The Sabre Slayers: the Air Battles of the 1965 War With Pakistan

1 September 1965. As the Pakistan Army breached the border and launched an attack on Indian defences to capture the Akhnoor Bridge—the main route leading to north Kashmir—the Indian Army found itself heavily outnumbered. Their only hope was support from the Indian air force. At Independence, after the departing British divided the Royal Indian Air Force between the countries, the air forces of India and Pakistan couldn’t have been more different. While the Pakistan Air Force boasted a state-of-the-art fleet of F-86 Sabres and F-104 Starfighters, the Indian Air Force relied on an ageing fleet of Vampires, Toofanis, and Liberators. However, in the first decades after Independence, India began to rely heavily on a lightweight transonic fighter: the Gnat. In the first major war fought by India and Pakistan in 1965, a titanic struggle would take place in the skies between the Indian Gnats and the Pakistani Sabres. The Sabre Slayers: The Air Battles of the 1965 War with Pakistan chronicles the 22-day war fought at 15,000 feet in air. Air Marshal Philip Rajkumar and Shiv Kunal Verma draw on archival records and first-hand accounts to honour the memory of those Indian Air Force officers who displayed immense courage and skill in winning the air war against vastly superior enemy aircraft.