MiG-21 Bison shoots down F-16 in Kashmir

[ArjunPandit]

^^ dont think TSP will ever get the hint. It's not in their nature..had they got the hint..2001, 2009 and 2001 could have been turning points in their history..but they chose not to learn

[Cain Marko]

Don't know if this was discussed but very good analysis... Including talk by forget ACM Dhanoaji on balakot strikes.

https://youtu.be/QiAxUfX3_vk

Oh but do ignore fair Bibi at the end. She hardly speaks to the official IAF reports.

[mahadevbhu]

Makes good points though. Fair Bibi - what's the deescalation ladder? How do you deescalate the next time this repeats.

[ArjunPandit]

Makes good points though. Fair Bibi - what's the deescalation ladder? How do you deescalate the next time this repeats.

i dont think that is planned either..we stop when we want to and how we want to...by not going above the ladder at taht time...my viewpoint is that we are climbing up the ladder very slowly, intentionally, like boiling the water in which crabs are present so that they dont realize they are being boiled......

[Rakesh]

Discussed to death Cain-ji. Fair Bibi - as usual - displays the usual American hubris —> America is the centre of the universe, how could a SDRE, Russian trained IAF pilot flying a Russian MiG-21 shoot down a TFTA, American trained PAF pilot flying an American F-16. The very thought is haram. How sinful!

[mahadevbhu]

Discussed to death Cain-ji. Fair Bibi - as usual - displays the usual American hubris —> America is the centre of the universe, how could a SDRE, Russian trained IAF pilot flying a Russian MiG-21 shoot down a TFTA, American trained PAF pilot flying an American F-16. The very thought is haram. How sinful!

Rakesh ji, I got a warning and my post deleted by Karan M for repeating this but in my humble opinion, it is a decent idea to take into accordance points of view which may not be in line with one's own thinking.

C Christine unFair screeches and belittles her way through a monologue and her good points get lost in her oddities.

Hope the powers that be have taken note of what she has said and included it in their own "warGames" and simulations of the next terrorist-attack-response escalation matrix and deescalation ladders.

[Rakesh]

Please do not call me ji.

What point of view did she really have? Did you see her behaviour on that stage?

How many more F-16s can LM "honestly" sell if the evidence came out?

Arm twisting a nation, yes. But who would really want the plane?

It just goes to show that technology, while great, is not the deciding factor. The person behind the machine is the one who counts.

[Aditya_V]

Please do not call me ji.

What point of view did she really have? Did you see her behaviour on that stage?

How many more F-16s can LM "honestly" sell if the evidence came out?

Arm twisting a nation, yes. But who would really want the plane?

It just goes to show that technology, while great, is not the deciding factor. The person behind the machine is the one who counts.

Its not just F-16, its AURA of American weapons and every year US is selling about 10 more F-16's in Billion Dollar deals which will go on till 2025, try telling nations a MIg-21 Variant shot down a variant of 100 USD aircraft they shot down and the opposition in each of these countries will ridicule them that no deal will go through.

And they do not want the Russians to take advantage and increasing their sales.

Plus the Pakistani military reputation among the public and BIF will come many scales down- all in all it is not something which is good for media consumption.

[mahadevbhu]

Please do not call me ji.

What point of view did she really have? Did you see her behaviour on that stage?

How many more F-16s can LM "honestly" sell if the evidence came out?

Arm twisting a nation, yes. But who would really want the plane?

It just goes to show that technology, while great, is not the deciding factor. The person behind the machine is the one who counts.

She's nucking futs. But has a couple of good points which I am.glad she came down to Chandigarh from the US to make.
1. Confirmation bias
2. Wargame out escalation and deescalation. Suppose we didn't get the F16 would we have carried out strikes again the next day? Suppose the Paki s had bombed us successfully? Strikes again?
Suppose we did not get anyone in the camp and as per Fair the Pakistanis have thousands of them ...so there will be more terrorist attacks. How do we penalize the people in charge the Pak military? (One way was the F16 but another would be to get their Navy and their ships)

[Rakesh]

@ Aditya_V: Agree.

