Pakistan has claimed to have downed multiple Indian fighter jets using its Chinese-origin J-10C fighter jet armed with long-range air-to-air missiles. The claims, despite not being supported by evidence, have been endorsed by Chinese state-owned media and military bloggers.
Pakistan claimed it had downed five Indian fighter jets over Kashmir and other regions, including the 4.5th-generation Rafale operated by the Indian Air Force (IAF) after India launched ‘Operation Sindoor’ on terror training camps in Pakistan as retribution for the Pahalgam terror attack.
Pakistan later claimed to have used its newly acquired Chinese-origin J-10C fighter for what it described as a brief encounter.
The Pakistani foreign minister, Ishaq Dar, told the National Assembly that the J-10C shot down five Indian fighter jets, three of which were Rafales. Pakistan has been unable to furnish evidence to back these claims, and the Indian side has not confirmed any losses.
An unidentified high-ranking French intelligence official later told CNN that Pakistan downed an Indian Rafale fighter. This apparent confirmation has been linked to reports that an aircraft had crashed in Bhatinda, Punjab. While this has stoked several theories, no concrete evidence has been presented so far.
Notably, the Chinese state-owned Global Times (GT) has diligently provided extensive coverage of these claims. After being schooled by the Indian embassy against publishing unverified claims on May 7, GT published Dar’s remarks in great detail, emphasising that “Pakistan has confirmed participation of the J-10C” in response to Indian attacks.
“Pakistan, which has imported a bulk of the defense equipment, including J-10C fighter jets, claimed to have shot down five Indian planes, including a French Rafale jet,” it stated.
The same editorial line was adopted by the Chinese news company and blogging site Sohu, where Chinese military bloggers and netizens discussed the alleged downing of the Indian Rafale. One such article stated that Pakistan had shot down six Rafales by using electronic warfare to disable them first, followed by a strike. Meanwhile, another article described it as the “most serious air loss faced by India in decades.”
Referring to the unconfirmed downing of an IAF Rafale, Hu Shisheng, Deputy Secretary-General of the Academic Committee of the China Institute of Modern International Relations, said that this attack will likely have a significant impact on India’s military reform, especially in terms of fighter procurement.
He stated that India may reconsider purchasing more advanced American fighters, such as the American F-35, or increase R&D investment in sixth-generation fighters.
Some of these reports and blogs heaped praises on the J-10C, arguing that Pakistan downed Indian Rafales as the Chinese-origin J-10C has a longer detection range than the Rafale, along with cutting-edge Electronic Warfare capabilities.
The above claim may be misplaced because, according to publicly available information, the Rafale is generally considered to have a longer detection range than the Chengdu J-10C. This is primarily due to its advanced RBE2 AESA radar, which reportedly has a detection range exceeding 200-240 kilometres. In contrast, the J-10CP has a range of about 120 to 200 kilometres.
The Chinese bloggers also pointed to the range of the PL-15E missile, which is believed to have been used by the PAF J-10CP against IAF fighters. It said, “The PL-15E has a range of 150 kilometers. With the active phased array radar of the J-10CE, it can lock and shoot down advanced fighters such as Indian Rafales and Su-30MKI in BVR combat.
Earlier, the Chinese media had endorsed claims made by Pakistani Defense Minister Khwaja Asif that the J-10C fighters successfully interfered with the Rafale’s radar and communication system, causing the aircraft to lose its situational awareness and forcing it to land in Srinagar on April 29. The incident remains unverified.
These comments and claims are hardly surprising given that China considers Pakistan its closest ally. Indian experts have repeatedly noted that Pakistan acquired the J-10C only to counter the Indian Rafale. In 2022, a popular Chinese military analyst, Shi Hong, told Global Times: “The J-10C is also significantly more powerful than the old US-made F-16 fighter jet of the Pakistan Air Force and can rival the Rafale fighter jet that recently entered service with the Indian Air Force.”
Nonetheless, several leading US-based publications, such as Reuters, the New York Times, and CNN, published these claims. As a result, the stocks of Avic Chengdu Aircraft Co. Ltd., which manufactures the J-10C and the JF-17 in use by Pakistan, rallied over 36% in two sessions. Meanwhile, Dassault Aviation’s stock dipped 1.64–5%.
China has since been milking the situation to its benefit. After Pakistan confirmed the J-10C’s deployment, a Chinese journalist and PLA commentator, Shen Shiwei, posted a video of the aircraft on the social media site X. The video was accompanied by the caption: “Three years in 2022, #Pakistan officially inducted the Chinese-developed fighter jets J-10CE, the export version of the J-10C, into its Air Force as a major addition to the country’s defense system.”
Rafale Down Or Not?
Pakistan’s Foreign Minister said that the J-10C fighter jets were deployed based on intelligence received beforehand. “There were instructions to only target Indian jets that released payloads,” Dar told lawmakers on May 7. “This is why only five jets were taken down. Had the directive been different, nearly 10-12 jets would have been struck.”
Some social media accounts posted pictures of the wreckage of an aircraft bearing serial number 001, claiming that this was India’s first Dassault Rafale EH fighter jet. The pictures were allegedly taken in the Indian city of Bathinda. However, on verification, it was ascertained that the BS-001 image of the claimed Rafale first appeared in September 2024.
More than 24 hours later, Pakistan has yet to serve evidence to support these claims.
However, if confirmed, this would be the first loss of a Rafale in combat. The IAF has 36 Rafale fighter jets in its arsenal, brought in a government-to-government contract in 2016. This would also be the IAF’s first combat loss since Balakot 2019, when the IAF lost a MiG-21 Bison in an air duel with Pakistan.
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The Indian government or military has yet to comment on these claims, but Indian military experts have dismissed them as disinformation, particularly because Islamabad has not provided evidence–such as a cockpit recording, radar data, or missile telemetry– to back the claims.
In addition to the alleged downing of Rafale, some Pakistan-affiliated accounts on the social media platform X are also posting videos of a crashed Indian MiG-29. However, the video is from September 2024, when the IAF lost a MiG-29 in the Barmer sector in Rajasthan. The Press Information Bureau (PIB) also refuted these claims.
Amid these claims and counter-claims, another set of images surfaced on social media showing the wreckage of a missile in Hoshiarpur in India, which experts and Western media publications have attributed to the Chinese-origin PL-15E. This further stoked speculation that a Pakistani J-10C likely fired the missile to shoot down an Indian jet in an aerial encounter.
These are mere predictions that could not be confirmed. Moreover, even if the wreckage is that of the PL-15E, there is no evidence to prove the missile was able to down a target.
EurAsian Times had reported earlier that China had urgently delivered the long-range missile to Pakistan amid rising tensions with India. The missile is compatible with the JF-17 and the J-10C fighters.
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