In an interview to discuss the claim made by the Air Force Chief, Air Chief Marshal A. P. Singh last week that during Operation Sindoor, India had downed 12 or 13 Pakistani planes, both in air and on the ground, including 9 or 10 fighter jets such as F-16s and JF-17s, a C-130 aircraft and perhaps one or possibly two air-borne early warning aircraft, the editor of Force Magazine, Pravin Sawhney, has categorically said: “I find the Air Force Chief’s claim very hard to accept.”

Sawhney said that he had spoken to a Russian expert, who understands the S400 extremely well, who pointed out that “it is not possible” to conclusively claim that the system has “killed” hi-tech fighter jets such as the F-16s and JF-17s. It has the capacity to engage them but it cannot prove that it has killed them. That would be an “assumption”, Sawhney said.

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