@ mahadevbhu: Please watch your language.

Confirmation bias is an excuse to deny the F-16 shoot down. From the US perspective, it is imperative to beat the drum on that narrative, as Aditya indicated above. Laura Seligman's article - of the F-16 count - is a good example. And Fair's assessment of that day, is again no surprise. Fair's behavior though is a whole different matter.

When looked at from the IAF's perspective, these are the facts;

- The Mirage 2000 mission on Feb 26th was a 100% success. All targets designated were struck, the IAF achieved complete surprise, the PAF was caught with their chaddi down and the IAF had zero losses. So what else does the IAF had to prove? Nothing.

So when the PAF struck the next day, to recover their lost honor, an air battle was bound to occur. The IAF was on full alert and the PAF was focused on their mission. The air battle was over as soon as it commenced and the PAF lost one F-16 and the IAF lost one MiG-21. But what would the IAF gain from making up such a story about a MiG-21 shooting down a F-16? They had already proved their point.

Not shooting down an F-16 is not a reason for escalation. That is not the Indian mindset, but rather the Pakistani one.

General Rawat has already confirmed that the Indian Army would have responded with full force had the PAF strike on the ammunition depot been successful. But that has nothing to do with the F-16 shoot down.

Again, with regards to the strike on the camp, you are believing the Pakistani mindset. The Indian strike was basically to prove that we can strike when we want, where we want and how we want. We can also escalate and de-escalate as per our liking. The number of killed is secondary. The lesson for Pak military - the real rulers in Pak - to learn is that terrorist strikes will come with a cost. Both in terms of finance and prestige.

Pakistan's psyche is built on the premise that the Pak Army (and her subsidiaries....the Navy, the Air Force and the Jihadi Wing) is the saviour of Pakistan. Damage (or even threaten) that psyche and the Pak Army will fall in line. So while one (or two) retaliation strike will not assuage the Pak Army to stop terrorist strikes, as the promise of 72 virgins is a very strong motivator, the Pak Army will now have to think very carefully on when and where to strike and what the possible Indian retaliation will be. Until Uri and Balakot, the Pak Army never had to think about that.

As for the technical reasons of the F-16 shoot down....Karan M, Sameer Joshi, etc have proved beyond a doubt that the F-16 was indeed shot down. I (or any sane person) do not need someone, who does not have an iota of a clue as to how air combat is conducted, to state that the IAF made up such a story. Every technical reason and evidence provided to date, confirms beyond a doubt, that the F-16 was indeed shot down.

Why do we need phoren confirmation of what the IAF did? Let her - or anyone else - say what she wants. Just do not invite her to any Indian military events - formal or informal - ever again. She has displayed her level of emotional intelligence.

[Aditya G]

(post below unconnected to above discussion)

There are 4 episodes to balakot episode:

1. Pulwama attack and subsequent investigation
2. Balakot airstrike including political decision making
3. PAF retaliation and F-16 shoot down
4. Negotiation to recover PoW and arm twisting i.e. "qatl ki raat".

#4 is least known and analysed part of the whole episode.

[Aditya_V]

Nope- these are routine crashes, wait a few years the truth on 27 Feb 19 will be accepted b y all.

[ramana]

#4 should stay hidden for a long time.

Also UnFair is fishing for GOI escalation thinking process.
No need to give her freebie.
As for F16 shoot down one of members talked to Abhi who did the actual shooting.
For H&D GOI does not want to embarrass the US arms peddlers.
The POTUS has been friendly within his sphere of influence.
COTUS is a vipers nest.

Also lost in the reporting is the fact that NSA confirmed that cell phone chatter showed over 500 different cellphones located in Balakot.

