the loss of several potential sales, such as to South Korea and Mexico. In addition to its adoption by numerous military customers, the PC-7 has also been used by private customers. It has been certified for civil use by both the FOCA and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) as compliant with regulations pertaining to general aviation operations in both Europe and the United States. Amongst its uses in the civilian sector has been aerobatic displays. During the 1990s, the PC-7 Mk II was adopted as the basic trainer of the Royal Brunei Air Force alongside the BAE Systems Hawk jet trainer; the acquisition was seen a key to its expanded operations with fixed-wing aircraft. During June 2011, the Indian Air Force (IAF) selected the PC-7 MkII as its new basic trainer, signing a contract for an initial batch of 75 aircraft with an option for buying an additional 38 PC-7 MkIIs; the service had a total requirement of 181 trainers. The fast-tracked decision to procure a foreign aircraft over a domestically developed alternative proposed by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) was a controversial one; retired Air Marshal Anil Chopra argued that HAL had no viable design for the role and that the IAF could not have reasonably afforded the delay involved in the development of such an aircraft. The procurement of an additional 106 trainers under the ‘Make & Buy (Indian) category was repeatedly deferred. In 2017, the maintenance agreement with Pilatus lapsed, resulting in the IAF becoming solely responsible for performing these activities. During 2018, India announced that it had chosen to exercise the option of buying a batch of 38 trainers. Combat use A number of PC-7s were employed by the Guatemalan Air Force in air strikes and for close air support (CAS) during the Guatemalan civil war, starting in 1982 until the end of the conflict in 1996. The PC-7s were typically deployed from the airfield in La Aurora, being armed with a mixture of gun pods and rocket pods. During the lengthy Iran–Iraq War of the 1980s, amid tensions between Iran and the United States, it is alleged that Iranian officials threatened to arm its PC-7 fleet with explosives and use them to launch suicide attacks against United States Navy vessels present in the Persian Gulf. Iran reportedly trained a number of suicide pilots and flew some operational missions, training was performed at Bushehr Air Base in