Did the SPECTRA EW suite contribute to the alleged IAF Rafale loss on the 7th May 2025?

[Ainen]

The question needs to be asked, why was India even flying in PL-15 range when they where launching cruise missiles with double the range of the PL-15? The whole point of cruise missiles is to not be in range of air defenses.

Simple answer is that aircraft launching LACMs didn't fly into PL-15 range.
Others did.

 

[AndersJ]

I cursorily watched hopefully the relevant parts of PAF's press conference when someone posted it here. Reading this I began to wonder about their description about changing their ROE literally on the fly and rerouting of civilian traffic; I mean, reroute as much as you will, civilian planes can't just instantaneously disappear into thin air. Viewed through a cynical lens, as long as the active engagement might have lasted if there was any civilian traffic in the vicinity then yes, it would raise the bar for IAF to start lobbing BVR missiles in the general direction of, if not ethically then at least in terms of its potential for a major escalation. Doesn't pertain to or explain SPECTRA not saving the lost Rafale though.



As to keeping things updated:



If there was an up to date threat description about the PL-15E available then IAF should have had it uploaded.

Yes, looking at a map over where the fight took place and noting population centers, shooting BVR missiles into India seems far safer than doing so into Pakistan if one is worried about collateral damage and downing civilian airliners.

Then about the SPECTRA: Even if the PL-15 was in the threat library, and even if the SPECTRA was in "war" mode, some ECM techniques requires that the defending aircraft is flown in a "correct" way to work. Sorry for being so coy, but even if its been more than 20 years since I worked with EW, I'm still bound by NDA's. The Rafale pilot could just have been unlucky that he was caught at a very inopportune moment.

 

[AndersJ]

The question needs to be asked, why was India even flying in PL-15 range when they where launching cruise missiles with double the range of the PL-15? The whole point of cruise missiles is to not be in range of air defenses.

The IAF are probably asking themselves that very same question right now: Why did we not have contingency plans to handle this? Why did we not anticipate that this could evolve into a long range BVR fight?

Remember that there is no indication that the IAF fired, or even carried METEORs in this engagement for that matter. So it look like they simply did not anticipate what unfolded.

Remember that even the PAF themselves say that they changed the ROE on the fly. I don't find it unlikely that the IAF through intelligence sources knew of the PAF ROE when they (the IAF) did their mission planning and that they were counting on his, which initially restricted AA missiles to be fired only on aircraft that had crossed the border, and that this would be the ROE that the PAF would adhere to.

I find this to be the most plausible explanation. Else why would they not have carried METEOR's when they knew the PAF had LP-15's?

 

[UpForce]

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/india-pakistan-conflict-offers-rich-intelligence-opportunity-china-2025-05-09/

The role of the Chinese in all this is another matter. SPECTRA not mentioned in the above article but must be of interest. Of course it might well be that this latest escalation was largely due to dynamics between the direct combatants only but Pakistan's strategic and economic environment is changing fundamentally, perhaps reflected in more diverse transactions between them and their arms suppliers. Certainly the events on the whole can be viewed as the Indians being goaded into a somewhat predictable course of actions. Pakistani descriptions of their diplomats excitedly racing to the Chinese to report on the events post facto, at least, as though Chinese intelligence just sat back through it all stretch credulity.

 

[Ainen]

In India it worked apparently well - with expensive missiles matching high intensivity, high stakes campaign and doing more or less as advertized. Good for India, being able to shoot multi-million defensive salvoes at will. In this sense, S-400 sits at both tables - both as theater OtH SAM(through 40n6), and as an area saturation attack breaker (through 9m96).

In Ukraine, it is in 3+ year long attrition campaign, where S-400 outproduced entire western SAM production in condituions of american space sigint/remote sensing, sacrifices have to be made(at least with Russian economy and electronics sector). The sacrifice is ARH.
Attrition campaign can't be done with top of the line interceptors(and those don't prevent losses outright, see patriot). Losing systems once in a while is not a disaster, since those can be replaced. Failing to keep up with drone production would've been a disaster.

The problem for the Kashmir in context of this thread - if/how it affected the specific engagement in question. And, at large, whether SAM could've played against an opponent with better reaching MRAAM. In Russian context, SAMs are getting networked with Russian aircraft for "forward pass" like operation. The question is whether India can create similar environment with mostly non-native datalinks and data sets all round.
It, of course, shouldn't have been a problem in the first place: meteor allows to fire back even from extreme disparity in launch conditions. But sometimes it can't be done(for example, fighters already lost initiative). Can SAM protect them without blue on blue (and won't spectra happily jam blue on blue in overhead engagement)?