And a Harpy drone was flying the area.
And RIASAT is quite working.
I wouldn't put it past GOI to have a raman with a cell phone videotaping the strike.*

All in all they are convinced the Balakot facility was the right target and it was hit with three SPICE 2k special versions.

* B.Raman would have volunteered!!


To me this should end the story.

[ArjunPandit]

#4 should stay hidden for a long time.

for the benefit of india yes, but for propapganda purpose no....

Also UnFair is fishing for GOI escalation thinking process.
No need to give her freebie.

lets be realistic..fairamma has a point..like all amrikhans she puts her argument in a convincing way which would find more credence than the polite and factful sam joshi. Period.

As for F16 shoot down one of members talked to Abhi who did the actual shooting.
For H&D GOI does not want to embarrass the US arms peddlers.
The POTUS has been friendly within his sphere of influence.
COTUS is a vipers nest.

Also lost in the reporting is the fact that NSA confirmed that cell phone chatter showed over 500 different cellphones located in Balakot.

apart from POTUS argument nothing else cuts ice..we dont owe the US arms peddlers

And a Harpy drone was flying the area.
And RIASAT is quite working.
I wouldn't put it past GOI to have a raman with a cell phone videotaping the strike.*

All in all they are convinced the Balakot facility was the right target and it was hit with three SPICE 2k special versions.

* B.Raman would have volunteered!!


To me this should end the story.

i dont think people here question that part..in the end we are talking about an apolitical organization, that held back medals years after actual wars. It gave all the facts it could ..the problem is most are not well qualified to absorb the facts and those responsible for disseminating information dont have interests of india at heart.

In my humble opinion, this thread is better closed now to be opened few years later when pakis are not there or some retd genl is keen to make some money in india by selling his book..

[ramana]

UnFair has no point or points.
Rest won't bother refuting.

[ArjunPandit]

UnFair has no point or points.
Rest won't bother refuting.

the fair points that unfair has are
1. that rest of the world doesnt see 27 feb the way we see it. With no debris being seen and the so called audit by some random US group. There is no way scepticals would believe that they shot down an F16.
2. Her point about the engine was fair one. That argument was where both sides declared victory
3. everyone (or at many least in pentagon) would not have minded if we shot down 1 or 10 F16s by PAF. This point is the single biggest revelation for me if you ask me.

Next time i think it would be worth sending some lost love to those bases from where the self proclaimed aces came. With tejas, Su 30 sqdns to say them hello. I think it is only a matter of when and not if. Unless paki does something before 2022, we will have to wait till then.

[Rakesh]

Why do you care how the rest of the world sees it?

[ArjunPandit]

Why do you care how the rest of the world sees it?

honestly i dont care..if IAF has said thats enough for me..i know truth will come out sooner or later...
....but just because I dont care doesnt mean i would others to bask in fake glory and putting down of the miracle that our boys did ....its the same reason there are news outlets and media organizations supposedly came out.. for dissemination of truth...
and in a way i feel happy with the way things are ..as the day pakis will get the truth it will be the transition from 14th Dec 1971 to 16th Dec 1971..from war till victory to significant losses and to surrender on eastern front

[Rakesh]

You said that she makes a fair point. So how does that gel with what you have said above?

[ramana]

Like many folks he is ambivalent.
A gora word is worth 10 SDRE.
That has been our failure since 1498

[Rishirishi]

Let us say for the sake of argument that IAF did not hit the camp and no F-16 was downed.
Still i would claim that India won.

1 India demonstrated that it will not accpet nuclear blackmail. TSP nukes have effectively lost value. Before they worked as a guarentee against military attack. Now they are reduced to a guarentee against total defete.

2 Pakistani military came out of this pretty well and stonger in the eyes of their own people. But they may not be so lucky next time. The Pulwarma Jehadi attack in India, worked out very costly. Several missiles were fired and a huge militaty opperation was undertaken by TSP. This is totally unsustainable. Particularly if they start loosing aircrafts. They are in no position to purchase new ones from US.

