The Sidewinder, now designated Air Intercept Missile (AIM) 9, proved decisive once again when Pakistan and India went to war for the second time over Kashmir in 1965. The air battle was unique: primarily American versus British and French warplanes. The Pakistanis were outnumbered 5-to-1, but they had Sidewinders.
On September 6, 1965, Flt. Lt. Aftab Alam Khan of the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) caught four Indian MD.452 Mystère IV fighter-bombers strafing a train. His F-104A Starfighter was a high-level interceptor, not a down-low dogfighter. He blew through the Mystère formation on full burner, at better than Mach 1. The Indians scattered low over the deck, seeking to mask their heat signatures. But before they could escape, Khan used his speed to come back around into a Sidewinder envelope. “I aimed the missile at the nearest aircraft, and heard the loud pitched missile tone,” he recalled. “The sight indicated that I was in range. With all other requisite firing conditions met, I squeezed the trigger, and kept it pressed. I waited, only to note that the missile had not fired. As I looked towards the left missile, I saw a big flash, and the missile leaving the aircraft. The missile had taken, as stipulated in the manual, approx. 8/10ths of a second to fire after the trigger had been pressed, but in combat this seemed like an eternity.” Though India denies it to this day, Pakistani ground control radar confirmed Khan’s missile kill, history’s first by a Mach 2 aircraft. According to Pakistani records, of 36 PAF victories in that war, eight fell to Sidewinders.