Pakistan's National Security Approach and Post-Cold War Security

Uneasy Co-existence

Arshad Ali

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000372434
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: National Security
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This book analyzes the paradox that despite being a national security state, Pakistan has become even more insecure in the post-Cold War era. It provides an in-depth analysis of Pakistan's foreign and security policies and their implications for the overall state and society.

The book identifies the immediate security challenges to Pakistan and charts the distinctive evolution of Pakistan's national security state in which the military elite became the dominant actor in the political sphere of government during and after the Cold War period. By examining the national security state, militarization, democracy and security, proxy wars, and the hyper-military-industrial complex, the author illustrates how the vanguard role of the military created considerable structural, sociopolitical, economic, and security problems in Pakistan. Furthermore, the author argues that the mismatch between Pakistan's national security stance and the transformed security environment has been facilitated and sustained by the embedded interests of the country's military-industrial complex.

A critical evaluation of the role of the military in the political affairs of the government and how it has created structural problems for Pakistan, this book will be of interest to academics in the field of South Asian Politics and Security, South Asian Foreign and Security Policy, International Relations, Asian Security, and Cold War Studies.

1 A conceptual overview of the national security state

This book focuses on the experience of what became of Pakistan’s national security state during and after the Cold War. Nonetheless, the national security state approach emerged in the US at the beginning of the Cold War. Before exploring Pakistan’s national security state, this chapter reviews the available literature on the evolution of the US national security state model and then identifies its key features and ideas that could be deployed in the case of Pakistan.

The emergence of the concept of national security¹

Historically, sovereign states have had a preoccupation with national defence, but the concept of national security only really appeared in the literature after 1945. The term was closely associated with the emergence of the US as a superpower in the post-1945 period and was used to identify elements that were seen to directly and indirectly affect the power and security position of the country (Leffler 1990).

Unlike the idea of national defence, which emphasizes the territorial integrity and physical protection of the nation-state, the concept of national security is linked to various political, cultural, economic, and military factors that potentially impact on the core interests of the nation-state (Patman, ed. 2006). Therefore, national security is more than the physical well-being of the state. According to Walter Lippmann, the concept of national security is much broader than national defence. National security suggests not only resistance to aggression but also may counter any potential danger by reaching outward to anticipate and neutralize it (Lippmann 1943). For instance, in 1948, President Truman said that “the loss of independence by any nation adds directly to the insecurity of the United States and all free nations” (Patman ed. 2006, 6). In other words, Truman’s understanding of American national security went well beyond the physical security of the national borders of the US and other states.

In addition, and not unrelated, there appears to be little agreement on the meaning of national security (Baldwin 1997). For instance, states often regard economic, political, and military developments in other states with some suspicion and believe such developments may potentially threaten their own security. Nevertheless, it is important here to clarify the concept of national security. Arnold Wolfers (1952) distinguished between the objective and subjective dimensions of the term: the achievement of “national security objectively means the absence of threats to acquired values and subjectively, the absence of fear that such values will be attacked.” This definition illuminates why national security is often a contested concept. State actors often disagree on objective and subjective indicators of national security. Some states may seek to maintain the status quo to protect their acquired values, whereas other states may believe it is necessary to revise the international status quo to protect and extend their values (Ripsman and Paul 2005).

Building on the definition of Wolfers, Morton Berkowitz and P. G. Bock (1965) have defined national security as “the ability of a nation to protect its internal values from external threat” (in Hermann 1977). The core internal values of a state may require the support of various interest groups, including government agencies, influential individuals, and political and religious groups. Trade-offs are made between interest groups to reach a consensus over core values such as liberal democracy, the right to self-determination, religious freedom, and other human rights (Leffler 1990, 145). Policymakers outline national security goals to protect such core values from external threats. It could be argued, for example, that liberal democracy has been the core value of the US and formed part of its foreign policy disposition. Thus, the US saw itself as an international protector of liberal democracy during the Cold War against the perceived Soviet totalitarian threat (Cox and Stokes, Ed. 2008).

In international relations (IR), the concept of national security is conditionally based on two major assumptions: the threats to a state’s security principally arise from outside its borders, and such threats are primarily military in nature. Lippmann (1943) outlined these assumptions in his definition of national security:

A nation is secure to the extent to which it is not in danger of having to sacrifice core values, if it wishes to avoid war, and is able, if challenged, to maintain them by victory in such a war.

Lippmann’s definition, as Arnold Wolfers (1952) pointed out, “implies that security rises and falls with the ability of a nation to deter an attack, or to defeat it.” Thus, national security has been defined in terms of military strength to protect core values within a sovereign state and sustain its territorial integrity. This perspective had a significant impact during the Cold War. Therefore, the main area of focus for both statesmen and academics during the Cold War was the enhancement of military capabilities to uphold national security.