3 Pakistans "value for money" Jehadi strategy costs has increased significantly.

[ArjunPandit]

Like many folks he is ambivalent.
A gora word is worth 10 SDRE.
That has been our failure since 1498

who is he here?

[Karan M]

Discussed to death Cain-ji. Fair Bibi - as usual - displays the usual American hubris —> America is the centre of the universe, how could a SDRE, Russian trained IAF pilot flying a Russian MiG-21 shoot down a TFTA, American trained PAF pilot flying an American F-16. The very thought is haram. How sinful!

Rakesh ji, I got a warning and my post deleted by Karan M for repeating this but in my humble opinion, it is a decent idea to take into accordance points of view which may not be in line with one's own thinking.

No, you got a warning for repeating propaganda which had already been rebutted earlier on in the thread, in what came across as an incredibly lazy and disrespectful response to a pointed remark to be serious about the topic. Each and everyone of the points you had made had already been discussed and rebutted. Despite Sameer noting the same on stage even, you tried to give them credence again. We neither have the time or patience to sit through another round of justifications for what were obviously DGISPR funded propaganda, tacitly aided and abetted by the deliberate reticence of types like Fair, Seligman in admitting a MiG21 downed a widely distributed symbol of US military tech supremacy.

Everyone here has the common sense to consider multiple points of view. We don't need your patronizing spiel about "taking into accordance points of view which may not be in line with one's own thinking."

Rakesh has been patient enough to spend his valuable time in reiterating the facts as they are. But any more signs of thread disruption from your side, and you will get a second warning. This thread has enough information in it for you to read and educate yourself, rather than wasting our time with what Fair said and what some rando on the net said, based on half-baked imagery which any military would laugh at. All this has been discussed multiple times and there is no point in us wasting bandwidth over it again, merely because you came across all this now.

[Karan M]

Thanks for confirming that bit from Abhi. BRF is incredible!

Completely agree, Fair is fishing for information. We escalated on our terms, de-escalated on our terms, got our pilot back.

Broke the nuke redline, and redrew it to a conventional conflict. That in itself is a huge win.

What Pakistan basically admitted via Op Swift Retort is that they were unwilling to wage all-out war over Balakote and were signalling a limited strike.

In short, they just allowed India to seize the initiative. We get to move the conflict back to our terms, i.e. conventional.

Also validates over a decade of BRF discussions where consensus was PA was all bluff and bluster about redlines, and we needed to strike across to call their bluff.

Nitin Gokhale's book on Modi, ASAT etc includes a post strike eval of Balakote, and the eval states several hundred casualties.

#4 should stay hidden for a long time.

Also UnFair is fishing for GOI escalation thinking process.
No need to give her freebie.
As for F16 shoot down one of members talked to Abhi who did the actual shooting.
For H&D GOI does not want to embarrass the US arms peddlers.
The POTUS has been friendly within his sphere of influence.
COTUS is a vipers nest.

Also lost in the reporting is the fact that NSA confirmed that cell phone chatter showed over 500 different cellphones located in Balakot.

And a Harpy drone was flying the area.
And RIASAT is quite working.
I wouldn't put it past GOI to have a raman with a cell phone videotaping the strike.*

All in all they are convinced the Balakot facility was the right target and it was hit with three SPICE 2k special versions.

* B.Raman would have volunteered!!


To me this should end the story.

[ramana]

Like many folks he is ambivalent.
A gora word is worth 10 SDRE.
That has been our failure since 1498

who is he here?

You tell me!
You find UnFair credible and keep repeating that line.

[ArjunPandit]

sir, i think you are missing my point. I didnt want to jump the guns and wait to see if you have a larger point. I repeat even if you guys on BRF had disagreed, I would have trusted IAF.

please pardon my arguments on semantics, as its easy to miss on forum writing, but I did not write that I find her to be credible. I do not. I merely stated that her arguments would find more credence than factful and polite sam joshi.

