Many things come in Play
Russian jets Is a pipe dream which isnt happening Soon Unless Indian Fcks it up big time you will see only good economy projects or some so level weapons coming to Pakistan which wont offened indian lobby that much because India is still a major buyer
F16 and kargil Pakistan didnt have bvr that didnt have spares for its bird no sane commander will ask his men to fight where he knows he cant win not by any chance
They kept there mouth shut and saved there assets
There are other planes too which do different missions to so should buy everything
F16 its cheap , can do anything as its also will be there for a while you dont need to get new infrastructure or anything and save the money for next project and also keep making thunders
In future you will see Pakistan going for high end bird when they have acquired 150+ thunders and 100+ f16s
Than we will be the major change because
Making 10 to 12 birds per year its not cheap
So Indian Has sams so Pakistan should just buy hi end birds no everything comes into play
PAF is a mixture of Hi low end birds
Whichs comes with there pro and cons
I really can't get to your POV in your post up untill now ?
Sorry ,
But you are accepting in your post that that dam stupid F*16s were not able to fly when in kargill we needed them the most ?
I mean with so much money & time & the precocious lives of our soilders were just wasted for the dam machine which can't defend us when we needed them most ?
Bvr wasnt quite was the problem then , it was spares .
What you think , that problem has been resolved now ?
No ,no & never .
& who told you F*16s comes cheaper ?
Just imagine a machine , which isn't working the time we needed it the most , but we are paying millions of $$$ to keep it as show pices & hope our enemy won't attack us ?
My god thats what I call , living over the moon
Sorry again ,
You think our enemy would be waiting to attack us when we will have 150+ thunders & plus dam spareparts prone F*16s ?
No our enemy won't be waiting , they will get us when we are at our lows ?
& without new high tech multirole fighter we will keep standing in our lows , dreaming that dam F-16s will work for us this time ?
& with F16s our enemy has technical advantage that it can put preasure in America to not to send any spares in any conflict with them ?
Basicly F*16s given to Pakistan back in 80s were part of protection from soviet air force in Afghanistan ?
It wasn't meant to defend our selves with our arch rival ?
Sorry ,
We have passed many decades by now , we have experimented that stupid logic , & came like a slap during kargill that , we can't protect ourselves from our enemy with our dam F*16s .
So by now we need to bring a balance in out strategy & in our fleet leading fighter jets ?
Which can be used at any time at any place ?
Russians are more interested in Islamic world not just because for selling their super sukhois but also to share trade , & power ?
With that strategy , they won't be listening to anyone hurting their global plans ?
Be it India ,USA , or anyone else ?
If they were listening them , then today they shouldn't be selling a screw to China , whose air force is mainly made by Russia ?
& I don't want to go into details , that neither India or america wants to see PLAAF getting stronger day by day ?
If they could have stopped Russia , they would have done that decades ago ?
PAF needs good multirole fighters immediately , it has option going with China its most trusted source on projects like J*31s !
PAF also can order 60 +J*10Ds , J-16s at anytime ?
At the same time they can push Russia for 24 plus SU*35s .
if we can have that , force of 100+ high end fighters , I'm sure that at any given time we can defend ourselves from our given enemy , even if it is having the dam American mad rapptors F*22 ?
Nope, first there is no Rafael dilemma for PAF, PAF look overall current and future capabilities of enemy and create its doctrine and requirements of purchase of equipment is related to doctrine.
Yes sure & PAF s doctrine ends or starts with F*16s ?lolzz