What Does Pakistan's Use of a New Chinese Fighter Jet Mean for the Future?
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You're listening to State of the World from NPR. We bring you the day's most vital international stories up close where they're happening. I'm Greg Dixon. India and Pakistan traded cross-border military strikes last month. It was the latest flare-up in a long-running feud between the two nuclear-armed countries. There was fear the attacks would continue to escalate, but fortunately they ended after four days with the help of the U.S. and others.

Among the significant developments in the brief conflict, a Chinese fighter plane saw combat for the first time. PAS Vigorous Dragon is here. That's a video from the Pakistan Air Force. Their pilots flew the Chinese-made Chengdu J-10C Vigorous Dragon during the clashes. And as we hear from NPR's Dia Hadid in Mumbai, that debut may have far-reaching consequences.

The Chinese fighter jets made an appearance after India launched strikes on Pakistan in May. India says it was retaliation for an attack two weeks earlier where militants killed 26 people. Pakistan said it wasn't connected and it fought back. It was the most serious fighting in decades. One piece of hardware that Pakistan used commanded outsized attention.

the Chengdu J-10C Vigorous Dragon, or the J-10. It's in the league of the F-16 or the French Raphael. That fighter jet is used by militaries around the world, including India's.

And soon after fighting began, Pakistan claimed that their J-10 squadron downed three of those French-made Rafales. CNN and Reuters later reported that Pakistan likely downed one Rafale. Only weeks later, the Indian chief of defence staff confirmed that they lost aircraft but gave no further details.

But the debut of the J-10 was not lost on those watching this conflict. The old commercial used to say, you know, this ain't your daddy's Oldsmobile. Brendan Mulvaney is a director of the U.S. Department of the Air Force's China Aerospace Studies Institute. The Indians were flying a very modern, very capable aircraft. The Pakistanis were flying a Chinese aircraft and shot it down with a Chinese air-to-air missile. Chinese social media went wild. This clip went viral. Bumalavichu, bumalavichu, bumalavichu, pitahap.

Chinese men dance Bollywood style with toy airplanes stuck to their Indian turbans and taunt to an Indian tune. They sing, what a shame those planes were destroyed.

The planes were the most prominent kit, but so much more comes from China. Aisha Sadiqa is an expert on Pakistan's military. By the time we got into this round of conflict, Pakistan's weaponry, 72 to 80 percent, has been from China. That gave the appearance to many Indians that China was ganging up with Pakistan. India and China have longstanding border disputes.

This is retired Indian Major General Ashok Kumar. Pakistan used the entire weaponry provided by China. So indirectly, it became a fight with China. He says that's what made the four-day conflict in May far more serious than previous bouts of fighting between India and Pakistan. But one analyst argues China isn't seeking to be a partner in Pakistan's fight with India.

This is Associate Professor of Political Science at University of Albany, Christopher Clary. China has been hesitant to take a public role other than voicing support for Pakistan.

and encouraging restraint. But Clary says China will keep weapons flowing for Pakistan for its next fight with India. What seems to be changing about modern China is it has the military capabilities to be a partner that can keep another state like Pakistan alive.

And the next fight is likely to be far more severe because the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has vowed to hit Pakistan even harder next time. With Indian officials saying publicly that terrorism on Indian soil will be greeted by a military response,

it is reasonable to expect that the next crisis will be quite severe. But not everything China supplied Pakistan was top-notch. Pakistan's Chinese-supplied air defences appear to have largely failed during the fighting. India struck deep into Pakistan multiple times, including a military base near the capital.

Mulvaney of the China Aerospace Studies Institute says regardless. We should give it due respect. They're not quite as good as, you know, what the US and our allies and partners use, but they're pretty darn good. They don't need as cool as Gucci equipment. Good enough. And that may be enough in the next round of fighting. With Emily Feng in Washington, I'm Dia Hadid, NPR News, Mumbai.

That's the state of the world from NPR. Thanks for listening.

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