United States President Donald Trump said on Friday that up to five jets were shot down during the recent India-Pakistan conflict that began after a deadly attack in India-occupied Kashmir\u2019s Pahalgam, with the situation calming after a ceasefire in May.<\/p>\n
Trump, who made his remarks at a dinner with some Republican US lawmakers at the White House, did not specify which side\u2019s jets he was referring to.<\/p>\n
\u201cSomething I\u2019m very proud of [is that] we stopped a lot of wars. A lot of wars. And these were serious, serious wars; would have been going on,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou had India-Pakistan that was going, and in fact, planes were being shot out of the air. Five, five, four or five, but I think five jets were shot down actually,\u201d Trump said while talking about the India-Pakistan hostilities, without elaborating or providing further detail.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was getting worse and worse, wasn\u2019t it? [\u2026] These are two serious nuclear countries and they were hitting each other. It seems like a new form of warfare; you saw it recently, when you looked at what we did in Iran when we knocked out their nuclear capability, totally knocked out,\u201d he said, referring to the US strikes on Iran\u2019s three nuclear sites.<\/p>\n
Pakistan claimed it downed five Indian planes in air-to-air combat, later stating that figure as six. India\u2019s highest-ranking general said in late May that India switched tactics after suffering losses in the air on the first day of hostilities and established an advantage before a ceasefire was announced three days later.<\/p>\n
As New Delhi launched deadly air strikes on Pakistan in early May over allegations about the Pahalgam attack, which Islamabad denied, the Pakistan Air Force downed five Indian jets in retaliation. After tit-for-tat strikes on each other\u2019s airbases, it took American intervention on May 10 for both sides to finally reach a ceasefire.<\/p>\n
India also claimed it downed \u201ca few planes\u201d of Pakistan. Islamabad has denied any losses of planes but acknowledged that three air bases suffered hits, while saying that 26 Indian targets were hit.<\/p>\n
Trump has repeatedly said he prevented a \u201cnuclear war\u201d between Pakistan and India after Washington held talks with both sides, even crediting Chief of Army Staff Field Marshal Asim Munir for helping in it. India has differed with Trump\u2019s claims that it resulted from his intervention and his threats to sever trade talks.<\/p>\n
Most recently, on July 7, the Trump administration doubled down on its narrative of Trump playing a central role in defusing tensions, despite India claiming otherwise.<\/p>\n
Asked about Indian officials\u2019 repeated denials of Trump\u2019s role, US State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce avoided taking a position. \u201cSo many comments speak for themselves,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Pressed further, Bruce added, half in jest: \u201cEveryone will have an opinion. That\u2019s an opinion. Some opinions are wrong. Mine rarely are, but other people\u2019s opinions can be wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump\u2019s statements stand in contrast to India\u2019s official position, which maintains that New Delhi acted independently during the May crisis and that Washington did not mediate. Trump\u2019s remarks support Pakistan\u2019s view that quiet US diplomacy \u2014 and direct intervention from the White House \u2014 helped calm tensions.<\/p>\n
India\u2019s position has been that New Delhi and Islamabad must resolve their problems directly and with no outside involvement.<\/p>\n
India is an increasingly important US partner in Washington\u2019s effort to counter China\u2019s influence in Asia, while Pakistan is a strong partner in counterterrorism.<\/p>\n
The April attack in Pahalgam killed 26 men and sparked heavy fighting between the nuclear-armed Asian neighbours in the latest escalation of a decades-old rivalry.<\/p>\n
New Delhi blamed the attack on Pakistan, which strongly denied responsibility while calling for a neutral investigation. Washington condemned the attack but did not directly blame Islamabad.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
United States President Donald Trump said on Friday that up to five jets were shot down during the recent India-Pakistan conflict that began after a deadly attack in India-occupied Kashmir\u2019s Pahalgam, with the situation calming after a ceasefire in May. Trump, who made his remarks at a dinner with some Republican US lawmakers at the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10869,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10868","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10868","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10868"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10868\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10870,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10868\/revisions\/10870"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10869"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10868"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10868"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10868"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}