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A newsletter from The Wire | Founded by Tanweer Alam, Sidharth Bhatia, Pratik Kanjilal, Seema Chishti, Sushant Singh, MK Venu, and Siddharth Varadarajan | Contributing writer: Kalrav Joshi, with additional inputs by Anirudh SK

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Over to Siddharth Varadarajan for today’s Cable

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Snapshot of the day

July 17, 2025

Siddharth Varadarajan

The Economist reports on the mystery surrounding Pakistan’s claims that it shot down several Indian fighter jets during Operation Sindoor and lays out probable scenarios:

“One theory among foreign officials is that on the first day, India did not mount its Rafales with Meteor long-range air-to-air missiles (presumably thinking that they were beyond the reach of Pakistan’s fighters or that Pakistan’s initial response would be less escalatory). Another is that India’s fighters did not have the right electronic jamming equipment, up-to-date software or relevant data to protect them from Pakistan’s new weaponry. A third, and broader, explanation is that India lacked the necessary “mission data” to understand how Pakistan could identify Indian plans, pass data to its own jets and guide missiles to their targets.

“But if the fighters were made vulnerable because of orders from political leaders to only hit militant targets, as [Indian Defence Attache to Indonesia] Captain Kumar suggests, then responsibility would lie more with the government of Narendra Modi. While consistent with India’s approach to other recent clashes with Pakistan, in which India has sought to avoid escalation, such orders would not have taken into account recent improvements in Pakistan’s capabilities. That suggestion is now fuelling opposition allegations of a cover-up.”

While the preliminary report into what caused the loss of Air India Flight 171 last month has provided some answers, it has also prompted a wave of predictable and even offensive speculation about its cause. Amidst a blizzard of theories that has swept over the crash, including questionable narratives