MiG-21 Bison shoots down F-16 in Kashmir

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 05 Apr 2019 14:23

Guys, the person in question has been banned for several months. Hopefully till then he will get some sense. May I suggest you stop responding to his virtue signalling. We get these overly patronizing, self righteous types every now and then, who use the first excuse to jump down the throat of the GOI, services, all the while loudly proclaiming their patriotism, their logic, objectivity and so forth. Don't waste your time on them.

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 05 Apr 2019 14:29

About the F-16 shootdown, lets see if the GOI releases some info., or just ignores FPs claims with contempt. Either is their choice to make.

Those of you on social media are welcome to elicit more details (without abuse) and post them here:
https://twitter.com/laraseligman?lang=en
https://foreignpolicy.com/author/lara-seligman/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/lara-seligman-33270831

YashG · Post by **YashG** » 05 Apr 2019 14:30

Aditya G wrote:Does the US count all F-16s, including the older ones and ex-Jordan airframes? The strict monitoring was only for the new Block 52 units

Ye which ones were counted? Probably the one that went down wasnt the one covered under US inspection (Jordanian perhaps).

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 05 Apr 2019 14:38

Its also telling which tweets Seligman is retweeting. It would be naive to believe that she doesn't have an agenda or is not taking a political stance.

For instance, she has retweeted three tweets.
One from a guy attacking Modi.
Second, from a Pakistani claiming she will get abused by Indians (virtue signalling in advance).
Third, by another rando claiming "nationalist abuse".

Amazing.

And we are to believe this woman doesn't have an agenda or wasnt sent out with a specific objective in mind? Doesnt speak well for her credibility or her objectivity.

She also claims her sources were Pentagon officials.

IMHO, this woman was sent out as a stalking horse, fed with specific info, to make a fuss by certain USG officials who want to drive a spoke into US-India ties.

India is well within its rights to ask for further clarifications on the topic.

I think its time for GOI to call her bluff and ask the USG for an official stance on the topic, in specific even asking the Pentagon and naming both Foreign Policy and Seligman.

Kashi · Post by **Kashi** » 05 Apr 2019 14:39

nam wrote:The issue is not GoI's claim. It is Indians who have such low confidence in themselves, that they are ready to believe foreign government like US & Pak who have vested interest in debunking our claims.

It's not even a government, it's a supposed claim from an "unnamed source" published in far-from-objective newsmedia resource. I suppose that doesn't really merit a clamour for proof.

As Karan M rightly said, we should wait and watch as to how GoI replies. But since, the hit-job was published in a newsmedia resource, it would an overkill for GoI/IAF to respond directly and hence letting themselves be drawn into some sort of equal-equal with a dubious journalist. It would not be unsurprising to see some articles from our side citing "official sources under the condition of anonymity" that debunk the hack's narrative.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 05 Apr 2019 14:41

ras al ghul has conveyed me this:
the person who just got banned was also banned under handle earlier.
some of you may recall the super comprehension man, a handle coined by yet another miscreant who is on self-imposed vanvaas cum lurk mode

i dont think he even lives in india anymore(ie taxpayer).

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 05 Apr 2019 14:42

Sometimes over reaction works though. People here may remember Terence of the USAF and Red Flag and his chest thumping speech. IAF asked for an official clarification. USAF sent an apology. IAF went ahead and also released the real story thereafter, which Stephen Trimble of Flight carried " A final word from India on Youtube Terry".

Kashi · Post by **Kashi** » 05 Apr 2019 14:43

Singha wrote:ras al ghul has conveyed me this:
the person who just got banned was also banned under handle earlier.
some of you may recall the super comprehension man, a handle coined by yet another miscreant who is on self-imposed vanvaas cum lurk mode

i dont think he even lives in india anymore(ie taxpayer).

Bector sa'b in a new avatar?

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 05 Apr 2019 14:46

Singha wrote:ras al ghul has conveyed me this:
the person who just got banned was also banned under handle earlier.
some of you may recall the super comprehension man, a handle coined by yet another miscreant who is on self-imposed vanvaas cum lurk mode

i dont think he even lives in india anymore(ie taxpayer).

