Ahmad Faruqui - Rethinking the National Security of Pakistan: The Price of Strategic Myopia

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RETHINKING THE NATIONAL SECURITY OF PAKISTAN

In the name of God, the most gracious, the most merciful.

In loving memory of my parents,

Abdus-Samad Faruqui and Qudsia Jan Rahmani,*

Who emigrated in 1948 from India to Pakistan

With many hopes and aspirations.

*May God have mercy on their souls.

Rethinking the National Security of Pakistan

The price of strategic myopia

AHMAD FARUQUI

American Institute of International Studies

First published 2003 by Ashgate Publishing

Reissued 2019 by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

Copyright 2003, Ahmad Faruqui

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Notice:
Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

Publishers Note
The publisher has gone to great lengths to ensure the quality of this reprint but points out that some imperfections in the original copies may be apparent.

Disclaimer
The publisher has made every effort to trace copyright holders and welcomes correspondence from those they have been unable to contact.

A Library of Congress record exists under LC control number:

Typeset by Martingraphix

ISBN 13: 978-1-138-72126-5 (hbk)
ISBN 13: 978-1-315-19461-5 (ebk)

Table of Contents

My motivation for writing this book is to contribute to the ongoing public debate on the causes of Pakistans deteriorating economic and political outlook. In the 1990s, Pakistans economic performance worsened significantly, with per capita income growing by about one percent per year. Poverty levels rose to unprecedented levels, foreign exchange reserves declined to cover just a few weeks worth of imports, and the value of the Rupee fell to under two US cents. The urban areas, beginning with Karachi, came under the grip of armed gangs that exploited ethnic and sectarian rivalries to create conditions that can only be described as anarchic. Armed robberies and kidnappings became an every day occurrence.

Such a Lord-of-the-Flies type of existence led the US National Intelligence Council to predict that, in the year 2015:

Pakistan will not recover easily from decades of political and economic mismanagement, divisive policies, lawlessness, corruption and ethnic friction. Nascent democratic reforms will produce little change in the face of opposition from an entrenched political elite and radical Islamic parties. Further domestic decline would benefit Islamic political activists, who may significantly increase their role in national politics and alter the makeup and cohesion of the military-once Pakistans most capable institution. In a climate of continuing domestic turmoil, the central governments control probably will be reduced to the Punjabi heartland and the economic hub of Karachi.1

This future is a very far cry indeed from the vision of Pakistans founding fathers, Iqbal and Jinnah, who envisaged a nation that would unite the Muslims of South Asia, and give them an opportunity to live in peace with each other and with their bigger neighbor, India. Jinnah had said: If we want to make this great State of Pakistan happy and prosperous, we should wholly and solely concentrate on the well-being of the people, and especially of the masses of the poor. If you will work in co-operation, forgetting the past, you are bound to succeed.2

The precipitating event that compelled me to write this book was the April-June 1999 clash between the Pakistani and Indian armies in the icy heights of Kargil. This was the fourth major conflict between Pakistan and India, a nation that is seven times larger than Pakistan. Coming within a year of the tit-for-tat nuclear tests conducted by the two countries, the conflict in Kargil was a reminder that the subcontinent has indeed become-to use Bill Clintons memorable phrase the worlds most dangerous place. The Kargil conflict ignited tensions between the civilian government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and the army chief, General Pervez Musharraf, leading ultimately to Pakistans fourth bout of military rule.

In conducting my research, I have found it useful to analyze contemporary events in light of the regions complex history. One unmistakable conclusion emerged in my research: several of Pakistans problems can be traced to its national security policies that place a heavy emphasis on military spending. Its fear of being reabsorbed into India has caused it to spend enormous amounts of its fiscal and foreign exchange resources on national defense. Very little has been left for economic and social development, resulting in the present situation where its national security has been gravely compromised by the very policies that seek to increase its security.

This book lays out an alternative path-a soft path for improving Pakistans national security. I pray that Pakistans leaders will show the courage to take this path. The American poet Robert Frost could well have been speaking to them when he wrote the immortal lines:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.3

Notes

United States Central Intelligence Agency (2000).

Quoted by US Ambassador to Pakistan, William Milam, speaking to the English Speaking Union, Karachi, Pakistan, June 18, 2001.

Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken, The Atlantic Monthly, August 1915.

All praise is due to God,

Lord of the worlds,

The most compassionate, the most merciful.

Master of the day of judgment!

You do we worship,

And to You we turn for assistance.1

I would like to thank my wife, Nuzhat, for her patience in letting me spend the better part of my leisure time during the past two years working on this book. My elder daughter, Furah, a political science graduate of the University of California, Los Angeles, provided context and references while I was developing the book. My younger daughter, Saba, a business major at the University of the Pacific, edited the final draft of the manuscript, formatted it according to the publishers requirements, and taught he how to prepare an index. During their grade school years, both Furah and Saba accompanied Nuzhat and I to numerous Air Shows and Fleet Weeks, getting to know more about modern weapon systems than they wanted to know.

My brother, Abdul-Ahad, enthusiastically supported my work, and provided me with a daily stream of clippings from Lahore via e-mail. He has been a consistent resource on matters connected with the Pakistani military, from that day in October 1958 when General Ayub Khan sent an army detachment to secure the Hyderabad Power House where my father was Resident Engineer. In later years, my sister, Zahra Yasmeen, and I would spend many a summer afternoon in Sukkur and Karachi playing war games with him, using tanks and artillery pieces made of chalk and soldiers and warplanes made of match sticks.

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