Pakistan Tests First Home-Made Fa'az Air-to-Air Missile

Photo: The Nation (the Fa'az missile fired during the test on 3 November)

Pakistan has tested its first home-made air-to-air missile, Fa'az, and the military says it can hit enemy aircraft from farther away than before. The flight test took place on Tuesday, and senior officers, scientists and engineers watched it together.

Dawn reported that the military's media wing, Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), called the test another big step for the country's own defence industry. This is the first time Pakistan has built an air-to-air missile itself, a weapon fired from a fighter jet at another aircraft in the sky.

The key part of Fa'az is what the ISPR calls its terminal guidance system. In plain words, that means the missile guides itself in the final seconds of its flight, so it can keep tracking a moving target right up to the hit. Geo News reported that the ISPR says the missile can engage enemy aerial targets at longer ranges, though it did not give a figure for that range.

For the Pakistan Air Force, that longer reach matters. A pilot who can fire from farther away does not have to fly as close to danger to take a shot, and the ISPR says Fa'az will give the air force more flexibility in the air. The statement also said the test shows the technical maturity and self-reliance of Pakistan's defence industry, the same point the military made after its operations in Balochistan on Tuesday, where the ISPR again fronted the announcement.

President Asif Ali Zardari, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Chief of Defence Forces and Chief of the Army Staff Field Marshal Asim Munir and the services chiefs all congratulated the scientists and engineers behind the missile. Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi also congratulated the nation, saying the country's scientists and engineers had once again achieved something to be proud of.

Fa'az is the third missile test in a busy few weeks for Pakistan, and the list shows how the programme has moved:

• 6 October: extended version of the Fatah-IV ground-launched cruise missile, a surface-to-surface weapon
• 13 October: extended-range Fatah-2 hypersonic ballistic missile, also surface-to-surface
• 3 November: Fa'az, the first home-made air-to-air missile, fired from the air

What this means for ordinary Pakistanis is less about the hardware and more about the direction. A country that can build its own air-to-air missile does not have to depend on buying one from abroad, and that is the point the ISPR kept coming back to. The military has not yet said how far Fa'az can fly, how fast it goes, or when it will enter regular service, so those details are still to come.

The test also lands in a tense region, coming after Iran set out five conditions for lasting regional security and at a time when fuel prices at home, like today's one day petrol cut, show how quickly outside events reach Pakistani households. For now, though, the message from Rawalpindi is simple: the missile flew, it worked, and the people who built it have been thanked at the very top.

Sources

Dawn: Pakistan successfully tests its first indigenously developed air-to-air missile Fa'az: ISPR

Geo News: Pakistan successfully tests first indigenously developed Fa'az air-to-air missile

Business Recorder: Pakistan tests first indigenously developed Fa'az air-to-air missile

The Nation: Pakistan achieves milestone with successful test of indigenous Fa'az air-to-air missile

Watch for the ISPR to release the missile's range and induction plans, and for any reaction from neighbouring capitals.

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