~~Didn't sound like SCM/Somnath to me~~.. but I could be mistaken.

Just putting a general note and using your post to make a general point.

Another gent just got a warning for using the topic as an excuse to bring in his political bigotry into the thread, making mocking jibes about "bhakts" etc.

[edited] please give ras al ghul my compliments.

ranneel · Post by **ranneel** » 05 Apr 2019 14:58

Singha wrote:ras al ghul has conveyed me this:
the person who just got banned was also banned under handle earlier.
some of you may recall the super comprehension man, a handle coined by yet another miscreant who is on self-imposed vanvaas cum lurk mode

i dont think he even lives in india anymore(ie taxpayer).

Looks like a saboteur to me.. you can'teven believe with indian guys now Vipin,Panda and whatnots!

ranneel · Post by **ranneel** » 05 Apr 2019 15:00

Is anyone interested in a web scrapper for India associated articles and identification of friend or foe project ? Or is it more relevant in the AI thread ?

YashG · Post by **YashG** » 05 Apr 2019 15:02

IAF shooting F16 & Balakot Strikes have been politicised. This is BAD.

*IAF should take over the narrative of Balakot & F16 Dogfights, so it is not politicised.*

Lara Seligman's article has Modi on top of the article. Why?! IAF action was not about Modi.
When she calls IAF liars, its hurting India's image ( even if she think its hurting Modi).

This is not Modiji ki Sena!

ranneel · Post by **ranneel** » 05 Apr 2019 15:05

YashG wrote:
Lara Seligman's article has Modi on top of the article. Why?! IAF action was not about Modi.
When she calls IAF liars, its hurting India's image ( even if she think its hurting Modi).

This is not Modiji ki Sena!

Lara Seligman ...yehudi of a different flavour I guess.

mmasand · Post by **mmasand** » 05 Apr 2019 15:07

Several times post the episode, there was speculation about the F-16 in question being a Jordanian re-equipped version. What journos should be digging is the support that particular block received from Unkil, and is it subject to inspections bi-annually like the block 50/52. The article clearly states, inventory of the solah sold by Papa is accounted for. Leaving the rest to imagination, and somewhat absolving the Americans from having to put out an official comment.

PS unrelated but anyone remember Iraq WMD fabrication sold by Unkil and war crim Blair? Was one good presentation made to the UN at the time.

Bharadwaj · Post by **Bharadwaj** » 05 Apr 2019 15:10

Surprisingly him of the mustache fame is out front in the efforts to question the validity of this article.... Has made a series of valid queries.

jagga · Post by **jagga** » 05 Apr 2019 15:13

Why are people getting upset due to Paki paid FP article? As Karan mentioned , the three tweets retweeted by author exposed her agenda. There is enough hate India crowd in these rags, which can be easily bought to vomit anti-India journalism. A humble MIG spanked the mighty F16 and people expect US to take India's side? It will be stupid to force/ask SD to give official statement on a article which clearly mentions is based on the information provided by unnamed officials. GOI MUST NOT RESPOND TO FP ARTICLE. There is no need to get Gora stamp of approval. This is a real war, not some Bollywood movie. Armed forces are doing their job with utmost sincerity and bravery. The least we can do is not to get emotional or panicky , we must have unshakable faith in armed forces. If you cannot handle info war then better take a break from Social Media.

Vips · Post by **Vips** » 05 Apr 2019 15:25

If physical proof of existing inventory is required Pakis can easily get a Turkish F16 , paint it, bunch it with its existing inventory for Photo-op and claim all ij well. Unless Uncle Sam does an on-ground full blown inventory audit of PAF F16s (which is not going to happen) pakis will live with tangdi uchi until they are bitch slapped again by the IAF.

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 05 Apr 2019 15:28

Guys, you have to gatecrash into any privileged "white boys club". This has always been the case.

When you do so, people like Seligman etc are sent out with reports to discredit the effort and pretend all is well, and the upstart has not done anything to warrant recognition.

