Pakistani Officer Claims Strike On Non-Existent Indian Airbases, Sparks Online Mockery

A Pakistani military officer has come under intense scrutiny and online mockery after claiming that Pakistan successfully targeted two Indian airbases that, according to official records, do not exist.

The controversy erupted after a video clip featuring Pakistani Army officer Captain Muneeb Zamal went viral on social media. In the interview, the officer claimed that Pakistan’s Fatah-1 missile system had successfully struck “Rajouri Airbase” and “Mamun Airbase” during military operations against India.

“We were assigned two targets, Rajouri Airbase and Mamun Airbase, and we successfully engaged them,” the officer said in the now-viral clip.

However, fact-checks and defence observers quickly pointed out glaring inaccuracies in the claim. Rajouri, located in Jammu and Kashmir, is a district but does not host any operational Indian Air Force airbase. Mamun, meanwhile, is a military cantonment area near Pathankot in Punjab and similarly has no airbase.

The statement immediately triggered ridicule online, with users posting maps, defence listings and memes questioning how missiles could strike facilities that do not exist.

One user sarcastically wrote that “archaeologists, cartographers, Google Maps and the Indian Air Force” should launch a joint mission to locate the mysterious airbases. Another joked that the missiles hit the targets “so hard that they vanished from existence”.

The remarks come against the backdrop of heightened tensions between India and Pakistan following the Pahalgam terror attack and India’s subsequent precision strikes on terror infrastructure across the border under Operation Sindoor.

In retaliation, Pakistan reportedly launched drone and missile offensives under Operation Bunyan Ul Marsoos, targeting regions across Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab, Rajasthan and Gujarat. Indian air defence systems intercepted several incoming threats during the escalation.

On May 10, 2025, Pakistan launched the Fatah-1 guided artillery rocket system, which Indian defence sources said was intercepted mid-air over Sirsa in Haryana before it could cause damage.

Subsequently, missile debris was reportedly recovered from several locations, including Sirsa in Haryana, Barmer in Rajasthan and Jalandhar in Punjab. Earlier, suspected fragments of a Fatah-1 missile were also recovered from Srinagar’s Dal Lake.

Captain Zamal also claimed in the interview that civilians present near the launch site boosted the morale of Pakistani forces during the operation. But his comments were largely overshadowed by the controversy surrounding the alleged “airbase strikes”.

The viral clip has since become the latest flashpoint in the information war accompanying military tensions between the two neighbours, with social media users widely mocking what many described as a “phantom strike” narrative.

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