 

[AndersJ]

Horseshit.

Yes, it certainly is. But it was in reply to an even bigger pile of said substance and while I was being ironic, sadly, I think the post I was replying to was not.

 

[Bruno Anthony]

Please elaborate.

I don’t think the Russians shot down ATACMS in numbers if they were fired in numbers. Did they shoot down one or 2 shot in 1 or 2 missile salvos? Yeah probably.

 

[Galaxy]

The question needs to be asked, why was India even flying in PL-15 range when they where launching cruise missiles with double the range of the PL-15? The whole point of cruise missiles is to not be in range of air defenses.

One can argue the aircraft launching standoff munitions were not in range however based on experience from the 2019 Balokot strikes India does needlessly put its aircraft in harms way. In 2019 Indian aircraft crossed the border to hit targets in Balokot Pakistan when it’s less than 50km from the LOC. Even more bizarre is they used Spice 2000s that could have been released from about 60-100km away.

One can argue they used low level penetration attacks to keep the element of surprise and that at low altitudes the Spice 2000 did not have the range but it was still a poor choice in my opinion. Indian aircraft could have simply flown at low levels, gained altitude around the LOC, released the munitions and then flew back home.

Horseshit.

Thanks for the professional reply. Ukrainians officials have vowed on many occasions to destroy the Crimea bridge and they have been able to stike it approximately zero times with any munitions precisely because of heavy air defenses around the bridge. The Russians reported many failed Ukrainian missile attacks on the bridge. The only time they struck the bridge was when Ukraine used a terrorist style attack by placing explosives in an unsuspecting innocent man’s truck and detonating it when other vehicles were present.

Yes there is video of an S-400 launcher getting destroyed but it did fire off missiles before it was hit. This suggests Ukraine used a saturation attack.

Indian prime minister also praised the performance of the S-400 recently while it’s acknowledged that Pakistan used the Fatah-II ballistic missiles and I have yet to see convincing evidence of Pakistan successfully targeting Indian bases.

 

[Gablu]

Morning fellas.

Where can I access the closed thread of our skirmish with Pakistan?

Can't find it.

 

[flateric]

https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/kashmir-conflict-2025-news-only.46119/

 

[flateric]

I see some still gonna transfer all the off-topic shit from closed Kashmir topic here. I wonder what would you do with hamster owners forum.

 

[AndersJ]

That is another good point. The Russian used S-400s over Ukraine in which they knocked out F-16s equipped with EW system and many SU-27s, MiG-29s and SU-24s from long distances and often while those aircraft are at very low altitudes as there are several videos of Ukrainian aircraft getting shot down while flying low. It makes me wonder what Indian S-400 systems were doing? I find it hard to believe the Pakistanis just jammed everything because even the Ukrainians can’t prevent the Russians from effectively using S-400s and other missiles from downing Ukranian aircraft with the help of NATO EW systems. My guess they were out of range or did not engage due to fear of friendly fire. If Ukraine were to launch dozens of aircraft it’s guaranteed at least some would get knocked out.

In India it worked apparently well - with expensive missiles matching high intensivity, high stakes campaign and doing more or less as advertized. Good for India, being able to shoot multi-million defensive salvoes at will. In this sense, S-400 sits at both tables - both as theater OtH SAM(through 40n6), and as an area saturation attack breaker (through 9m96).

In Ukraine, it is in 3+ year long attrition campaign, where S-400 outproduced entire western SAM production in condituions of american space sigint/remote sensing, sacrifices have to be made(at least with Russian economy and electronics sector). The sacrifice is ARH.
Attrition campaign can't be done with top of the line interceptors(and those don't prevent losses outright, see patriot). Losing systems once in a while is not a disaster, since those can be replaced. Failing to keep up with drone production would've been a disaster.

The problem for the Kashmir in context of this thread - if/how it affected the specific engagement in question. And, at large, whether SAM could've played against an opponent with better reaching MRAAM. In Russian context, SAMs are getting networked with Russian aircraft for "forward pass" like operation. The question is whether India can create similar environment with mostly non-native datalinks and data sets all round.
It, of course, shouldn't have been a problem in the first place: meteor allows to fire back even from extreme disparity in launch conditions. But sometimes it can't be done(for example, fighters already lost initiative). Can SAM protect them without blue on blue (and won't spectra happily jam blue on blue in overhead engagement)?

