From 07 to 10 May 2025, Pakistan and India fought a brief – but intense – military conflict. After about four days of fighting, the conflict was stopped through an American-mediated ceasefire, announced by President Donald Trump on 10 May.
In the course of the short conflict, the world witnessed a long list of important warfare shifts: a large-scale air battle between multirole fighters, heavy use of drones and loitering munitions, the deployment of supersonic to near-hypersonic ballistic and cruise missiles, and even a declaration of cyberwarfare on infrastructure.
Overall, the 2025 Indo-Pak Conflict offered a prelude to the next generation of conventional warfare between major states, i.e., a conflict where well-equipped, well-integrated militaries employed full system-of-systems against each other.
Quwa will explore how Pakistan’s prior procurement and planning had fared in the conflict, and the potential outcome this conflict could have on Pakistan’s future procurement and development programs through a series of articles and other content pieces.
As a starting point, this article will examine a few key observations at a high level – these will be unpacked in greater detail in future content in the coming weeks and months.
One of Quwa’s earlier projections was that the PAF would continue enlarging its J-10CE fleet; after all, the PAF generally plans to acquire at least 80 units of every fighter type it inducts. In this sense, additional J-10CEs could potentially be bought relatively affordably and, given the heightened threat environment, inducted in an accelerated timeline. AVIC has shown that it is capable of honouring urgent delivery timelines, at least to the PAF.
Pakistan’s fiscal constraints will likely force the PAF to choose between additional J-10CEs and JF-17-related development. While it is true that the PAF was working on an upgrade path for the JF-17 Block-2 and two-seat JF-17B, it may be reluctant to upgrade these aircraft.
One major challenge with upgrading the older JF-17s is that doing so would mean taking units out of service; given the security situation, the PAF will want to keep its serviceability rates as high as possible. The challenge with acquiring additional JF-17Cs is that the PAF would likely prefer the J-10CE for its higher air-to-air performance.
The only space for new-built JF-17Cs would be in the strike role, but even that avenue is more precarious as the stand-off range threshold has severely diminished amid the advent of long-range air-to-air missiles (LRAAM) that can reach in excess of 140 km.
Finally, it is unlikely the PAF would even want to risk sending any crewed aircraft into Indian airspace, which benefits from dense air defence coverages from both land and in the air. Any focus on the offensive edge will likely center on unmanned combat aerial vehicles (UCAV).
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