Hypothetically, Even if every other piece of evidence turns out to be wrong, I would still give IAF guys benefit of doubt in fog of war. Despite of all this, I strongly believe that IAF is the truth this side and NOBODY else's words make any difference to me. I do not seek any validation etc from any gora or take their words as gospel of truth. Perhaps that is the single biggest learning from a decade on different BRF caves.

But does that mean, would i not have wanted them to to believe in my version of truth? or rather convert to my loving and truthful god (read IAF). Same holds for rest of the world. I wont even say it is non binding coz if we dont start doing it now, when will we do it then. We are in the top 5 military, economy, population democracy and what not.
Otherwise we are simply the exactly opposite of what pakis are, Truthful and weak on narrative. It is not that i am seeking validation or respect from them. That is my self esteem based on my myself, nation and my religion. But just because I am open to listen to views from gora side and not dismissive of them please dont consider that as my obsequisness or bending backwards to gora.
Last one from me on this. I will Request you to please delete this post after a few days.

[Rakesh]

Explain how her arguments would find more credence than Sameer Joshi? The latter is a fighter pilot and former is a civilian. Who would you believe?

And why do you want her (and others like her) to believe in your version of the truth? What will that achieve? What narrative do you want to achieve? Win a twitter war? Win a forum war? For what?

I am astounded as to your reasoning. I really am. WOW!

[ramana]

My handicap is I am an engineer.

[SSridhar]

I don't want to turn this into a discussion on Ms. Fair. But, once upon a time, Ms. Christine Fair, was tasked by the GoTUS with supporting the Pakistani falsehood of Indian consulates in Herat and Jalalabad destabilizing Pakistan through Balochistan. She has used our mere presence in Afghanistan to discredit us without any shred of evidence. She has also claimed, "In 1989, an indigenous insurgency erupted in Kashmir in response to gross Indian malfeasance". Ms. Fair has invented several reasons always to justify Pakistan's nukes or its support for LeT. She would interlace such things with her criticism of the PA just in order to appear fair. So, why do we give her any credance?

[ArjunPandit]

My handicap is I am an engineer.

how so sir..if you ask me that is your single biggest asset...

Explain how her arguments would find more credence than Sameer Joshi? The latter is a fighter pilot and former is a civilian. Who would you believe?

I am indifferent to her but many folks outside BRF pointed her speech to me and they had two reasons sir,
1. she's supposedly neutral. Her dissing of pakis in one of her videos gives her that credential. Compared to that Sameer is an unknown figure outside military/BRF circles. Let's do a twitter follower count of hers and Sam Joshi. Not on twitter right now so cant quote the exact nos..
2. She quotes military experts with random stuff which most non BRF people can understand.
Sameer is a former pilot, but to most he's not a neutral party. He's part of IAF, which to many is like US military which has not been truthful.

Now your other questions,

And why do you want her (and others like her) to believe in your version of the truth?

Because, I believe it is the truth. I dont want India and Indian forces to be tagged along with pakis that lie, when they say we shot an Su30 and we say we shot an F16.

What will that achieve? What narrative do you want to achieve? Win a twitter war? Win a forum war? For what?

Depends on how do you look at it. Perhaps that is what differentiates us from pakis that can only win twitter wars and we dont even care about it. I do not believe, information warfare is a trivial thing. India paid the price of it by defeat of ABV in elections. But the main thing i want is the recognition to IAF where it is due. Most people, inclduing many indians do not give that. Now that is individual belief system. Mine might be wrong so happy to learn from wiser people here. I know it is getting off topic, but may be there is a bigger learning for me. Happy to learn from you all, pardon the ignorance.

[Karan M]

SSridhar, many simply don't know the background of Fair, or that other anti-Indian dude Stephen Cohen (whose claims were taken down in blistering rebuttals by you, JEM and KGoan) and several of these gora analysts who are anything but neutral. They continue to think these people are somehow objective, when their bias has become ludicrously laughable.

