Windjammer
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PAF in the media and on the cover!
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Super Falcon
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windjammer ummhaaaaa love u yaaaaar for your nice work
Windjammer
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Windjammer
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Guys, i didn't want to open an other thread, however just to let you know that a new book on PAF is due out next month. Details as follow.........
Cutting Edge PAF: A Former Air Chiefs Reminiscences of a Developing Air Force
By Air Chief Marshal (retired) M Anwar Shamim Vanguard Books; Pp 345
Of late, there have been numerous occasions to visit the hallways of Pakistan Air Force (PAF) history. Pioneers adorn the walls while historians glower from a corner, trying to reconstruct these mens stories. Men who went up in a blaze of glory, men who left a trail of controversy, and men who went on to lead quiet lives in the suburbs, they are all in there somewhere. Missteps aside, each of them contributed towards making the air force what it is today.
Written under duress, the air chief marshal buckled under his daughters pressure and broke his silence about life in the PAF. The title suggests that his autobiography focuses more on the professional achievements of the service than the controversial aspects of his tenure. However, the slew of allegations and bizarre rumours about him and his wife have been duly addressed at the end.
The tone is circumspect; the prose is simple; and the story follows the evolutionary path of a PAF initially composed of 222 officers and 2,342 airmen moulded into a cutting edge force that became the pride of the nation and the talk of the town. He commanded 33 Fighter Wing during the 1965 War, served as air adviser to His Majesty King Hussein Bin Talal, planning and developing a modern Jordanian Air Force, and rose to become the second longest-serving PAF chief in 1978.
Cutting Edge PAF is divided into pre-war reminiscences and post-war contributions of the man who helped shape a modern air force. It is also about the vicissitudes of life experienced as a young air force officer and the boy who was first to go solo from No 2 University Air Squadron, the graduate from Royal Australian Air Force College, Point Cook, raving about the Aussie way their honesty, cleanliness and habit of giving host teams a thundering good time one day before a match and the pilot who ferried a fleet of F-86s from Paris to Karachi only to make a harrowing discovery near Rome that the air traffic controllers knowledge extended to just two words, Continue approach!
An analysis of both wars is embedded within to complete the look of a period piece. Mostly, it serves as a platform to restore his image as a forward-thinking leader with the foresight to choose F-16s for Kahuta indefensible and eight minutes away from the PAF, but only three minutes ride from the Indian Air Force. A man credited with three Tactical Commands, thus decentralising tactical operations, one Institute of Air Safety that trained Air Safety Specialists, seven Jet Stream exercises in seven years designed to test preparedness, which also laid the seed of inter-services cooperation and a nine hole golf course in every base, leading the PAF to become inter-services champs in 1980. Sound investments all of them, yes, even the golf courses.
This impressive list of achievements can only be rivalled by an equally formidable string of allegations that plagued his career. Stigmas are easily attached and impossible to remove. The writer tries nevertheless. His book reproaches Defence Journal for pitting a group captain against his air chief by allowing Cecil Chaudhrys views to be aired without investigation and wonders at the PAF for letting them go unchallenged. He attaches an excerpt from Profiles of Intelligence by Brigadier Syed Ali Tirmizi (1995), which gives a new twist to the story, bringing up Cecil Chaudhrys links with the Soviets. He cites the Legion of Merit given by the US government as proof against drug conspiracy charges and describes the foolproof process of Foreign Military Sales (FMS) to counter the kickback story where he saved, not cost, his country millions.
He also goes to great lengths to clear his wifes name. Ms Tahira Shamim is said to have revamped the entire Pakistan Air Force Womens Association (PAFWA) on modern managerial lines and started the Mujahida Academy, now affiliated with the Air University. He attributes suggestions of impropriety to natural prejudice against women taking initiatives at a time when it was not fashionable. A neat explanation a little too neat some might say.
This carefully drawn sketch is set to dazzle. And in this group portrait, incidents have been arranged to showcase not just the expanding firepower and might of the service but also the initiative and ability of its officers one in particular Anwar Shamim, who as the air chief took on the challenge of absorbing F-16s in one year when the usual timeframe was three; who claims his testimony as a witness during the PAF witch-hunts got several innocents off the hook; and whose stories of command decisions range from improving the morale of his men where needed to fixing the discipline within ranks when required like the uppity airman on probation who started walking when ordered to double march and took to running when told to halt.
Past familiar landmarks of history, through corridors of power lies the room where policies are made, decisions are taken and fates are sealed. Cutting Edge PAF provides an engrossing look at the duties of the air board, functions of the AHQ, etc., during the transformative phase of a service striving hard to achieve a higher state of operational readiness. The book shines a blinding light on the good, hoping to banish the bad and the ugly. And it works. For a while. Cutting Edge PAF is due out by April 2010.
Afrah Jamal is a freelance journalist. She can be reached at afrahjh@hotmail.com
Cutting Edge PAF: A Former Air Chiefs Reminiscences of a Developing Air Force
By Air Chief Marshal (retired) M Anwar Shamim Vanguard Books; Pp 345
Of late, there have been numerous occasions to visit the hallways of Pakistan Air Force (PAF) history. Pioneers adorn the walls while historians glower from a corner, trying to reconstruct these mens stories. Men who went up in a blaze of glory, men who left a trail of controversy, and men who went on to lead quiet lives in the suburbs, they are all in there somewhere. Missteps aside, each of them contributed towards making the air force what it is today.
