India Could’ve Destroyed Pakistan’s Nuclear Plants With Its Superior Air Power In 1984: CIA Documents

Recently declassified CIA documents, part of a secret assessment report prepared sometime around November 1984, have revealed that India could have destroyed Pakistan’s nuclear plants by conducting air raids on its nuclear installations soon after Indira Gandhi’s death.

"India, in our view has the capability to carry out a preemptive airstrike that would inflict major damage to Pakistan's most critical nuclear facilities… and destroy or sufficiently damage the facilities to prevent Islamabad from production nuclear weapons for several years," the CIA report says.

This report, primarily a detailed analysis of India’s air power, concludes that the Indian Air Force (IAF) was superior to that of Pakistan’s and could have maintained air superiority in case of a conflict. It says that India’s MiG-29s of the Soviet origin were superior to the F-16s supplied to Pakistan by the United States and also states that IAF was capable of acting as a 'formidable counter to a challenge from China'.

"We believe that the Pakistanis can neither provide effective air defense for their military and industrial targets against a concerted Indian air attack nor seriously threaten most strategic targets in India," the report reads.

The document reveals that the US, using war game exercise, had prepared for scenarios where India attacked Pakistan’s nuclear installations using SEPECAT Jaguars and MiG-23s.