One can argue the aircraft launching standoff munitions were not in range however based on experience from the 2019 Balokot strikes India does needlessly put its aircraft in harms way. In 2019 Indian aircraft crossed the border to hit targets in Balokot Pakistan when it’s less than 50km from the LOC. Even more bizarre is they used Spice 2000s that could have been released from about 60-100km away.

One can argue they used low level penetration attacks to keep the element of surprise and that at low altitudes the Spice 2000 did not have the range but it was still a poor choice in my opinion. Indian aircraft could have simply flown at low levels, gained altitude around the LOC, released the munitions and then flew back home.

Thanks for the professional reply. Ukrainians officials have vowed on many occasions to destroy the Crimea bridge and they have been able to stike it approximately zero times with any munitions precisely because of heavy air defenses around the bridge. The Russians reported many failed Ukrainian missile attacks on the bridge. The only time they struck the bridge was when Ukraine used a terrorist style attack by placing explosives in an unsuspecting innocent man’s truck and detonating it when other vehicles were present.

Yes there is video of an S-400 launcher getting destroyed but it did fire off missiles before it was hit. This suggests Ukraine used a saturation attack.

Indian prime minister also praised the performance of the S-400 recently while it’s acknowledged that Pakistan used the Fatah-II ballistic missiles and I have yet to see convincing evidence of Pakistan successfully targeting Indian bases.

Well all these songs of praise for the S-400 and other Russian built systems that are popping up in this thread will not change the fact that a nation which claims to be a Superpower has now in more than three years of fighting not managed to attain anything like air superiority over a minor nation (military wise) and which only had token forces back in 2022.

Sure, today in 2025 Ukraine has more competitive anti-aircraft and air assets and Russia is bogged down, but back then in 2022? Objectively it should have been a cake walk. But as things have unfolded, Russian military gear performed just dismally poor there as it always has.

In the past Russians have resorted to blaming the operators of the equipment for these shortfalls, e.g. like Syria, Egypt and Iraq etc. in the Middle Eastern conflicts. But now it’s themselves operating their own military gear. And still it does not perform.

And now the single loss of a Rafale is being brought forward as proof that things have changed. This time it’s different and now Russian and Chinese gear will transform the battlefield.

But that would have been like saying that since the USAF lost an F-4 to a Mig-21 in Vietnam, this now means that the US has been dethroned as the producer of the world’s best military gear. Sure, USAF planes were brought down in that conflict by SA-2 and Migs. But that did not mean that Russian gear was better or that the West was being dethroned as the producers of the best military gear. The loss of an F-4 could and did happen in Vietnam, but it was the exception to the rule.

I’m pretty sure that that is what happened with the IAF Rafale loss as well. It will in the long run prove to be the exception, and not the rule. But that does not stop sycophants and people like the aviation journalist I mentioned earlier from claiming that this time it’s different: This time Russian and Chinese military gear is on the rise.

But this Rafale loss is still a single occurrence, and in that sense tells us no more than the loss of a single F-4 back in the 1970’s. And Western military gear kept on being ahead of Eastern from then on and remains so to this day. And just as the loss of a single state-of-the-art F-4 to a Mig in Vietnam did not change that fact, neither will the loss of a single Rafale do so either.

 

[Galaxy]

Well all these songs of praise for the S-400 and other Russian built systems that are popping up in this thread will not change the fact that a nation which claims to be a Superpower has now in more than three years of fighting not managed to attain anything like air superiority over a minor nation (military wise) and which only had token forces back in 2022.

Sure, today in 2025 Ukraine has more competitive anti-aircraft and air assets and Russia is bogged down, but back then in 2022? Objectively it should have been a cake walk. But as things have unfolded, Russian military gear performed just dismally poor there as it always has.

In the past Russians have resorted to blaming the operators of the equipment for these shortfalls, e.g. like Syria, Egypt and Iraq etc. in the Middle Eastern conflicts. But now it’s themselves operating their own military gear. And still it does not perform.

And now the single loss of a Rafale is being brought forward as proof that things have changed. This time it’s different and now Russian and Chinese gear will transform the battlefield.

But that would have been like saying that since the USAF lost an F-4 to a Mig-21 in Vietnam, this now means that the US has been dethroned as the producer of the world’s best military gear. Sure, USAF planes were brought down in that conflict by SA-2 and Migs. But that did not mean that Russian gear was better or that the West was being dethroned as the producers of the best military gear. The loss of an F-4 could and did happen in Vietnam, but it was the exception to the rule.