This was the case today.
This was the case in 1998 and the Shakti tests.
This was the case when Mangalyan happened.
This was the case when India did BMD.
This was the case when India launched the largest number of sats in a single launch.
This was the case when India surprised the USAF at Cope India till AWST intervened as much for USAFs own reasons (cough F-22 cough).
This was the case during Parakram. "IA has obsolete kit, PAF has greater serviceability". Old-timers may well remember the famed AFM water carrier of PAF, Alan Warnes who repeated all their propaganda verbatim.

Some of us have long memories and remember.

Now don't be naive and carry their water for them by navel gazing and thinking "oh but for Modi". Irrespective of who it was in power, the contempt would be expressed. The degree of contempt and the manner in which it was expressed would be different, but it would be there. Make no mistake.

YashG · Post by **YashG** » 05 Apr 2019 15:31

jagga wrote:Why are people getting upset due to Paki paid FP article?

Nobody is getting worked up. This is a war of narratives that we should win.
This requires our *appropriate attention* so we stay on the top of narrative.

History is written by the victor. Then the history becomes the truth. It is not about refuting this article but the wider narrative war in which we should stay on top. We cant especially ignore this article cz it calls IAF liar.

For me IAF (IN IA also) is more sacrosant than GoI. GoI under BJP or congress do things that help their politics.

IAF is a different institution - it only works directly for Indian sovereignty. It is above politics for Indians. Sanctity of its word needs to be defended at all times ( for the sake of mango junta's higher regards for Armed forces too).

jagga · Post by **jagga** » 05 Apr 2019 15:44

Karan M wrote: This was the case today.
This was the case in 1998 and the Shakti tests.
This was the case when Mangalyan happened.
This was the case when India did BMD.
This was the case when India launched the largest number of sats in a single launch.
This was the case when India surprised the USAF at Cope India till AWST intervened as much for USAFs own reasons (cough F-22 cough).
This was the case during Parakram. "IA has obsolete kit, PAF has greater serviceability". Old-timers may well remember the famed AFM water carrier of PAF, Alan Warnes who repeated all their propaganda verbatim.

Some of us have long memories and remember.

Exactly, I have yet to see a foreign news channel or publication, which reports a balanced news regarding India. This is same for decades , all they vomit is one sided and mostly virulently anti-India agenda. Many a times, we discuss how GOI lacks in capability when it comes to info warfare, or doesn't invest much into info-warfare. All this is very true to great extend. However, No matter how hard you try or spend out, it wont be easy to change the anti-India mindset which foreign media houses have inbuilt in them. On top of that most of the foreign governments are hell bent to do equal equal between India Pakistan. Although there have been some changes recently, but I would still say don't hold your breath.

ArjunPandit · Post by **ArjunPandit** » 05 Apr 2019 17:35

ranneel wrote:Is anyone interested in a web scrapper for India associated articles and identification of friend or foe project ? Or is it more relevant in the AI thread ?

i agree there should be a thread highlighting the inclinations of media houses/personalities.
One of the learnings in my initial BRF years was that news articles should not be looked just from the content. The author/journalist/country/publishing house and inclinations all matter. In India we know a lot abt our desi journos and their kukarms but for the rest of the world we will still need a mapping. Sadly at the time I proposed this, GDF got closed.

It is for mods to decide where they want to house this discussion esp now political discussions are happening over elections. My suggestion to circumvent the non-GDF handicap is the following
1. Strat thread
2. a. Identify key foreign authors writing/focussing on India: CFair/CJ Welerman, Sadanand Dhume, Alyssa Ares, etc
2.b. Identify media houses: Economist, NYT, WAPO, FP, FA, FT,
3. a. Any criminal investigations going for them (in india we can have for burkha, US would be mostly harrassment)
3.b. Inclinations: Indophile, Indophobic, Hinduphobic

Sadly, BRF does not support tagging, database compilation of this sort to have a running excel. That is one serious handicap of BRF. I dont have any proficiency with PHP based forums/portals to think through this. I have suggested this to mods in the feedback forum at the top, but haven't received any response, so I suppose they have politely said no or they've got something better to do

VikramA · Post by **VikramA** » 05 Apr 2019 17:42

India rubbishes claim by US magazine that no Pakistani F-16s are missing
https://theprint.in/diplomacy/india-rub ... ing/217386

New Delhi: Top government sources Friday insisted that Pakistan did lose an F-16 in the 27 February air battle in the Nowshera sector, despite a prominent American magazine saying otherwise.