Unpacking the idea of the national security state

The US maintained its territorial security throughout its history prior to the Second World War. Apart from the War of 1812, the physical security of the US was challenged for the first time when Japan attacked the US naval base and other military installations at Pearl Harbour on 6 December 1941 (Stuart 2000). Additionally, the advent of sophisticated arms such as long-range bombers, atomic bombs, and ballistic missiles had further reduced the invulnerability of the US after 1945. The potential impact of these modern arms was devastating as they could be used not only to target security installations but also population centres, markets, and industrial zones (Stuart 2000, 9). After the decline of the British Empire and the Soviet Union’s key role in defeating Nazi Germany during the Second World War, Moscow emerged as a superpower in the post-war period and rival to the US with a competing ideology and philosophy towards international security and the global governance system (Library of Congress, Retrieved: May 2016). Therefore, for the first time in its history, the US leadership felt its security was directly threatened by a state that was geographically removed from the region in which America was located.

In this context, the Truman administration was convinced that there was a need to move from the traditional idea of national defence to one national security in order to safeguard the country in the post-1945 era. The attack on Pearl Harbour, the advent of new long-range sophisticated weaponry, including nuclear arms, and the rise of the Soviet Union in Europe, all helped to transform US foreign and security policy thinking after 1945. It was a turning point in US history with regard to the shaping of its national security policies. Consequently, the US adopted the national security state that was born out of very extreme security circumstances at the beginning of the Cold War.

The US national security state was based on two key ideas: anti-communism and a new security doctrine to uphold US interests such as physical security, the promotion of core values, and economic prosperity (Yergin 1977). The new security concerns briefly coexisted with America’s traditional understanding of security based on national defence after 1945 (Hogan 1998). However, the new national security ideology prevailed after many public discussions and debate in Congress. In March 1947, President Truman announced the country’s new security doctrine – known as the Truman Doctrine – and said that the US would support free countries or people anywhere in the world in their fight against the spread of communism (Watson 2002). The Truman Doctrine was very important as it showed that the US was prepared to resist and contain the expansion of communism in the world.

Consequently, the Truman administration oversaw the reorganization of the American state so that military, foreign policy, and domestic economic resources could be coordinated and channelled in a more efficient fashion to meet the newly perceived security challenges. This led to the creation of an American national security state in the late 1940s (Yergin 1977). In the next four decades, this fledgeling national security structure consolidated itself to become a powerful actor in the making of US foreign policy and had a profound impact on American governance and society.

The US had emerged as the world’s most powerful nation after the Second World War. Most of its Western allies were affected by the war, and they depended on US aid to restore their war-torn social and economic structures. In addition, developing countries were looking towards the US for its support for their national independence movements against their colonial regimes. Therefore, many nations looked for US support to achieve an economic revival and national renewal after the Second World War (Raskin 1976). On the other hand, the Soviet Union was trying to increase its influence around the world and tried to fill the vacuum left in Europe and northeast Asia. For instance, the Soviet Red Army occupied Eastern Europe and their apparent agenda was to expand their socialist model to the rest of Europe. This led to the beginning of a constant global power struggle between the US and Soviet Union known as the Cold War. The global competition for power between the superpowers included ideological confrontation, an arms race, propaganda, diplomatic outbursts, proxy wars, and economic rivalry (Patman ed. 2006). The confrontation between superpowers resulted in two opposing blocs: the Western Alliance led by the US and the Socialist bloc led by the Soviet Union. Such polarization reinforced the notion of national security in the Cold War era as a majority of states in the developing world were courted by the superpowers to align with the Western or the Socialist blocs.

Meanwhile, the US and the Soviet Union both saw each other as security threats to their core political values (in Walker 2009). The Soviet Union’s ideology was based on communism with its one-party political system and closed economy, where the state had full control over the economic system. However, the US political system was based on liberal democracy and capitalism, with private ownership of the economy (Library of Congress, Retrieved: May 2016). According to President Truman, “the US must be willing to help free peoples to maintain their free institutions and their national integrity against aggressive movements that seek to impose upon them totalitarian regimes” (in Watson 2002). That meant that the US after 1945 increasingly felt it had to play a leading role in containing the perceived Soviet totalitarian threat on a global basis.

Against this backdrop, there was initially no clear security template on how the US should fight the Cold War. However, the Deputy Chief of Mission at the US Embassy in Moscow helped to provide the intellectual framework to fill this gap. George F. Kennan advocated the idea of firm containment in his famous article “The Sources of Soviet Conduct” in 1947. Kennan (1947) wrote that “the main element of any US policy toward the Soviet Union must be that of a long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive ­tendencies.” Subsequently, the Truman administration adopted a containment strategy to counter the Soviets’ expansion and intervene when it was necessary to safeguard Western interests (The Office of the Historian, Retrieved: June 2016). To implement the containment strategy, the US came up with a national security strategy to integrate “foreign, economic and military policies relating to the national security so as to enable the military services and the other departments and agencies of the government to cooperate more closely and effectively in matters involving national security” (Raskin 1976, 194). Throughout the Cold War era, the containment strategy became the major component of US national security policies in which diplomatic, military, economic, cultural, nuclear, and covert initiatives were integrated to counter the Soviet aggression and its expansion (Lucas and Mistry 2009).

The US national security state was formally established after the US Congress enacted several key pieces of legislation. The main objective was to create an organizational framework that was capable of developing a coherent, effective, and unified national security policy (Benedetti 1978). Following 18 months of debate, the US Congress passed the 1947 National Security Act. The Act created the leading institutions of US national security system, including a unified Nationa...