I’m pretty sure that that is what happened with the IAF Rafale loss as well. It will in the long run prove to be the exception, and not the rule. But that does not stop sycophants and people like the aviation journalist I mentioned earlier from claiming that this time it’s different: This time Russian and Chinese military gear is on the rise.

But this Rafale loss is still a single occurrence, and in that sense tells us no more than the loss of a single F-4 back in the 1970’s. And Western military gear kept on being ahead of Eastern from then on and remains so to this day. And just as the loss of a single state-of-the-art F-4 to a Mig in Vietnam did not change that fact, neither will the loss of a single Rafale do so either.

Your rant is all over the place, I’m not sure what you’re even getting at since i have mentioned the Rafale as being one of the most capable aircraft in the world and more than capable of shooting down anything Pakistan has.

And I’m not sure where or what kind of informing you are getting about Ukraine but Ukraine had hundreds of S-300 launchers in 2022 plus BUKs and thousands of manpads and of one the largest stockpiles of weapons on earth. For comparison Ukraine had 700,000 soldiers in 2022 plus about 2,000 tanks, in comparison the UK which is considered a large NATO country had 145,000 soldiers in 2022 and a whopping 213 tanks with only about 150 that are in working condition.

Calling Ukraine “minor” is poor choice of wording, they had a more tanks than most European NATO countries combined plus they received an additional 700 tanks and thousands of armored vehicles like approximately 7,000+ not counting hundreds of artillery systems and thousands of drones and millions of munitions in tens of thousands of ATGMs, ect.

If I recall correctly the Iraqis had mostly 1960s SAMs and within a month the coalition lost 75 aircraft to all causes. Subsequently Iraqi aircraft still operating to a limited extent throughout the war. The US coalition also had the luxury of usung Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Turkey, Bahrain and UAE to attack Iraq with. How nice it would be if Romanian and Poland allowed Russians to use its airspace and land to attack Ukraine from the west.

Also define how Russian military equipment performed “dismally poor”? The Russians destroyed every “game changing” equipment given to Ukraine ie: HIMARS, Patriots, NASAMs, IRIS-Ts, F-16s, Storm Shadows, Leopards, Abrams, Challengers, Bradley’s, AMX-10s, CV9040, Marder, M113s, Oshkosh, Stryker, Kirpi, Roshel Senator, HF-70, M-777, Krab, M-109, Archer, Ceasar, Bayaktar, countless radars, and dozens of other weapons systems. More important Ukraine is getting a never ending flow of these weapons along with training, logistics and global intelligence. Ukraine would have fallen within months if it did not have outside support. Starlink alone is keeping the front from crumbling via providing real time communications on what part of the front to reinforce and where to retreat before getting encircled they also use it in drones. Not to mention systems like HIMARS are worthless if you don’t have intelligence on what to hit and NATO is providing Ukraine with satellite, ELINT, drone, and HUMINT intelligence.

If NATO or just the US struggled in Iraq imagine if they would have to fight in a country like Ukraine which is much bigger then Iraq, has millions of acres of forests to hide infantry and weapons in, has thousands of rivers and lakes, thick mud, heavy fog, dug in fortifications, Soviet era buildings with underground bunkers designed to withstand nuclear war, ect plus some 50 countries providing arms, intelligence, logistics, training, ect. Do you think the US would have “air superiority”? No, if the US was denied access from other countries do you think they would be as successful? No, if US tanks and infantry had to cross minefields and rivers with drones overhead do you think they would be successful? You are not only jumping the gun but you are not taking into account terrain or global intelligence, logistics, ect. You are basically saying western weapons are fantasy because NATO attacked Iraq over 30 years ago, a country that had lot of 1950s and 1960s equipment, no outside support, was under embargo, had its military weakened by the Iran Iraq war, ect. You think you are being a bit unfair or biased?

Even now the US coalition is taking relatively high losses in Yemen with dozens of coalition aircraft shot down, and hundreds of vehicles destroyed. Yemen even came close to hitting an F-35 and some naval ships according to the latest reports.

 

[AndersJ]

Your rant is all over the place, I’m not sure what you’re even getting at since i have mentioned the Rafale as being one of the most capable aircraft in the world and more than capable of shooting down anything Pakistan has.

