The Impact Of Pakistan’s First Indigenous JF-17 Thunder Squadron Deployment

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan—The impact of the JF-17 Thunder deployment can be heard far beyond Islamabad and Peshawar. This positions Pakistan on new geostrategic map. Now the Sri Lankans can have as many planes they want to fight the Indian sponsored Tamil terrorists. And the Middle Eastern Air Forces can begin flying the JF-17 Thunders without begging the U.S. And the small countries of Africa can own their own JF-17 Thunders without selling their souls to the Europeans. The manufacturing and the deployment of the new class fighter jet has been done in a record time, one of the shortest time lines in the history of aviation. This is a major milestone for the Pakistan Air Force and brings it one step closer to becoming a major producer and exporter of planes around the world. About 17 countries are interested in the JF-17 Thunder which was a major attraction at the Pakistani IDEAS 2009 defense show this year. The success story of Pakistan’s military-industrial manufacturing base is not limited to the JF-17 Thunder. The nuclear bomb, the missiles and the tanks were all produced in record time, considering that Pakistan had only one dysfunctional textile mill, one dilapidated university, and one archaic jute mill at Independence in 1947. No other country has come so far in defense production in such a short period of time.