According to Foreign Policy, a US count of Pakistan’s F-16s has reportedly found that none of them are “missing”, and all are “present and accounted for”.

The finding by the US on the ground in Pakistan “directly contradicts” India’s claim that its air force shot down an F-16 during the dogfight over Jammu and Kashmir.

“This was on expected lines. Do you think that the US will ever accept that an F-16 was shot down by a vintage Russian MiG-21 Bison?” a source told ThePrint.

Multiple sources said there is electronic and physical evidence to corroborate the fact that F-16s were indeed used by Pakistan.

“The F-16s are the most sold American fighter aircraft in the world now. They are also in contention for the 114 fighter jets order from the IAF. So, how can they really admit that their aircraft was shot down?” another source said.

Enough evidence
Sources pointed out that Pakistan had, on the first day, claimed that two aircraft were shot down, and also that one pilot was in custody, another in hospital, and it was looking for a third pilot.

“India accepted that one MiG-21 Bison was shot down and its pilot is in Pakistani custody. What about the second aircraft and the two pilots that Pakistan military and the Prime Minister Imran Khan had claimed was in their custody?” asked the second source cited above.

The Indian Air Force on 28 February displayed pieces of the AMRAAM missile fired by a Pakistani F-16 as evidence to “conclusively” prove that Pakistan deployed US-manufactured F-16s in its raid targeting Indian military installations.

Addressing a rare tri-service press conference on 28 February, Air Vice Marshal R.G.K. Kapoor had told reporters: “There is enough evidence to show that F-16s were used in this mission through their electronic signatures. Parts of the AMRAAM air-to-air missile, which is carried only on the F-16s, was recovered east of Rajouri within Indian territory.”

Also read: India produces proof, rubbishes Pakistan claim that F-16s weren’t used across LoC

Kapoor also said the Pakistan media had shown parts of the engines and drop tanks that didn’t belong to India’s downed MiG-21, which confirmed that the F-16 was shot.

Rakesh · Post by **Rakesh** » 05 Apr 2019 17:54

Truthseeker: Please change your username to a more human sounding one. If you need assistance, please let me know.

Rakesh · Post by **Rakesh** » 05 Apr 2019 18:06

India rubbishes claim by US magazine that no Pakistani F-16s are missing
https://theprint.in/diplomacy/india-rub ... ing/217386

“This was on expected lines. Do you think that the US will ever accept that an F-16 was shot down by a vintage Russian MiG-21 Bison?” a source told ThePrint.

Multiple sources said there is electronic and physical evidence to corroborate the fact that F-16s were indeed used by Pakistan.

“The F-16s are the most sold American fighter aircraft in the world now. They are also in contention for the 114 fighter jets order from the IAF. So, how can they really admit that their aircraft was shot down?” another source said.

Points to note above...

1) Admitting that a Russian-origin MiG-21 shot down a F-16 will be too much for a H&D loss for the Americans to swallow. That is like committing harakiri. Not going to happen.

2) And no electronic evidence needs to be released just to please a few on twitter. Keeping Netra's capabilities confidential is way more important. The IAF said that they shot down the F-16 and that is all the verification that is needed.

3) Lockheed Martin lost the contest the day Wing Co Varthaman shot down that twin seater F-16 of the Pakistan Air Force. Even prior to that, the F-16 had little or no chance of winning. You can lipstick on a pig, but it will still be a pig onlee.

yensoy · Post by **yensoy** » 05 Apr 2019 18:07

Let's not forget the US was the last to ban the Boeing 737 MAX; because they thought there was nothing wrong with the plane and both crashes were due to pilot error/unfamiliarity with procedure. This is not pre-history, it is just about as old as the Balakot episode. The US FAA had a major commercial reason to protect Boeing. While the US official position generally is backed on verifiable fact, it has erred many times in the past and occasionally, blatantly so (WMD in Iraq being the most egregious one) in order to secure its interests.