And I’m not sure where or what kind of informing you are getting about Ukraine but Ukraine had hundreds of S-300 launchers in 2022 plus BUKs and thousands of manpads and of one the largest stockpiles of weapons on earth. For comparison Ukraine had 700,000 soldiers in 2022 plus about 2,000 tanks, in comparison the UK which is considered a large NATO country had 145,000 soldiers in 2022 and a whopping 213 tanks with only about 150 that are in working condition.

Calling Ukraine “minor” is poor choice of wording, they had a more tanks than most European NATO countries combined plus they received an additional 700 tanks and thousands of armored vehicles like approximately 7,000+ not counting hundreds of artillery systems and thousands of drones and millions of munitions in tens of thousands of ATGMs, ect.

If I recall correctly the Iraqis had mostly 1960s SAMs and within a month the coalition lost 75 aircraft to all causes. Subsequently Iraqi aircraft still operating to a limited extent throughout the war. The US coalition also had the luxury of usung Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Turkey, Bahrain and UAE to attack Iraq with. How nice it would be if Romanian and Poland allowed Russians to use its airspace and land to attack Ukraine from the west.

Also define how Russian military equipment performed “dismally poor”? The Russians destroyed every “game changing” equipment given to Ukraine ie: HIMARS, Patriots, NASAMs, IRIS-Ts, F-16s, Storm Shadows, Leopards, Abrams, Challengers, Bradley’s, AMX-10s, CV9040, Marder, M113s, Oshkosh, Stryker, Kirpi, Roshel Senator, HF-70, M-777, Krab, M-109, Archer, Ceasar, Bayaktar, countless radars, and dozens of other weapons systems. More important Ukraine is getting a never ending flow of these weapons along with training, logistics and global intelligence. Ukraine would have fallen within months if it did not have outside support. Starlink alone is keeping the front from crumbling via providing real time communications on what part of the front to reinforce and where to retreat before getting encircled they also use it in drones. Not to mention systems like HIMARS are worthless if you don’t have intelligence on what to hit and NATO is providing Ukraine with satellite, ELINT, drone, and HUMINT intelligence.

If NATO or just the US struggled in Iraq imagine if they would have to fight in a country like Ukraine which is much bigger then Iraq, has millions of acres of forests to hide infantry and weapons in, has thousands of rivers and lakes, thick mud, heavy fog, dug in fortifications, Soviet era buildings with underground bunkers designed to withstand nuclear war, ect plus some 50 countries providing arms, intelligence, logistics, training, ect. Do you think the US would have “air superiority”? No, if the US was denied access from other countries do you think they would be as successful? No, if US tanks and infantry had to cross minefields and rivers with drones overhead do you think they would be successful? You are not only jumping the gun but you are not taking into account terrain or global intelligence, logistics, ect. You are basically saying western weapons are fantasy because NATO attacked Iraq over 30 years ago, a country that had lot of 1950s and 1960s equipment, no outside support, was under embargo, had its military weakened by the Iran Iraq war, ect. You think you are being a bit unfair or biased?

Even now the US coalition is taking relatively high losses in Yemen with dozens of coalition aircraft shot down, and hundreds of vehicles destroyed. Yemen even came close to hitting an F-35 and some naval ships according to the latest reports.

Thanks for sharing. I think your post gives us a very good picture of why Russia is failing in Ukraine. Only maybe perhaps not in the way you intended.

And now that our respective positions on Ukraine have been ironed out, how about returning to the subject at hand, i.e. the loss of an IAF Rafale and what conclusions we can draw from that and its SPECTRA EW system?

 

[Ainen]

And now that our respective positions on Ukraine have been ironed out, how about returning to the subject at hand, i.e. the loss of an IAF Rafale and what conclusions we can draw from that and its SPECTRA EW system?

Should've been there in the first place, of all people, topic starter derailing the thread is a strange sight.

The only basic conclusion is that rafale isn't invulnerable (and, for the matter, even b-21 isn't). Few things are invulnerable in presence of hostile, determine humans.
Peacetime/coin operations pushed with propaganda tilted public perception to a wrong direction (not unlike pre-1914 Europe), but really this shouldn't be much of a secret. It's an advanced non-stealth aircraft, this is more or less enough to describe its role since the 1990s.

We can't say the rest without knowing air battle picture (which we don't, but maybe will in a few months - there was good in-depth indian description on Balakot in approximately similar time frame). We don't even know how much rafales (and others) avoided per loss, at which ranges and so on.

The only current conclusion is that buying non-stealth aircraft with extreme EW (which alone costs as much as the entire aircraft that shoot it down) as either sole or main aircraft of your air force is questionable.

