The current iterations of the Tejas, the 2001 Mark 1 and Mark 1A, utilize G.E. Aerospace’s F404-GE-F2J3 afterburning turbofan engine.
India and Pakistan are fighting each other once again, as India is retaliating for terrorist attacks that killed more than two dozen people, including tourists, in the Indian part of Kashmir on April 22. Thus far, the conflict hasn’t escalated into a situation like the two nations’ full-scale wars of 1965 and 1971; instead, it seems to be limited in scope a la the 1999 Kargil War.
Pakistan claims to have shot down five Indian fighter jets already, but these claims have not been independently corroborated, and what’s more, the Pakistani government is mum on specifics of how it accomplished this alleged feat. Thus far, there have been no reports of any air-to-air combat between the two nations’ fighter jets. The last significant Indo-Pakistani jet vs. jet combat took place in the 1971 war; as The National Interest’s Michael Peck noted in a May 20, 2021, article,
“Both sides claimed victory in the air war. Chuck Yeager, who was in Pakistan advising their air force, claimed the Pakistanis ”whipped their asses.” The Indians claim Yeager was crazy. However, it does appear that India had the upper hand in the air, controlling the skies over East Pakistan and losing about forty-five aircraft to Pakistan’s seventy-five.”
If and when the Indian and Pakistani Air Forces’ jet jocks do clash with one another once more, there’s a distinctive possibility that they’ll be doing so using warbirds that at least partially incorporate U.S. technology.
Pakistan’s F-16: Wholly American-Made
The flagship (so to speak) of the Pakistani Air Force is the American-made F-16 Fighting Falcon (or as its U.S. pilots and crew chiefs prefer to call it, the “Viper”). According to my TNI colleague Sebastien Roblin, “Between October 1982 and 1986, a total of twenty-eight F-16As and twelve two-seat F-16Bs were delivered to Pakistan via Saudi Arabia in Operations Peace Gate I and II. According to the World Directory of Modern Military Aircraft (WDMMA), the Pakistani Air Force’s current F-16 fleet composition is as follows:
- Thirty-one F-16AM Block 15 fighter jets
- Twenty-three F-16BM Block 15 fighter jets
- Twelve F-16C Block 52+ fighter jets
- Nine F-16A Block 16 fighter jets
- Six F-16D Block 52+ fighter jets
- Four F-16B Block 15 fighter jets
The initial F-16 sales to Pakistan occurred during happier times in U.S.-Pakistani relations. Pakistan’s then-ruler, General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, was a strong supporter of America’s efforts to arm the Afghan mujahideen fighters’ resistance efforts against Soviet occupation. After Zia’s death in August 1988 and the end of the Soviet-Afghan War six months thereafter, relations between America and Pakistan gradually took a turn for the worse; those ties briefly warmed up in the early days of the Global War on Terror in the autumn of 2001, when then-Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf aligned himself with then-President George W. Bush’s war effort against Al Qaeda and Taliban forces in Afghanistan.
However, that “second honeymoon” (so to speak) didn’t last long, largely due to long-standing suspicion that Pakistan’s infamous Inter-Services Intelligence has been supporting the Taliban and other terrorist groups (including the Kashmiri militants that carried out the April 2025 attack). Accordingly, the United States suspended its F-16 sales to Pakistan for many years, thus compelling Islamabad to partner with a major American adversary, China, to produce the JF-17 Thunder fighter.
India’s HAL Tejas: Homegrown in India, But Carrying an American-Made Engine
Throughout the Cold War, India proclaimed itself to be part of the so-called Non-Aligned Movement, but that didn’t stop them from buying plenty of Soviet-made military equipment, to include jet fighters such as the MiG-21 (NATO reporting name “Fishbed;” Indian reporting name “Bison”) and the MiG-29 “Fulcrum.“
Fast-forward to the present day, and concurrent with the deterioration in America’s relationship with Pakistan has been a warming trend in U.S.-India relations, as manifested in “The Quad” as a bulwark against China. Though India hasn’t yet purchased any American-made fighters—and indeed, India’s continued purchase of Russian military hardware remains a bone of contention in its relationship with the United States—it has produced a homegrown fighter, the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) Tejas (“Radiance”) Light Combat Aircraft, which utilizes American-made engines.
The current iterations of the Tejas, the 2001 Mark 1 and Mark 1A, utilize G.E. Aerospace’s F404-GE-F2J3 afterburning turbofan engine, while the Mark 2 Tejas will use G.E.’s slightly more powerful F414 INS6 (the same powerplant as the U.S. Navy’s F/A-18 Super Hornet).
Tejas vs. Viper: Who Would Win?
Though the fourth-generation F-16 (maiden flight date February 2, 1976) is a significantly older design than the 4.5-generation Tejas (maiden flight date January 4, 2001), the Viper hasn’t remained frozen in time, as it has gone through more upgrades than you can shake a stick at. The American jet has speed, range, and ceiling advantages over the Indian warbird (differentials of 90 mph, 634 miles, and 4,134 feet, respectively).
Moreover, the F-16 is one of the most battle-proven fighters in existence, with an extremely impressive 76:1 aerial kill ratio. In contrast, the Tejas has only been deployed operationally once thus far (not counting the current kerfuffle) and has yet to be “blooded” in air-to-air battle.
But don’t count out the Tejas completely just yet. As the narrator of the CVRN Tech channel on YouTube states in a video posted on March 11, 2025:
“While the F-16 remains a battle-tested aircraft, Tejas is an evolving fighter with modern technology. As India continues to upgrade Tejas with better weapons, radar, and engines, like the G.E. F414 for the Mk 2, it will become an even stronger contender. Tejas may not completely outclass the F-16 today, but in the coming years it will have the potential to match or even surpass it in combat effectiveness.”
So then, in the meantime, I’d still have to give the edge to the F-16 over the Tejas, at least on paper, but ultimately it’d boil down to individual pilot training, skill, and determination.
About the Author: Christian D. Orr
Christian D. Orr was previously a Senior Defense Editor for National Security Journal (NSJ) and 19FortyFive. He is a former Air Force Security Forces officer, Federal law enforcement officer, and private military contractor (with assignments worked in Iraq, the United Arab Emirates, Kosovo, Japan, Germany, and the Pentagon). Chris holds a B.A. in International Relations from the University of Southern California (USC) and an M.A. in Intelligence Studies (concentration in Terrorism Studies) from American Military University (AMU). He has also been published in The Daily Torch, The Journal of Intelligence and Cyber Security, and Simple Flying. Last but not least, he is a Companion of the Order of the Naval Order of the United States (NOUS). If you’d like to pick his brain further, you can ofttimes find him at the Old Virginia Tobacco Company (OVTC) lounge in Manassas, Virginia, partaking of fine stogies and good quality human camaraderie.
Image: Falcons Spotters / Shutterstock.com.