Here we have official word of IAF based on electronic tracking, versus an unnamed source in a journal known to have an agenda. Even if a count was done, we don't know when they started counting (could very well be the case that an aircraft counted before 27/2 might be the downed one), what they counted (US origin, Jordanian & Turkish 2nd/3rd hand tranches), and how they counted (whether unalterable parts were inspected to ensure that one wasn't being passed off as another). The one thing we can infer is that the counting didn't happen in one place & time, which means there are ways to subvert the process.

The Paki story has too many holes. Balakot was closed for a month. The airspace was shut down (and still not fully open). There is no further information about the alleged second pilot. All this is out in the open, nothing one can be accused of making up.

Our media did sting operations on Balakot local authorities and casualties were confirmed. The paki denial of F-16 use was debunked. Their current narrative is "so what if F-16s were used"? Sure so what, but we can now agree they were used. Remember, they denied the F-16 kill by saying that they never used F-16s. Now tell me, who has credibility and who doesn't?

Pakis have a track record of lying. The generals lied to their government in 1965, they lied to half their countrymen in 1971, they lied to the world in 1999; and these were foundational lies of cataclysmic events, not minor mis-statements. In a state of delusion, they kept their rupee pegged at 100 to the dollar till it was totally unsustainable; the CPEC plan is a big lie, and so is their stance about support of terrorism.

We may have problems with our government but really, we are minnows when it comes to the art of lying with a straight face compared to the Pakis, or for matter the Americans.

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 05 Apr 2019 18:19

Guys, not the first time lobbyists make sure any negative information is quickly suppressed. Here is one prior example.

https://medium.com/war-is-boring/one-an ... a942d0cf8a

John Stillion wrote a piece very critical of the F-35. Then...

John Stillion predicted the F-35’s dogfight failure seven years ago in a controversial study that, by some accounts, got Stillion fired from a prominent think-tank.

This was "independent" RAND. And now for independent Aviation Week..

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wired. ... ed-jet/amp

One of the aviation industry's biggest critics of the Pentagon's gajillion-dollar fighter jet has been temporarily barred from writing about the controversial plane.

Bill Sweetman has authored over 30 books on military aircraft, and now edits Defense Technology International, a monthly magazine put out by Aviation Week. Few journalists today know more about tactical aircraft. And few have been more critical of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, the jet that's eventually supposed to replace as much as 95% of combat planes. "The program is no longer at risk of failure," he wrote in March on *Aviation Week's *defense blog, Ares. "It has already failed."

But Sweetman, for the moment, won't be allowed to opine on the JSF. Aviation Week has pulled him from the beat. The maker of the jet swears they had nothing whatsoever to do with the suspension. "Lockheed Martin has not asked Aviation Week to take disciplinary action against Bill Sweetman nor have we asked that he be removed from reporting on the F-35 program or any other Lockheed Martin program," the company says in a statement.

jagga · Post by **jagga** » 05 Apr 2019 18:19

yensoy wrote:Let's not forget the US was the last to ban the Boeing 737 MAX; because they thought there was nothing wrong with the plane and both crashes were due to pilot error/unfamiliarity with procedure. This is not pre-history, it is just about as old as the Balakot episode. The US FAA had a major commercial reason to protect Boeing.

Yes all kind of misinformation is being spread by most of the western newspaper i.e pilot error, bird/foreign object hitting the sensor during the take off, that aircraft had serious issues reported but were ignored by Ethiopian Airlines.

negi · Post by **negi** » 05 Apr 2019 18:27

War is about both what happens on the ground as well as shaping perception or opinion ; FP article obviously has a slant but if there is so much skirmish on this thread , imagine the confusion outside among general public . When you end a fight abruptly without taking it to a logical conclusion you dilute the cause as well as lose the perception battle .

