National Defense ReCalibration

Pakistan’s post 9/11 circumstances have drastically changed the national defense requirements.  The threat matrix has seen a rise of new players emerge on the scene.  The biggest threat is no longer traditional adversary India but internal conflicts ranging from terrorism and lawlessness to energy shortages.  Drones operated remotely from distant continents violate Pakistani airspace with impunity.  We have witnessed increasingly bellicose statements coming out of Kabul’s green zone on issues such as border security and the Durand line.  Armed malcontents from Chechnya to Yemen roam our tribal areas and terrorize our citizens with impunity.  The Pak military, for its part, is designed to first defend the LOC and secondly to liberate occupied Kashmir.  In 1948, Pakistan successfully liberated 84,000 sq. km or one-third of Kashmir.  In 1965, a victory in Rann of Kutch skirmish preceded a hard-fought draw in the larger second Kashmiri war.  Subsequent wars with Bharat have been outright defeats or abject failures, each more acute than the last.  At this time of great upheaval and distress, our embattled nation must recalibrate our historic military strategy and reorient its tactics to neutralize active threats.

It is heart-wrenching to read about unspeakable atrocities perpetrated against our Kashmiri brethren in reports published by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.  Over 100,000 Kashmiris have been killed in Indian ‘administered’ Kashmir.  Unfortunately, neither our bond nor our armed forces can reverse the logic of arithmetic.  A military offensive requires a 3:1 advantage over the defender for any chance of success.  Pakistan will obviously not attain a 3:1 numerical advantage over India.  Secondly, the 3:1 ratio is based on the assumption that the battlefield is just that, a field.  The Kashmiri theatre lies right in the middle of the world’s most unforgiving, mountainous terrain defended by a well-fed, heavily-armed, and resolute adversary.  Furthermore, continued hostility with India along with an ambiguous and unpublished nuclear doctrine means the bulk of the army cannot be allocated to other hot zones on the Pakistani geostrategic chessboard. Conversely, India has a declared no-first-use policy or a pledge to not use nuclear technology as a means of warfare unless first used by an adversary.  Pakistan uses the so-called “national assets” as a deterrent for India in the event of all-out war or invasion.  However, it retains just enough ambiguity to continue occasional skirmishes in the Kashmiri theatre.  This allows Pakistan to harass Bharat in ill-fated attempts to wrest the remainder of Kashmir yet maintain an unknown red line should the Indians choose to cross the international border in the Punjab or Thar desert.

Our ambiguous nuclear doctrine means Pakistan must defend the eastern frontier with the full might of the army just to maintain a numerical disadvantage.  This posture fails to fully maximize Pakistan’s nuclear deterrence.  More importantly, the military cannot focus on other more immediate threats.  The TTP has killed over 35,000 Pakistanis, mostly civilians.  U.S. Drones have killed 3,500, mostly militants.  In Karachi, approximately 3,500 have died in targeted killings.  Under such dire circumstances, the focus on India is neither feasible nor sustainable.

To alleviate the pressure on our armed forces, Pakistan should clearly define a red line on the eastern border.  A published nuclear deterrence policy has several advantages.  It would put at ease our fears of both an unlikely Indian invasion and the more probable Siachen-type territorial encroachment.  This simple charter would relieve the army of an enormous burden on the armed forces’ resources and our depleted national treasury.  Those precious resources can then be allocated on our western border.  This would allow Pakistan, for the first time in its history to have a presence on our porous western border.  A political strategy backed by democratically elected federal and provincial governments and the military could then focus on neutralizing active threats such as terrorist organizations such as TTP, BLA, LeJ, LeT.

This article makes no attempt at justification of Indian hegemony since the very birth of our nation.  From the poorly executed partition, Adequate sharing of agreed-upon funds and resources, the contradictory and self-serving approach in Junagadh/Kashmir/Hyderabad principalities.  The encroachment of territory in Siachen, disregard for the other dominion in Minicoy, intervention in East Pakistan (Now Bangladesh) well before 1971, to the unjust occupation of Indian ‘administered’ Kashmir.  This historical narrative can not be explained away but we the Pakistani people must ask how long we must remain hostage to this national grievance?  Despite seemingly insurmountable challenges, The Northwest Muslims in Allama Iqbal’s vernacular has already outlasted the original Pakistan of West & East Pakistan.  The existential threat to Pakistan from India is no more.