Pushing everything on muh stupid indians isn't going to do anything other than kill relations with the single largest customer, which basically brought second lease of life to this aircraft. Especially when indian rafale is better than most AdA ones, and indian flight hours are iirc way higher than the french.

 

[AndersJ]

Returning to the subject at hand, i.e. the loss of the Rafale and SPECTRA, I found some interesting information connected to my earlier post saying that the IAF Rafale that got shot down may just have been unlucky: I found an article from as far back as 2021 that says this:

"There are many companies which make such decoys, here we are going to particularly talk about the Decoys used in our Rafale Aircrafts. The towed decoys of Rafale are made by Rafael Systems. The one on Rafale is named X-Guard Fiber Optic Supersonic Towed Decoy."

So now it seems confirmed that IAF Rafales have this towed EW system. And with such a system, there are ECM jamming modes that I would say are practically impossible to handle with ECCM in a missile.

So either the IAF were simply not using their X-Guards on their Rafales for some reason, or the Rafale that got shot down was in the process of doing a turn or some other maneuver and got caught at the exact moment the geometry for jamming with a towed decoy was poor, and the missile passed close enough to the Rafale to trigger the PL-15's proximity fuze.

 

[Ainen]

Let's try again to return the thread back on track (derailing in chinese is cheating!). We can have a great 1812 room elsewhere.
Just to add some context of modernity. Things are vulnerable. At some point, even US got cold feet operating Lightnings over Yemen, against(at best) second grade iranian SAMs.

If, again, expectation is that Indian pilots didn't learn the button deploying towed decoy - this isn't exactly a likely explanation. The reasonable explanation is that modern weapons, when employed properly against target within their engagement envelope, are in fact dangerous.
Ultimately, what makes plane dangerous is combination of its main FC sensor(i.e. can generate good enough firing solution in time) and weapon(which can prosecute the engagement).
SPECTRA interfers with that, but we simply don't know - how many exactly rafales were there, how many missiles were launched, how many rafales were hit(or damaged!). Towed decoy and seeker jamming don't guarantee lack of hit in the first place, another likely result is explosion further away. Which may or may not lead to loss of aircraft (i.e. it's a point where maneuvering, luck and passive protection measures will play).

So now it seems confirmed that IAF Rafales have this towed EW system. And with such a system, there are ECM jamming modes that I would say are practically impossible to handle with ECCM in a missile.

The problem is that Ku-band AESA seeker in LPI could be unrecognized (or its pseudorandom emission pattern) in time at all.
Digital backends have significant ECCM capabilities in the first place, jamming electronically-scanned arrays is more difficult still.

 

[lancer21]

I see some still gonna transfer all the off-topic shit from closed Kashmir topic here. I wonder what would you do with hamster owners forum.

I thought the forum admins had a revised sterner OP to deal with this kind of constant derailing/political posturing?

 

[Arjen]

Moderation is done by volunteers, if you spot something iffy - hit the <Report> button - then exercise patience.

 

[Archibald]

Moderation is done by volunteers, if you spot something iffy - hit the <Report> button - then exercise patience.

Reported and reported again, but I tend to fail at - the bolded.

Made my own cleanup, by the way.

 

[AndersJ]

If, again, expectation is that Indian pilots didn't learn the button deploying towed decoy - this isn't exactly a likely explanation. The reasonable explanation is that modern weapons, when employed properly against target within their engagement envelope, are in fact dangerous.
Ultimately, what makes plane dangerous is combination of its main FC sensor(i.e. can generate good enough firing solution in time) and weapon(which can prosecute the engagement).
SPECTRA interfers with that, but we simply don't know - how many exactly rafales were there, how many missiles were launched, how many rafales were hit(or damaged!). Towed decoy and seeker jamming don't guarantee lack of hit in the first place, another likely result is explosion further away. Which may or may not lead to loss of aircraft (i.e. it's a point where maneuvering, luck and passive protection measures will play).

Absolutely. Missiles are, and have also historically always been dangerous. No one is denying that. Even in Vietnam, when missiles (both SAM's an AA) were in their infancy, aircraft got shot down. And even though the USAF at that time were the undisputed leaders in radar, avionics and countermeasures technology, they still lost a lot of aircraft in that conflict.