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 05 Apr 2019 18:28

If you had shot down 5 F-16s in BVR or by chasing them down, and not 1, all had fallen down over the Pakistani side, same issue would have remained.

Aditya_V · Post by **Aditya_V** » 05 Apr 2019 18:30

And Unfortunately many Indians have been taken in by this propaganda, while officially we should ignore this, definitely there are ties with the US SD and Pentagon which should be used to get the Truth out - cant have them call IAF as liars especially from a country where USA has given soo much Baksheesh. The Lady reporter twitter handle shows she is very much anti India.

Aditya_V · Post by **Aditya_V** » 05 Apr 2019 18:32

Karan M wrote:If you had shot down 5 F-16s in BVR or by chasing them down, and not 1, all had fallen down over the Pakistani side, same issue would have remained.

If it is over Paki Jabi cities very difficult for PAF to do blackout like they have done in POK.

mmasand · Post by **mmasand** » 05 Apr 2019 18:33

^ you have to be bigger than having to rebuff a 'single' journo. Pushing the SD will cost a lot of diplomatic capital. It's a question of priorities.

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 05 Apr 2019 18:34

Meanwhile, a blast from the past.
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/wor ... 628240.cms

Read the entire link.

negi · Post by **negi** » 05 Apr 2019 18:35

For shooting down 5 f-16s one has to first put up a fight , you don’t shoot that many when in defensive mode and we were only defending . Wars are never won like that .

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 05 Apr 2019 18:36

Aditya_V wrote:
Karan M wrote:If you had shot down 5 F-16s in BVR or by chasing them down, and not 1, all had fallen down over the Pakistani side, same issue would have remained.
If it is over Paki Jabi cities very difficult for PAF to do blackout like they have done in POK.

Why would the F-16s or JF-17s oblige you by crashing where you need them to, yindoo infidel?
Point is its irrespective of how many aircraft you down, the propaganda war would remain lopsided.

Suppose CAS manages to have his boys shoot down 12 PAF aircraft, at the loss of 6 Indian fighters. India acknowledges all 6, PAF only admits 4. What then? The same issue.

Y I Patel · Post by **Y I Patel** » 05 Apr 2019 18:37

It may not look like it on the surface, but this is a big diplomatic gain for India. US coddling of Pakistan is a known, but was getting obfuscated by all the sweet talk about supporting India in its fight against terrorists.

Now SD has been forced to defend its client. Notice the craftily hidden concession on use of F-16s. So US knew Pak would use them all along, yet invented creative reasons not only to sell them, but also to provide a military aid package to ease the burden on Pakistan!

Let them try to pressure India on any military related issue now. In chess terms, the US queen has been pinned in its attempt to shield the Paki king.

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 05 Apr 2019 18:38

negi wrote:For shooting down 5 f-16s one has to first put up a fight , you don’t shoot that many when in defensive mode and we were only defending . Wars are never won like that .

Ok we go offensive and then shoot down 5. Point remains. What did your "offensive war" get you in terms of perception? China rushes stocks to make up for the losses, US backs Pak to protect image of F-16s, you admit all your losses. Who won?

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 05 Apr 2019 18:50

Y I Patel wrote:It may not look like it on the surface, but this is a big diplomatic gain for India. US coddling of Pakistan is a known, but was getting obfuscated by all the sweet talk about supporting India in its fight against terrorists.

Now SD has been forced to defend its client. Notice the craftily hidden concession on use of F-16s. So US knew Pak would use them all along, yet invented creative reasons not only to sell them, but also to provide a military aid package to ease the burden on Pakistan!

Let them try to pressure India on any military related issue now. In chess terms, the US queen has been pinned in its attempt to shield the Paki king.

It should have been fairly obvious how the empire would strike back. First they got some rando called Maria al Habib to write a series of articles in NYT about Indias poor military. Her Twitter timeline is full of the usual anti Modi screed, cr@p about Hindus and simultaneously plugging the USs latest military wares "Indias MiGs keep crashing".

Second, she then quoted US officials as denying there was any real arrangement for F-16s not to be used against India because "it depends".

