Posted on 04/07/2016 6:49:11 AM PDT by sukhoi-30mki
PARIS, April 7 (Reuters) - Pakistan wants to upgrade its ageing fleet of fighter jets in anticipation of a prolonged battle against Islamist militants, although the purchase of fifth-generation planes would only be a last resort, a senior air force official said.
U.S. ally Pakistan, a nuclear-armed nation of 180 million people, is fighting a Taliban insurgency in its northwest, a separatist insurgency along its Iranian border in the west, and has a heavily militarised and disputed border with arch rival India in the east.
In 2014, the military launched a crackdown in the northwestern areas of North and South Waziristan and has managed to push back militants into a few pockets.
But its air force, which will need to retire dozens of jets over the coming years, lacks the latest technology and relies heavily on a fleet of about 70 U.S.-made Lockheed Martin F-16s, which are solely capable of carrying out precision targeting.
"Our concern is that we don't know how long these anti-terrorist operations will continue," Pakistan Air Force second-in-command Muhammad Ashfaque Arain told Reuters in an interview late on Wednesday.
"We have weakened them (militants) to a great extent, but I don't see an end in the very near future, so all the burden is being shared by the F-16s and its pilots."
Sceptics suspect that Pakistan's military is seeking an improved arsenal to counter the growing military might of India, its eastern neighbour. The two countries have fought three wars since their violent separation in 1947 at the end of British colonial rule.
Pakistan's fleet also includes hundreds of Dassault Aviation French-made Mirage jets that are over 40 years old and F7 Chinese warplanes that are over 25 years old, both of which the air force plans to retire over the next few years.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.trust.org ...
We give them F-16’s if they attack Iran.
With 70 planes against Iran, is there any need for "precision bombing"?
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