For years, I’ve listened to analysts claim Washington was washing its hands of us. So, honestly? I felt a real sense of vindication when the State Department notified Congress of that $686 million upgrade package. We’re talking 92 Link-16 systems and top-tier avionics that keep our F-16s lethal until 2040. You don’t drop that kind of money on ‘routine maintenance.’ That is a loud, strategic vote of confidence in Pakistan’s air power, plain and simple.

Washington’s timing could not be more telling. It comes just seven months after the events of 6-8 May 2025, when the Pakistan Air Force delivered a clinical, proportionate, and overwhelmingly superior response to India’s attempted strikes in Operation Sindoor. In those seventy-two hours, our pilots, leveraging Chinese-origin J-10C fighters armed with long-range PL-15 air-to-air missiles, neutralised multiple Indian combat aircraft-confirmed losses include at least three Rafales, two Su-30MKIs, one MiG-29UPG, one Mirage 2000, and one Jaguar-while keeping our own material safe. JF-17 Thunder jets, firing hypersonic CM-400AKG missiles, obliterated India’s prized S-400 air defence system at Adampur, a $1.5 billion asset that had been touted as impenetrable but proved woefully vulnerable to our precision........

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