Latest news with #French-origin
Time of India
3 days ago
- Politics
- Time of India
India lost jets but changed tactics to hit Pakistan hard: CDS
NEW DELHI: India did lose some fighter jets during the strikes on nine terror hubs in Pakistan and POK and the consequent retaliation on May 7, but then changed tactics to inflict major damage on airbases deep across the border before the ceasefire three days later, Chief of Defence Staff General Anil Chauhan said on Saturday. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now The CDS did not specify the exact number of jets India lost but asserted that Pakistan's claim of having shot down six IAF aircraft, including three French-origin Rafales, was "absolutely incorrect" in separate interviews to Reuters TV and Bloomberg TV on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore. Gen Chauhan's admission of India's initial setbacks during is the most direct since director -general of air operations Air Marshal A K Bharti on May 11 said losses were part of any combat situation but "all our pilots are back home", implying that they had ejected safely after their jets were hit by enemy fire. "What I can say is on May 7, in the initial stages, there were losses," Gen Chauhan said. India-Pak conflict came nowhere close to N-faceoff: CDS Chief of Defence Staff Gen Anil Chauhan said the conflict with Pakistan from May 7 to May 10, which saw reciprocal air, missile, drone and artillery strikes, never came anywhere close to the point of nuclear conflagration, with both sides 'displaying a lot of rationality in their thoughts as well as actions'. In another interview on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue, the CDS further said, 'The good part is that we are able to understand the tactical mistake which we made, remedy it, rectify it, and then implement it again after two days and flew all our jets again, targeting at long range.' Gen Chauhan was also dismissive of the effectiveness of Pakistan's air defence systems of Chinese-origin like HQ-9 missile batteries and radars as well as the use of Turkish-origin Byker Yiha kamikaze drones and Asisguard Songar drones. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now 'They didn't work. We were able to do precision strikes on heavily air-defended airfields of Pakistan 300km deep inside, with the precision of a metre,' he said. Pakistan was obviously prepared for the initial Indian strikes on May 7, which saw the IAF and Army hit four terror hubs in Pakistan and five in PoK, with fighter-launched missiles and 'smart' bombs as well as Kamikaze drones and extended range artillery shells between 1.05 am and 1.30 am. India immediately made it clear that the aim was to hit only terror infrastructure, and no military bases were targeted. Pakistan, however, chose to escalate the situation, which included launching waves of drones and some missiles to target Indian airbases, military assets and civilian areas. The IAF then struck nine Pakistani airbases and at least three radar sites, a few of them close to nuclear facilities as well as command and control structures, with Sukhoi-30MKI, Rafale and Mirage-2000 fighters using BrahMos, Crystal Maze-2, Rampage and Scalp missiles, among other precision munitions, for the calibrated pinpoint strikes, as was reported by TOI. Gen Chauhan, on his part, declined to comment on President Donald Trump's claim that the US brokered the ceasefire to help avert a nuclear war but said it was 'far-fetched' to suggest either side was close to using nuclear weapons. Pakistan's chairman of joint chiefs of staff Gen Sahir Shamshad Mirza had made the same point a day ago, also on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue, but had stressed that a 'strategic miscalculation' cannot be ruled out in the future. Gen Chauhan, however, said 'people in uniform' were actually the 'most rational' since they understand the consequences. 'In every step that happened during Operation Sindoor, I found both sides displaying a lot of rationality in their thoughts as well as actions. So, why should we assume that in the nuclear domain, there will be irrationality on someone else's part,' he said. There is 'a lot of space' between the conduct of conventional operations and the nuclear threshold, the CDS said, adding that channels of communication with Pakistan 'were always open' to control the situation and there were 'more sub-ladders' on the escalation ladder that 'can be exploited to settle our issues'.
The Wire
4 days ago
- Politics
- The Wire
The French Are Anxious to Know the Fate of Rafales in Operation Sindoor Combat
IAF fighter aircraft Rafale flies past during the 13th edition of Aero India, in Bengaluru. Photo: PTI/File New Delhi: For the first time, France's armed forces ministry has said it is in contact with the Indian government to 'better understand' the circumstances surrounding French-origin aircraft during the recent hostilities between India and Pakistan. At a press conference in Paris on Tuesday, a spokesperson for the French defence ministry said the situation remained unclear and that Paris was attempting to make sense of conflicting accounts. 'Regarding the conflict taking place between India and Pakistan, what I mainly observe is that we are in the fog of war and that there is an intense information war. In other words, what we know most of all today is that we don't know what happened. So indeed, there are a number of allegations that I will not repeat, since there is no confirmed information,' the spokesperson said. France is understood to be particularly concerned about reports suggesting that Rafale aircrafts, supplied by Dassault Aviation and widely considered the backbone of India's combat air fleet, may have been lost in action during Operation Sindoor. 'The issue of the Rafale is, of course, of primary importance to us. We are naturally keen to understand what happened, and so we are trying to stay as close as possible to our Indian partner to better understand the situation,' the spokesperson added. 'Obviously, the most significant feedback will come from this use in high-intensity combat, which apparently, according to some reports, involved several hundred aircraft. So, of course, we are following these events as closely as possible,' the spokesperson said. Noting that the Rafale had seen two decades of active service across various theatres of war, the official said any confirmation of a combat loss would mark a first in the aircraft's operational history. 'What we can especially note today is that the Rafale has seen 20 years of operational use – 20 years of combat deployment – and that if it turns out there was indeed a loss, it would be the first combat loss of this warplane.' The Indian government has not commented on international media reports suggesting that an Indian aircraft may have been shot down or crashed during the strikes carried out on the night of May 6-7, when Indian forces targeted nine suspected terror bases in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. Official statements have only acknowledged that losses are an inevitable part of warfare. At a media briefing on May 8, foreign secretary Vikram Misri said that official information will be shared when the time is right. On May 11, a day after fighting ended between India and Pakistan, Director General of Air Operations Air Marshal A.K. Bharti responded to a question about possible losses by stating, 'We are in a combat scenario and losses are a part of it. The question is, have we achieved our objective? The answer is a thumping yes. As for details, at this time I would not like to comment on that as we are still in combat and (do not want to) give advantage to (the) adversary. All our pilots are back home'.
