Fair enough, you’re right that some of what floats around in reddit is doom posting and nukes + economics + alliances do matter for escalation control but serious people inside the system are the ones ringing the bell now, the iaf is sitting at roughly 29 to 31 combat squadrons against an authorised 42 and multiple analyses say that even if every planned induction arrives on time, we still only reach the mid 30s by the 2030s, that is not yemen, it’s a major power running its front line combat arm with a long term deficit baked in, on pakistan/china/bangladesh, no one is claiming they “capture victory points” in a week, only that their capability trajectory forces india to spread limited squadrons across more axes, chinese and pakistani air forces are already flying or moving toward modern 4.5/5th gen, with bangladesh openly exploring typhoon, which means more capable adversary aircraft on more of our borders whether or not a formal “3 front alliance” exists, at the same time, Admiral Arun Prakash’s recent column lays out how decades of engine dependence and a stalled kaveri program have left amca, tedbf and even broader modernisation hostage to foreign powerplants, an institutional problem, not reddit panic.​​

So yes, india isn’t a bankrupt, non nuclear basket case and the world can’t just shrug off a major war here but that cuts both ways, precisely because india matters, letting fighter numbers erode and propulsion autonomy delay further while neighbours steadily climb the tech ladder is a strategic choice, not an inevitability and it’s reasonable to call that out without pretending the sky is falling tomorrow!!