So no one is denying that the PL-15 seems to be dangerous. Just as the latest versions of AMRAAM and METEOR. But what's happened since the Vietnam era is that the West has not lost its technological lead in electronics but rather increased it. Sure, Russian aircraft of today are very good when it comes to aerodynamics and flight performance. We see that all the time at airshows. But they are simply not playing in the same league when it comes to radar, sensor fusion, and EW. And that is what counts today more than ever before. And IMHO the Chinese are just as the Russians still playing catch up as well.

One thing that would be interesting to get to the bottom off is exactly how many PL-15's did the PAF fire during the 7th May BVR engagement? During the press conference the PAF representative said that they concentrated on the center where the Rafales were. So another way of viewing what went down is to conclude that the IAF brought knives to a gunfight, and ended up in a hail of PL-15's but with no METEORS to shoot back with.

So from that perspective, one could instead argue that it seems that SPECTRA did an amazing job since only one Rafale seems to have been lost. It could actually also be so that all other IAF Rafales were actually saved by their SPECTRA/X-Guard systems and that only one poor sod had the misfortune to be lined up exactly in the direction the PL-15 came from. We simply don't know. Sometimes you eat the bear, and sometimes it eats you. In war you get losses, even if you have the best systems.

And this brings us back to where all this started: The loss of a single Rafale to an PL-15 cannot be taken to mean that SPECTRA sucks and that Chinese systems are as good as attention seeking journalists are currently making them out to be. We simply need more statistics. Until then this seems to have been a fluke given that no more than one Rafale was lost in the PL-15 barrage they seem to have faced.

Towed decoy and seeker jamming don't guarantee lack of hit in the first place, another likely result is explosion further away. Which may or may not lead to loss of aircraft (i.e. it's a point where maneuvering, luck and passive protection measures will play).

and

The problem is that Ku-band AESA seeker in LPI could be unrecognized (or its pseudorandom emission pattern) in time at all.
Digital backends have significant ECCM capabilities in the first place, jamming electronically-scanned arrays is more difficult still.

Here we just have to agree to disagree: Using certain ECM techniques using a towed system like X-Guard there are ways to defeat active radar missiles that are basically surefire. But how that is done is of course not something I'm going to write about here.

 

[Ainen]

On that we don't know the end result on SPECTRA - yep, especially situation was in fact political (ROE). It may have been succesful in preventing worse results.

But still, full targeting loop was closed at least on 1 (likely two, elt-568) top of the line european self-defense suits. This is a long cycle, which includes multiple failure points(engagement radar; fighter:aew datalink; launch of the missile and its second burn; two-way datalink to the missile; seeker engagement; proximity or even contact fuze engagement). And this is important, too - while there is potential to increase SPECTRA "score" by increasing number of weapons - at the same time it's also digging the hole: how many weapon launches was missed until too late?

Which is why i am at my current point - ultimately, 76 mil fighter shot down 288 mil one (deal to deal comparison). And given that Pakistani aircraft in the air physically couldn't carry too many BVR missiles (J-10 isn't known for carrying a lot, especially if staff is concerned about time on station and drag coefficient), success rate can't be too low.

So no one is denying that the PL-15 seems to be dangerous. Just as the latest versions of AMRAAM and METEOR. But what's happened since the Vietnam era is that the West has not lost its technological lead in electronics but rather increased it. Sure, Russian aircraft of today are very good when it comes to aerodynamics and flight performance. We see that all the time at airshows. But they are simply not playing in the same league when it comes to radar, sensor fusion, and EW. And that is what counts today more than ever before. And IMHO the Chinese are just as the Russians still playing catch up as well.

Extreme proliferation of global electronics market, especially the endlessly deep hub in China, coupled with proliferation of digital/software-defined solutions(which are a huge know-how equalizer). In modern world i wouldn't rush to disregard systems from countries like Iran or DPRK. Much less Russia and especially China.

 

[had]

I find this discussion pointless. We (this Forum) will probably won’t get the necessary information to make a robust guess about the effectiveness of Chinese weapon systems (PL-15, J-10,…) at this point.

But we could think about signs which could let us draw some conclusions.
For me, the next Indian acquisitions will be important. Sadly they announced a big Rafale deal before this event but the next step will be interesting.
If Pakistan had the same freedom in weapons acquisitions as India, that would be even more telling but that is not the case.

For me that means more waiting and less discussing, but that is me.

