Thunders. New Blocks of F16s are also considered along with the further upgrades of the remaining fleet. The Mirage fleet of PAF cannot be upgraded further because of their aging airframes. Further French supplies of hardware are not available owing to massive Indian pressure. This leaves us a question what other European source can be visited,some say the Russians(similar to Chinese tech). Since we have friendly ties with other European Nations why not revisit the
Eurofighter Typhoons!!!
Indeed they are very expensive machines, but lately many European nations have considered selling them because of varying reasons, like the Italians and the Austrians.
https://www.flightglobal.com/austria-to-retire-eurofighter-typhoons-from-2020/124735.article
PAF pilots have had a taste of Typhoons on numerous occasions,with ACM Tanvir Mahmood also flying it. Some say the Saudi and the Qatari airforces do have some PAF inputs on their Typhoon operations and acquisitions!!!!
Already posted in this forum by mike2000 in 2016 ,tells us the enormous potential of this beast.
There is a continual evolution of many more deadly weapons systems such as SPEAR missiles, brimstone, meteor, Storm shadow, Marte-ER, sensors and information management systems,long lasting airframes and Engines.
There has been a valid concern on their affordability factor. Nevertheless there is no harm in seeking the second hand options to begin with. These beauties in the hands of the PAF professionals will seek havoc on the minds of our arch enemy. We will continue to maintain our psychological edge over them for decades to come.