I don't know anything about Tom Cooper. I do know about John Spencer and consider him a reliable source of information on modern warfare.

China’s J-10C Fighter: Separating Myth From Reality

There's a variety of links within the article above. In short, its reading like Pakistan surprised India by coordinating and networking its forces to a much greater degree than India had been expecting. With a heavy dose of PLAAF help, they used airborne early warning aircraft positioned well back from the front-lines, to guide-in the air-to-air missiles launched from it's fighters that were positioned much closer to the front lines. Because the Pakistani fighters weren't using their radars for targeting/guidance, that allowed them to stay hidden and their airborne quarterbacks could paint the targets and the fighters just served as missile trucks.

China's J-10 fighters used by Pakistan gets its first taste of combat, along with its PL-15 air-to-air missile, which is likely the weapon used to down India's fighters given the ranges discussed. Appears a number of PL-15 missiles fell to earth relatively intact, meaning they likely maxed-out its range and hit the ground with minimal kinetic energy, will be interesting if the US can get its hands on it as its supposed to rival the AIM-120 AMRAAM.