IAF to analyse F-16s before Pakistan acquires aircraft

IAF to analyse F-16s before Pakistan acquires aircraft

* Two air exercises with France and US will give IAF technical expertise

By Iftikhar Gilani

NEW DELHI: In a rare opportunity, the Indian Air Force (IAF) will be able to analyse and learn everything about the US F-16 fighter aircraft even before Pakistan acquires them.

Sources in the Defence Ministry said the United States had decided to field its F-16s fleet in the next joint exercises with India to be held in Kalaikonda in West Bengal in November.

Sources said the IAF would also get a chance to examine the upgraded Mirage-2000-V aircrafts when it holds exercises with the French Air Force in June. France has already offered to transfer Mirage-2000-V technology to India. However, sources added that India was pressing France to hold the exercises in India as it would enable the IAF to closely study the Mirage’s efficiency in Indian conditions. Unlike with F-16s, India already has substantial experience with Mirages that are part of its warplanes fleet.

Sources said the two joint exercises would also give an opportunity to IAF engineers and pilots to compare the two makes of aircraft with their own indigenously-manufactured Sukhoi-30 MKIs and analyse if some of the new available technologies could be adopted in the new production.

Sources said that it would also be the first opportunity for the US Air Force to gauge the capabilities of Sukhoi-30s. Besides the US F-16s and F-18s and the French Mirages coming in the new series called Garuda, the Swedish Gripen and Russian MiG-29 are the two other warplanes that India is examining for inclusion in the IAF fleet, sources added.

Sources said the governments of all four countries – the United States, France, Sweden and Russia — were contacting senior Indian politicians to lobby for the aircrafts from their manufacturers. Their interests are understandable since Indiaa’s decision to buy 126 new fighter aircrafts would mean the country’s biggest arms deal worth more than Rs 430 billion, sources added.

The US administration had recently lifted its embargo and decided to sell F-16s to Pakistan and at the same time proposed to India that it could not only buy F-16s but could also go for the upgraded F-18s.

Irrespective of whether India goes for these American aircrafts, the IAF would be able to have a very close look at them at the Kalaikonda joint exercise, the fourth in the series of the Cope Thunder Indo-US war games. It will be for the first time the US Air Force will be bringing F-16s.

The IAF top brass will descend on Kalaikonda air base, which has been recently refurbished for the war games, to assess the American aircraft, compare it with their own air power and with the aircrafts offered by other manufacturers. So far the Indian and American air forces have conducted two Cope Thunder war games in the last three years at Gwalior and Bangalore to understand each other’s operations and training.