There is one chap called Chris Clary who on Feb 27th, openly noted he'd believe anything from the US side over India's claims because obviously the former was more credible. At least he was honest. He and many others are linked to Cohen above. The network and thought process is widespread.

Tellis is pro-India to the extent we could serve His Master's Voice. He was given unfettered access to the desi-establishment pre/post MRCA, quickly figured out the LCA was shaping up to be the future of the IAF (way before most of the cynics in BRF had access to that) and hence spent a ton of time running down the program in his article on the MRCA, and arguing that IAF being "fighter jocks" had no idea of making a geo-strategic choice and hence chose the Euro-canards, which "only" offered better aero-performance.

The rest of the pack includes chaps like Paul Staniland, Economist's Joshi, and many others who spend all their time re-circulating articles and claims which often represent a rather nasty streak of Hinduphobia. Which in turn is widely re-circulated by Dhume and his better half, Alyssa Ayres (who prior to Trump was even angling for an ambassadorial post to India). Their bias, loathing for the current GOI is open.

WaPo's Annie Gowan was so blatantly bigoted she openly asked for all those with "angry Hanuman" images to be banned from interacting with her, ran a fake news factory on India including one accusing Gujarati "Upper caste" families of practicising eugenics (and never published a retraction when it was clear it was fake). Apparently a Jesuit who ran a campaign against Fair accusing latter of not being X'ian enough.

NYT, we all know, it has long jumped the shark with regards to anything regarding India. They too have posted people with deep evangelical links, to India, and of course we know what happened to NPR's "Kashmiri intern", but nothing happened to her boss who recruited her and cleared her stories.

Expecting any of these folks to be objective with regards to a strong "Hindu nationalist" Govt is to expect the impossible. They literally believe in west's manifest destiny and look down on any culture which doesn't breathe, behave exactly as they wish it to do. Most of the Indian's at these orgs have drunk even more deeply of the kool-aid and act more loyal than the king.

A handful of objective analysts exist but of course, they too will have to do monkey-balancing if all their peers are so rabid.

[manjgu]

Did i read somewhere that a BR member had a chat with abhi ? any details...

[ramana]

No.

[mahadevbhu]

Agreed that commentators have biases and biased backgrounds.

Is it possible even so, to address their commentary without keeping their biases in mind and to refute or agree with their commentary, point by point?

Rationale behind this being that biased they may be but some of the aforementioned names are senior academics who's job is to study theorize and come up with possible ideas.

Thus battling their ideas point by point lends better credence to one's own arguments and in fact their articles are cited and recited by other academics.

[Rakesh]

1. she's supposedly neutral. Her dissing of pakis in one of her videos gives her that credential. Compared to that Sameer is an unknown figure outside military/BRF circles. Let's do a twitter follower count of hers and Sam Joshi. Not on twitter right now so cant quote the exact nos..

So that is your reasoning? Who has a greater twitter following...makes one more credible? Donald Trump has a twitter following of 70+ million (far greater than Sameer Joshi and the Academic), but yet everyone knows how truthful he is.

And the "token" dismissiveness of a Pakistani gives her what credentials? How old are you?

2. She quotes military experts with random stuff which most non BRF people can understand. Sameer is a former pilot, but to most he's not a neutral party. He's part of IAF, which to many is like US military which has not been truthful.

Sameer Joshi is not a serving member of the Indian Air Force. He has no need - while true - to parrot the IAF narrative. His analysis is his own. The only one who does not find him truthful would be Pakistanis and yourself.

And why do you want her (and others like her) to believe in your version of the truth?

Because, I believe it is the truth.

Do you really believe in your own truth?

I dont want India and Indian forces to be tagged along with pakis that lie, when they say we shot an Su30 and we say we shot an F16.

