'Surprise Was Technical, Not Strategic': Ex IAF Officer Counters Criticism Over Jet Losses To PAF

‘PAF could not discover a place to cover’: Former IAF officer hits again. 

Through the latest public debate over Indian Air Drive (IAF) jet losses to the Pakistan Air Drive (PAF) throughout Operation Sindoor in Might 2025, former IAF officer Ajay Ahlawat offered an in depth rebuttal to criticisms, emphasising that the losses had been resulting from technical, not strategic, shock.

Ahlawat mentioned India misplaced some jets as the primary wave of airstrikes was carried out below some very exacting circumstances. “Our strikers had been working below very restrictive guidelines of engagements, towards an adversary that was pre-warned and well-armed,” he added. 

In accordance with Ahlawat, the preliminary wave of Indian airstrikes was performed below very restrictive guidelines of engagement, imposed by political directives that particularly restricted strikes to terror infrastructure and prevented navy targets.

This meant that customary SEAD (Suppression of Enemy Air Defences) and DEAD (Destruction of Enemy Air Defences) missions, that are sometimes important to any air marketing campaign’s opening section, weren’t carried out.

Ahlawat defined that shock—often a bonus for the attacking drive—was absent as a result of the adversary was pre-warned and well-prepared. As an alternative, the IAF confronted a “technical shock” when the PAF employed data-linked beyond-visual-range (BVR) missiles at excessive ranges, exceeding Indian assumptions about missile capabilities.

The steerage offered to those air-launched weapons by satellites and AEWC (Airborne Early Warning and Management) platforms was not totally anticipated, and the IAF’s digital warfare risk libraries weren’t sufficiently up to date to counter these techniques.

Nevertheless, Ahlawat famous that the IAF rapidly tailored, studying from the preliminary setback and resuming operations successfully within the following days, finishing up decisive assaults with out additional interference.

The controversy intensified after India’s defence attaché to Indonesia, Captain (Indian Navy) Shiv Kumar, acknowledged at a seminar in Jakarta that the IAF misplaced “some plane” throughout the operation, attributing these losses to political constraints that prohibited concentrating on Pakistan’s navy belongings and air defences.

Kumar said that, following these losses, Indian forces revised their techniques, prioritized suppression of enemy air defences, and subsequently performed profitable strikes on navy installations utilizing superior munitions like BrahMos missiles.

This admission led to political backlash in India, with opposition events accusing the federal government of hiding the extent of the losses and demanding better transparency. In response, the Indian Embassy in Jakarta clarified that Kumar’s remarks had been taken out of context and misrepresented by the media. 

The embassy emphasised that the intent was to show the Indian armed forces’ adherence to civilian political management and the non-escalatory nature of Operation Sindoor, which was targeted on counter-terrorism slightly than direct navy confrontation.

the jet losses, if any, suffered by the IAF had been primarily the results of technical underestimation and restrictive engagement guidelines, not strategic or political mis-judgment. The IAF tailored rapidly, and subsequent operations proceeded with out related setbacks, whereas the episode sparked a broader debate about transparency and civil-military relations in India.

Primarily based On Enterprise At the moment Report