The policy, unveiled by PM Imran Khan on 14 January 2022, is a guideline that adumbrates the parameters of national security. As expected, there is criticism on the policy – a female defense analyst has labeled the policy a “wish list, without the national resources to actualize it”. Others have denigrated it as “another research paper, out of the many churned out by various think-tanks”. Some people have dismissed the policy as a broad-brush, devoid of specific details.
A policy is a set of guidelines. The “nuts and bolts” are put together when the policy is transitioned into the actualization stage. Gleaning from whatever options were considered in the past, one can perceive a broad outline of the opportunities that need to be explored in response to the kinetic and non-kinetic threats to national security. The Threat assessment takes into account the internal and external situations.
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The enemy within
The internal threat to Pakistan’s security is the extension of its external threats or vice versa. We all know that moving forward from the Cold War period, India-Pakistan rivalry has shifted to a lower dimension where proxy operations against each other have replaced conventional warfare. In this scenario, nuclear deterrence acts as a stabilizer that prevents the events from getting escalated beyond a certain level. After the 1971 War, and particularly after the 1998 nuclear tests by India and Pakistan, a pattern can be discerned where both India and Pakistan have resorted to an indirect approach to address their mutual differences.
We must notice manifestations of this approach in the Indian support of various separatist forces in Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and Sindh, and its infiltration of religious extremists in Punjab. Many Pakistani and Afghan Taliban groups, and those operating from Iran and the Gulf, are also on the payroll of Indian intelligence agencies. Pakistan is supporting the freedom movement in IIOJK. It is logical for Pakistan, a weaker power, to resort to an indirect approach to achieve its strategic goal, i.e. recovery and integration of IIOJK with Pakistan.
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The external threats
With the present force ratios, India lacks the muscle to launch an aggression against Pakistan with conventional forces. What will India do? It will continue to destabilize Pakistan and try to implode it through the indirect approach. Once the central authority in Pakistan is eroded, India will exploit the situation and augment the indirect approach with a series of military actions.
In the past, India had been nibbling at Azad Kashmir and Baltistan and got away with it due to the ineptitude of Pakistan’s civil and military leadership. India’s most likely future thrust will remain focused on these areas. In the future, fighting in the mountainous terrain of Jammu, Kashmir, and Gilgit- Baltistan will no longer be characterized by slogging infantry attacks and conventional artillery duels.
India is raising a mountain strike corps with the avowed aim to capture Aksai Chin, Gilgit, and Baltistan in a future two-front war against Pakistan and China. The Likely objectives of this strike corps, against Pakistan, will be Skardu, Gilgit, and the proposed Bhasha Dam. An important task for this corps will be to disrupt the development of the projected China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) by destroying the communications network and important installations. This will materialize in the form of heliborne/ air assault landings in the rear of the objectives in conjunction with frontal assaults. Again, the military operation will be preceded by building upon the already simmering sectarian, political, and economic unrest in Balochistan and Gilgit-Baltistan.
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This will bring Iran into the matrix of confrontation
Success in disrupting CPEC will hinge upon how effectively India plays the sectarian card in this region. In the past, China remained silent when the Indian Army occupied the Siachen glacier, and it remained indifferent during the Kargil war. With its strategic interests involved in CPEC, China’s future response will be different.
Pakistan’s northwestern and southwestern borders are no longer inert. We are well aware of the security environment along the Pak-Afghan border. However, the threat from Iran is rather underrated. The extent to which Iran would extend cooperation to India during such a conflict is known in Pakistan. India is also using border areas of Afghanistan and Iran as staging areas for launching covert operations against Pakistan. Since the 1990s, India has tried to outflank Pakistan and open up a route to Afghanistan and Central Asia.
Not only Iran but also the other Gulf states, particularly UAE, consider the development of Gwadar Port and the projected China–Pakistan Economic Corridor as a threat to their economies. These countries, along with India, are supporting various separatist Baloch groups that have sprouted along the coastal belt of Balochistan during the last decade.
Saleem Akhtar Malik is a Pakistan Army veteran who writes on national and international affairs, defense, military history, and military technology. He Tweets at @saleemakhtar53. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Global Village Space.