It does not affect India or Indian forces, as to why others group India and Pakistan together. The only one who is having takleef over this is you.

Depends on how do you look at it. Perhaps that is what differentiates us from pakis that can only win twitter wars and we dont even care about it. I do not believe, information warfare is a trivial thing. India paid the price of it by defeat of ABV in elections. But the main thing i want is the recognition to IAF where it is due. Most people, inclduing many indians do not give that. Now that is individual belief system. Mine might be wrong so happy to learn from wiser people here. I know it is getting off topic, but may be there is a bigger learning for me. Happy to learn from you all, pardon the ignorance.

The IAF has got the recognition from where it matters most - her own citizens.

The Govt even awarded Wing Commander Varthaman a Vir Chakra.

But you want to win a twitter war. But you are not going to do it on BRF.

Is it possible even so, to address their commentary without keeping their biases in mind and to refute or agree with their commentary, point by point?

Her commentary has been refuted. It is nobody else's fault that she does not want to believe it. You can bring a horse to the water, but you cannot make it drink.

Rationale behind this being that biased they may be but some of the aforementioned names are senior academics who's job is to study theorize and come up with possible ideas.

Has it ever occurred to you that she has never flown a fighter aircraft in her *ENTIRE* academic career or any other career that she may have had in the past? Think about that really carefully and then decide what theories that she can come up with. I am referring to the actual air battle and not the list of nonsensical arguments that she put forth.

Thus battling their ideas point by point lends better credence to one's own arguments and in fact their articles are cited and recited by other academics.

Their ideas have been battled and beaten. But you cannot make everyone believe your point of view. It is human to disagree. It is okay. No need to get takleef

[Rakesh]

@ mahadevbhu and ArjunPandit --->

Would she be this adamant about the shoot down not occuring, if in place of an "American-built" F-16....it was a "Chinese-built" JF-17 Thunder or a "Chinese-built" F-7PG that was shot down? And would the two of you be beating the drum of chini validation as vigorously, as you are doing with gora validation? I already know the answer....so don't bother replying.

Ramana-ji put it best ---> A gora word is worth 10 SDRE. That is the problem here.

She is on a PR mission to protect LM's mythical unicorn at all costs. Admitting the loss, especially at the hands of a Russian-built MiG-21, would be disastrous for sales.

[Atmavik]

just saw the video of former Air cheif. classic trolling of Pakis and PAF as he mentions eating grass a few times.

[LakshmanPST]

The non-Indian ppl who definitely know that an F16 has been shotdown that day are Pakistani Air Force, Paki higher level officers, ISI, Paki higher level politicians... (And few intel operatives from other countries...)

These are the ppl who need to know and we know that they know it... There is nothing else to prove to anyone else...

Same with Balakot strikes... The ppl, for whom the message need to be sent, got it... Everything else is secondary...
----
Just assume an F16 crashed inside Indian territory after being shotdown... Pakis would claim it is engine failure and not shotdown by IAF...
USA will demand request access to the debris... Then some sources based report will be leaked saying that they have inspected the debris and found that it is engine failure... Officially, USA won't say anything...
All these Goras & Goris 'academicians' will continue to ask proof that an IAF missile from a MIG21 actually hit the F16...

Things will go on this way...
----
I understand that lot of Indians are frustrated coz. IAF's accomplishment is not getting the recognition it deserves from other countries... Instead it is being equated with the fake PAF claim of shooting down Indian Su30...
But that is how things are...

[ramana]

No they are not frustrated but playing into Pak and US hands. My suggestion is stuff it
One more pro Unfair you can leave,
Enough discussion.
Yes I do get intolerant.

[Roop]

Enough discussion. Yes I do get intolerant.

No, you are not intolerant. In fact, I think you and the mods have been far too tolerant of all the whining to date. This faaltu nit-picking should have been cut off long ago. Spineless shivering-dhotis will drag any Indian achievement into the trashcan if allowed to do so.