Written under duress, the air chief marshal buckled under his daughters pressure and broke his silence about life in the PAF. The title suggests that his autobiography focuses more on the professional achievements of the service than the controversial aspects of his tenure. However, the slew of allegations and bizarre rumours about him and his wife have been duly addressed at the end.
The tone is circumspect; the prose is simple; and the story follows the evolutionary path of a PAF initially composed of 222 officers and 2,342 airmen moulded into a cutting edge force that became the pride of the nation and the talk of the town. He commanded 33 Fighter Wing during the 1965 War, served as air adviser to His Majesty King Hussein Bin Talal, planning and developing a modern Jordanian Air Force, and rose to become the second longest-serving PAF chief in 1978.
Cutting Edge PAF is divided into pre-war reminiscences and post-war contributions of the man who helped shape a modern air force. It is also about the vicissitudes of life experienced as a young air force officer and the boy who was first to go solo from No 2 University Air Squadron, the graduate from Royal Australian Air Force College, Point Cook, raving about the Aussie way their honesty, cleanliness and habit of giving host teams a thundering good time one day before a match and the pilot who ferried a fleet of F-86s from Paris to Karachi only to make a harrowing discovery near Rome that the air traffic controllers knowledge extended to just two words, Continue approach!
An analysis of both wars is embedded within to complete the look of a period piece. Mostly, it serves as a platform to restore his image as a forward-thinking leader with the foresight to choose F-16s for Kahuta indefensible and eight minutes away from the PAF, but only three minutes ride from the Indian Air Force. A man credited with three Tactical Commands, thus decentralising tactical operations, one Institute of Air Safety that trained Air Safety Specialists, seven Jet Stream exercises in seven years designed to test preparedness, which also laid the seed of inter-services cooperation and a nine hole golf course in every base, leading the PAF to become inter-services champs in 1980. Sound investments all of them, yes, even the golf courses.
This impressive list of achievements can only be rivalled by an equally formidable string of allegations that plagued his career. Stigmas are easily attached and impossible to remove. The writer tries nevertheless. His book reproaches Defence Journal for pitting a group captain against his air chief by allowing Cecil Chaudhrys views to be aired without investigation and wonders at the PAF for letting them go unchallenged. He attaches an excerpt from Profiles of Intelligence by Brigadier Syed Ali Tirmizi (1995), which gives a new twist to the story, bringing up Cecil Chaudhrys links with the Soviets. He cites the Legion of Merit given by the US government as proof against drug conspiracy charges and describes the foolproof process of Foreign Military Sales (FMS) to counter the kickback story where he saved, not cost, his country millions.
He also goes to great lengths to clear his wifes name. Ms Tahira Shamim is said to have revamped the entire Pakistan Air Force Womens Association (PAFWA) on modern managerial lines and started the Mujahida Academy, now affiliated with the Air University. He attributes suggestions of impropriety to natural prejudice against women taking initiatives at a time when it was not fashionable. A neat explanation a little too neat some might say.
This carefully drawn sketch is set to dazzle. And in this group portrait, incidents have been arranged to showcase not just the expanding firepower and might of the service but also the initiative and ability of its officers one in particular Anwar Shamim, who as the air chief took on the challenge of absorbing F-16s in one year when the usual timeframe was three; who claims his testimony as a witness during the PAF witch-hunts got several innocents off the hook; and whose stories of command decisions range from improving the morale of his men where needed to fixing the discipline within ranks when required like the uppity airman on probation who started walking when ordered to double march and took to running when told to halt.
Past familiar landmarks of history, through corridors of power lies the room where policies are made, decisions are taken and fates are sealed. Cutting Edge PAF provides an engrossing look at the duties of the air board, functions of the AHQ, etc., during the transformative phase of a service striving hard to achieve a higher state of operational readiness. The book shines a blinding light on the good, hoping to banish the bad and the ugly. And it works. For a while. Cutting Edge PAF is due out by April 2010.
Afrah Jamal is a freelance journalist. She can be reached at afrahjh@hotmail.com
Creder
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Mastan khan made a very good point the other day, we reminisce too much about our past glory, we're in deep sh**t right now. Pakistan Airforce desperately needs to modernise itself with 4.5+ aircrafts and all we can still grasp on are some articles written in 1980's and a bunch of F-16's thrown our way.
Windjammer
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There are people much more aware and responsible than us to take care of these things, as they alone face the ultimate eventuality.
You learn from past, implement it into present and look forward to the future.
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yes true but we can only see whats infront of us and we can only think accordingly, right now i see 300 MKI's lined up against a batch of F-16's thats it. And it doesn't look good, before we lacked in numbers but knew we could pull it off with the quality..now its a different ball game
oh and i forgot to mention good post
Windjammer
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yes true but we can only see whats infront of us and we can only think accordingly, right now i see 300 MKI's lined up against a batch of F-16's thats it. And it doesn't look good, before we lacked in numbers but knew we could pull it off with the quality..now its a different ball game
oh and i forgot to mention good post
Indeed you can only see what's there for us to see or what's merely meant to be shown, we must also think of what we are oblivious to.
For example, not long ago, Americans were making an issue about Pakistan enhancing the capability of the US supplied Harpoons, they were right in the sense that Pakistan had a new punch in it's arsenal but little known to them was the fact that it wasn't a US supplied weapon. As for the much vaunted SU-30s, suffice to just rephrase the words of an Indian SU-30 leader, then a Wing Commander who was in UK for the JSCC, his disclosure was that if he ever went into battle, he would rather be in his old stead, the Mirage-2000 rather than the Russian fighter.
Windjammer
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