Chinese weapons gain credibility after Pakistan-India conflict

Miami Herald

14-05-2025

The recent conflict between India and Pakistan is prompting a reassessment of Chinese weapons, challenging long-held perceptions of their inferiority to Western arms and sparking concern in places wary of Beijing.
Pakistan hailed the use of its Chinese J-10Cs to shoot down five Indian fighters, including French-made Rafale aircraft, last week in response to Indian military strikes. Although the reports haven't been confirmed, and India hasn't commented, the jet's maker saw its market capitalization soar by over 55 billion yuan ($7.6 billion), or more than a fourth, by the end of last week.
Hu Xijin, the ex-editor-in-chief of China's nationalist tabloid Global Times, warned on social media that if Pakistan's successful strikes were true, Taiwan should feel 'even more scared.' Beijing sees the self-ruled democracy as its own, and reserves the right to use military force to bring it under control.
Taiwan closely watched the clash between Pakistan and India, according to Shu Hsiao-Huang, an associate research fellow at the Institute of National Defense and Security Research, a government-funded military think tank based in Taipei.
'We may need to reassess the PLA's air combat capabilities, which may be approaching - or even surpassing - the level of U.S. air power deployments in East Asia,' Shu said, adding Washington might want to consider selling more advanced systems to Taiwan.
While President Xi Jinping has been trying to modernize the world's biggest military by the number of active personnel, the People's Liberation Army has been mired in scandals. That had raised questions about the combat-readiness of its powerful and secretive Rocket Force, which is responsible for conventional missiles and would play a crucial role in any invasion of Taiwan.
The reported success of J-10Cs, which have had few battle tests and are used to patrol the Taiwan Strait, appears to counter those doubts. It's still uncertain, however, how they would fare against U.S. fighters such as the F-16, which make up the bulk of Taiwan's jets and have been combat-proven across decades and militaries.
Another Chinese weapon Pakistan uses will also be coming under intense scrutiny by Beijing's adversaries. Parts of Chinese air-to-air PL-15 missiles found in India after the reported shoot-downs suggest the weapons, deployed on Pakistan's J-10C aircraft, proved effective in their first known combat use. With a top speed above Mach 5, the PL-15 is a rival to Western air-to-air missiles.
China is the world's fourth-largest arms exporter but its customers are mostly developing nations like Pakistan that have limited funds. The latest developments could bolster Beijing's sales pitch as major economies from Europe to Asia heed President Donald Trump's call to ramp up defense spending.
'There is a good chance the weapons systems China is able to offer will be even more appealing to potential buyers' especially in the Global South, said James Char, assistant professor of the China Program at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, noting the J-10C is not even China's most advanced jet.
Buying weapons has also become a focus for developing nations, mulling U.S. arms purchases to appease Trump and his demands to reduce American trade imbalances. Several of these countries list China as a top trading partner and could consider hedging bets by acquiring systems from the Asian country, too.
China's overseas arms sales have been growing, with its five-year average weapons exports more than tripling in 2020-2024 from 2000-2004, according to calculations based on data from Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. Chinese government and state-owned enterprises do not disclose data on arms exports.
Some of the largest state-owned players - also blacklisted by the U.S. - include Norinco Group, which makes armored vehicles and anti-missiles systems; Aviation Industry Corporation of China, whose subsidiary AVIC Chengdu Aircraft Co. manufactured the J-10Cs; as well as China State Shipbuilding Corp., a producer of frigates and submarines.
M. Taylor Fravel, director of the Security Studies Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, cautioned that the Chinese jet was primarily for aerial combat, while the Rafale was designed to conduct many kinds of missions, meaning the J-10 may have held an advantage.
Chinese weapons exports have been plagued for years by defects, specialists have said, adding that the seemingly inexpensive systems can drain security budgets due to maintenance expenses.
'China attracts customers for its military equipment with cut-rate pricing and financing but there are hidden costs - especially when gear malfunctions,' Cindy Zheng, then a researcher at Rand Corp., wrote in a research paper just before joining the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission in the latter stages of the Biden administration.
In 2022, Myanmar had to reportedly ground its fleet of Chinese fighter jets due to structural cracks and other technical issues. Bangladesh lodged complaints with Beijing about the quality of its military hardware last year. Even the Pakistan Navy has been facing issues with its F-22P frigates, forcing them to operate the vessels with significantly degraded capabilities.
'Questions about combat capabilities and other issues, including concerns about interoperability with non-Chinese platforms, have hampered China's ability to expand exports beyond a handful of countries,' Bloomberg Intelligence's senior associate analyst Eric Zhu wrote in a note last week.
China's Defense Ministry didn't respond to a request for comment on the past weapon defects and the J-10C's recent performance. Beijing regularly says that its military helps maintain global stability and that it prefers to resolve the Taiwan issue peacefully.
Xi has been trying to turn China's defense industry around by bringing together the military and civilian sectors, in an effort to transform the PLA into a modern force by 2027.
That's led to breakthroughs such as China's launch in December of its first next-generation amphibious assault ships, considered the world's largest of its kind. A video of what is believed to be a test flight of the nations' sixth-generation fighter jet circulated on social media that year, leading to a rally in defense stocks.
But it's wrong to call the J-10C's potential success a 'DeepSeek moment' for China's military, said Fravel, referring to the artificial intelligence chat bot that surprised the world earlier this year, noting that the jet's design wasn't new.
'But it doesn't need to be a DeepSeek moment to be significant,' he added. 'A lot is being learned about how Chinese systems perform under combat conditions.'
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-With assistance from Colum Murphy, Alastair Gale and Philip Glamann.
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