 

[UpForce]

Returning to the subject at hand, i.e. the loss of the Rafale and SPECTRA, I found some interesting information connected to my earlier post saying that the IAF Rafale that got shot down may just have been unlucky: I found an article from as far back as 2021 that says this:

"There are many companies which make such decoys, here we are going to particularly talk about the Decoys used in our Rafale Aircrafts. The towed decoys of Rafale are made by Rafael Systems. The one on Rafale is named X-Guard Fiber Optic Supersonic Towed Decoy."

So now it seems confirmed that IAF Rafales have this towed EW system. And with such a system, there are ECM jamming modes that I would say are practically impossible to handle with ECCM in a missile.

So either the IAF were simply not using their X-Guards on their Rafales for some reason, or the Rafale that got shot down was in the process of doing a turn or some other maneuver and got caught at the exact moment the geometry for jamming with a towed decoy was poor, and the missile passed close enough to the Rafale to trigger the PL-15's proximity fuze.

I can one up you and introduce an article from 2019 ("Spécificités des Rafale indiens", quite an interesting one listing the many localizations made to the fighter at that point already) that refers to X-Guard on the Indian specification Rafale:

Un système de leurre tracté à fibre optique conçu par Rafael, le X-Guard, destiné à contrer les menaces air-air ou sol-air. Ce complément à l'environnement SPECTRA déjà existant, pourrait donner lieu à un emport en point 3 de voilure, par example.

The site seems to be a Rafale enthusiasts' gathering place but it has apparently not been updated since 2024. Problem is, I haven't been able to find official confirmation that the system is actually operational. Even more recent articles on many sites I don't know whether to trust write in future tense about the matter.

Nothing on how many systems were/are being bought. Are all Rafales so equipped? It's not integrated into the frame but attaches to a hard point so presumably configurations without X-Guard are possible also. Are there any plausible circumstances where IAF would go on combat missions without it?

On a general level I must note that perhaps this issue, SPECTRA and all, excites the imagination because the events (as they're known) defy logic on many levels, something just seems off. Also, doing web searches while trying to disambiguate between "Rafale" and "Rafael" was ... fun.

 

[AndersJ]

I can one up you and introduce an article from 2019 ("Spécificités des Rafale indiens", quite an interesting one listing the many localizations made to the fighter at that point already) that refers to X-Guard on the Indian specification Rafale:

The site seems to be a Rafale enthusiasts' gathering place but it has apparently not been updated since 2024. Problem is, I haven't been able to find official confirmation that the system is actually operational. Even more recent articles on many sites I don't know whether to trust write in future tense about the matter.

Nothing on how many systems were/are being bought. Are all Rafales so equipped? It's not integrated into the frame but attaches to a hard point so presumably configurations without X-Guard are possible also. Are there any plausible circumstances where IAF would go on combat missions without it?

On a general level I must note that perhaps this issue, SPECTRA and all, excites the imagination because the events (as they're known) defy logic on many levels, something just seems off. Also, doing web searches while trying to disambiguate between "Rafale" and "Rafael" was ... fun.

Nice job finding that info. So it looks like X-guard towed decoy is mentioned already in 2019 in conjunction with the delivery of the first Rafale to India.

Since this towed jammer unlike the early US (and Swedish models for the Gripen for that matter) is not a one-time use item, it seems senseless not to fly with them so one would guess that the Rafales in the 7th May incident were so equipped. But I haven't seen exactly how they are currently integrated on the Rafale and if they "steal" a hardpoint. Because if so, then the IAF may have chosen to fly without them on the day. If for example, the IAF did their mission planning based on the ROE that seemed to be in place for both sides (before the PAF changed them and authorized BVR shots over the border) which only allowed interception of aircraft that crossed the border, then they may have opted to use that wing station for ordnance instead. Especially if they never had any intentions of crossing into Pakistan and only to do stand-off AG attacks from inside India.

But even if they were carrying the X-Guard, you are not protected all the time: Because even if you fly a zig-zag pattern towards or away from the enemy (you obviously would never fly straight at or away from a threat in this case), during the course changes the missile will see no angular separation between you and the towed decoy meaning you could potentially get hit anyway, which I think is one of the plausible explanations for the loss of just a single Rafale. Else if the PAF shot so many PL-15's as they seem to have done, why are there then no more Rafale losses? Especially given that the PAF purportedly concentrated their PL-15 launches towards the center of the IAF strike package where the Rafales were?

 

[chimeric oncogene]

why are there then no more Rafale losses?

The Pakistani claimed three down.

We seem to have good correlation on one, from American and French sources (which would be expected to be favorable to India).

But that does not necessarily mean that there was not another.