Although the Indian Air Force has set itself the requirement of meeting the dual front combat since its establishment, it is naturally not easy to face the military pressure from China and Pakistan in reality. At this moment, the Indian Air Force is facing a problem, which is that the air defense systems of China and Pakistan are compressing the space of the Indian Air Force. What is going on?

The situation is that the Pakistani Army Air Defense Force recently introduced China's HQ-9 surface to air missile system, which is likely to be deployed near Kashmir. China had already deployed these missiles along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) earlier, which means that the entire Kashmir region may be surrounded by missiles of the same type from China and Pakistan.

This is obviously extremely bad news for the Indian Air Force. Although there has always been close military cooperation between China and Pakistan, if the latest defense cooperation between these two 'iron brothers' extends from the weapons field to the combat field, it will pose a new threat to India.

The HQ-9 is a medium to long range active radar guided surface to air missile system. The weapon uses the HT-233 Passive Electronic Scanning Array (PESA) radar system, with a detection range of 120 kilometers and a tracking range of 90 kilometers.

The system has four different types of radars: the 120 type low altitude capture radar, the 305A type 3D search radar, the 305B type 3D search radar, and the H-200 mobile combat radar.

It is widely believed that the HQ-9 can be comparable to the Russian S-300 and the US Patriot air defense system. The latest version of HQ-9 is expected to have a range of over 250 kilometers and a shooting altitude of up to 50 kilometers.

According to a tweet from the Pakistani military, the Pakistani army has introduced the HQ-9/P long-range surface to air missile. The export version of HQ-9 has a range of 125 kilometers.

Each system has eight transport launch vehicles, each carrying 4 missiles, for a total of 32 launched missiles. Other equipment that can be added includes a TWS-312 command post, an on-site survey vehicle based on Dongfeng EQ2050, and additional transport/loading vehicles.

It is not surprising that Pakistan purchases air defense weapons from China. Because India has been using its military trade relations with the United States and Russia to prevent Pakistan from obtaining weapons and equipment from these two countries. This means that it is difficult for Pakistan to obtain the S-400 and Patriot systems.

As more and more gusts of wind from the Indian Air Force appear in Kashmir, Pakistan naturally wants to obtain more anti-aircraft weapons to restrict the range of Indian fighter jets. And Chinese products may be the only ones that Pakistan can purchase without hesitation. At the same time, the advanced performance and perfect after-sales service of Chinese missiles can also make Pakistan deploy and use them with confidence.

On the other hand, India is clearly not going to sit idly by. The five sets of S-400 systems that India has purchased at a huge cost have already begun delivery, and it is expected to deploy three sets on the China India border and two sets in the India Pakistan direction.

India is still procuring Israel's Barak 8 air defense missile and the United States' NASAMS (AIM-120 land-based version) air defense missile. But for India, the biggest problem is not the inability to buy good weapons, or the insufficient quantity of purchases to create economies of scale.

On the other hand, the number of air defense missiles that can be deployed by China on the other side is enough to make Indian pilots feel uneasy. No wonder the Chief of Staff of the Indian Army claimed that China could "tear India to pieces" and defeat the Indian army within 60 hours.

Source: unnamed official account