India Performed Creditably In May 2025 India-Pakistan War, Says Stimson Centre Analyst – OpEd |
Though India lost some aircraft in the four-day India-Pakistan air war in May 2025, it struck deep into Pakistan with missiles and drones while defending itself well against similar attacks by Pakistan, says Christopher Clary, a Fellow at Stimson Centre’s South Asia program.
In the conflict that began on May 7 and ended on May 10, Pakistani air defences interfered with or intercepted some attempted Indian strikes, but Pakistan showed a serious vulnerability to Indian air attacks, Clary says in his report entitled “Four Days in May: The India-Pakistan Crisis of 2025, Stimson Centre” published on May 28, 2025.
The conflict represented several military firsts, the US analyst points out. It was the first time that India used cruise missiles on Pakistan, both the BrahMos cruise missile (co-developed with Russia) as well as the European SCALP-EG.
It was also the first time Pakistan used conventionally armed short-range ballistic missiles on India, in the form of the Fatah-I and Fatah-II and possibly other types.
While drones have been used sporadically along the Line of Control in Kashmir and elsewhere for smuggling, this is the first instance of drone “warfare” in an India-Pakistan conflict where both sides employed drones with the intent of causing damage to the other.
On May 7, Pakistan had immediate success in a defensive counterair operation. It claimed it shot down six Indian Air Force (IAF) jets on May 7, five over Kashmir and one over Punjab. There is substantiating evidence that Pakistan indeed brought down up to four planes.
A Washington Post visual investigation found compelling evidence of three crash sites in India—two in Indian Kashmir and another in Indian Punjab. The Post went further in identifying two of the three crashed airplanes as the French Rafale and Mirage-2000. The presumption is that any downed aircraft in India were Indian rather than Pakistani. The Government of India had not labelled any of these crash sites as being those of Pakistani aircraft.
Separately, Reuters reported on May 7 that there were three aircraft downed in Kashmir alone, citing local government sources. Foreign government officials confirmed to international media that at least one or two aircraft were downed in India in the early hours of the conflict.
How Pakistan achieved this apparent counterair success is unclear. International observers assess IAF pilots as being highly skilled, and several of the downed aircraft were relatively modern – Rafale deliveries to India only started in 2020.
On the reason why Indian jets were shot down, Clary says that it was perhaps because India chose to focus exclusively on terrorist- and militancy-associated targets in the initial May 7 strikes. A broader Indian campaign to suppress Pakistani air defences might have caused military casualties and undercut India’s desire to avoid escalation and demonstrate restraint, Clary says.
Political logic and military logic might have worked at cross-purposes, he adds.
However, some outside observers speculated that the Pakistani success was the result of greater integration of ground- and air-based sensors with frontline fighter aircraft. Before the military clashes began, the Pakistan Air Force had previewed its potential use of Chinese PL-15 long-range air-to-air missiles.
The recovery of PL-15 missile debris in India confirms they were used. At least one US official told Reuters that the Chinese J-10 was involved in the downing of Indian aircraft, which would imply PL-15 success.
The Indian Air Force denied that the PL-15s hit their intended targets and pointed to unexploded PL-15s on Indian soil as a sign of at least some misses.
It is also possible that some or all downed........