Unfortunately, by not taking stern action against some of these propaganda outlets (why are they allowed to make money off of India anyhow?), we have been remiss in protecting ourselves from hybrid warfare.

Instead, prn sites are banned in India.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 05 Apr 2019 18:58

these farticles come of the same pre-election/intolerence ecosystem as this

https://www.news18.com/news/movies/konk ... top_pos_11

times are desperate, and the SD EJ Pak hawala leftist cabals only hope is modi defeated in polls. april 11 is now 5 days off.

only thing missing in this cycle - so far - is church vandalism

mysterious vandals always attack minorities just before elections and then go into hibernation until the next

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 05 Apr 2019 19:07

Singha wrote:these farticles come of the same pre-election/intolerence ecosystem as this

https://www.news18.com/news/movies/konk ... top_pos_11

times are desperate, and the SD EJ Pak hawala leftist cabals only hope is modi defeated in polls.

Well said. Have you seen the pattern so far?

Balakot strikes---> Unknown gora "think tank" in Aussie land/ Bellingcat (which has been at the front of the antiRussian pro Ukrainian propaganda war) suddenly jump in to rubbish IAF strike/confirm loss of MiG-21---> local "patrakars" like Shukla/Print journos etc start spreading FUD about "were really 300 killed?" "was the strike a partial success"...all sorts of self proclaimed "weapons experts" pop up to claim strike was not a success/this, that. GOI responds by leaking strike data to both pro-BJP and anti-BJP journos. So the Balakot was a flop theory is held off. Veterans join in and rub the motivated guys (like Shukla's) theories in the mud. Strike 1, abort.

Strike 2: India has a poor military, no ammo etc. Some unknown Maria al Habib is yanked out of wherever she was, sent to India and given a clear editorial brief to run down India and also push the "buy modern stuff" line. She does her brief. But her article is poorly researched and has glaring loopholes. People put Maria al Habib in research he!l by showing how poorly researched her claims were. She responds via SM about bad Indians trolling her on Twitter, promptly starts tweeting about evil nationalist Hindus oppressing minorities (victim positioning, virtue signalling 101).. NYT corrects title of her article to India only has 10 days of ammunition, and plus pushes Khan's wares. Yet, no real success because Indian elite have moved onto events of Feb 27th and the original hype about "Mirage 2000s and Spice" etc has been hard to run down. Open bias about not even mentioning F-16 shootdown made people realize she had overplayed the story. Besides US aviation blogs like Drive get into play and after dancing around, kinda, sorta admit, the Bison could have downed the F-16. On twitter, Habib continues pushing the line *both* India and Pak are engaged in a propaganda war and even ropes in Nirmala S as being a "hoaxer/purveyor of fake news". Note the agenda. Do as we say or...

Strike 3: "On Feb 27th obsolete, poorly managed IAF lost air battle to Pak". Charge led by Coupta and Print. Appears after PM openly mentions Rafale would have been useful. Again, bunch of ronin gather together and start disseminating info, and then Govt clearly authorizes select folks in veteran community to do their bit and again, propaganda effort is busted.

Strike 4: FP "discovers" no F-16s were shot down. An unknown beat reporter Lara wutever, is leaked info and again, see the parallel with Maria Al Habib, brings up F-16 no loss (As versus not mentioning it altogether) and again leads with anti-Modi commentary, quotes a Pakistani, and some random guy about "nationalists attacking her" and "how this is an embarassment for Modi".

Sure, not coordinated at all.

And now, lets see how this one goes.

This *is* Hybrid War.

On the one side we have the ISPR/ISI, Indian left + assorted local politicos who desperately want to deny the Indian side landed any hard blow, and also elements of the Khan establishment who want to ensure we don't get too big for our boots, can't stand the current BJP led GOI doing a "1998" all over again, and yet also want to use the oppty to sell us some previous generation toys (while Khan of course moves kindly to F-35).

Anyone remember the think tank recommendation for Khan to sell India wares, because then it can then "control" Indian policy? In a nutshell.

Lets see how this latest ploy is responded to.