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It is imperative to understand that an extremely poor country like Pakistan cannot afford to spend any more money than is strictly necessary on defence.
Mustaqbil will make a fundamental and comprehensive review of defence policy. Defence requirements will be evaluated in relation to perceived threats. Military preparedness will reflect this assessment. Since we do not harbour any offensive intentions towards anyone, the stress will be on defensive capabilities.
Accordingly we will seek to cut back expenditure on offensive capability. The question we will ask is: To what extent does a large conventional army meet our legitimate defence needs? And, would it not be possible to significantly reduce troop levels without compromising on security?
Critical weaknesses in our defensive capability have been embarrassingly highlighted recently: Pilotless drones operate in Pakistani airspace unchallenged, and attack at will. Our defence establishment lacks the means to stop them.
Mustaqbil will make it a primary objective of military policy to develop an indigenous missile based anti aircraft system. It is clear that such a system is critical to our defence. Potential aggressors now rely primarily on overwhelming air superiority to obtain military victories. Conventional armies – such as the one we now maintain at great cost – seem to have become relics of the past. A litany of death and destruction in places such as Iraq, Serbia, Lebanon, and Afghanistan bear testament to how potent such unchallenged air power has become.
Clearly, for a country such as Pakistan, developing an effective missile based anti aircraft system poses many challenges. An array of technologies must be mastered and coordinated. These include: rocket engines, radar, guidance and control, complex electronics and software. While we envision that missiles will be the primary delivery system, we will also work on developing directed energy weapons -such as lasers – which, we expect, will ultimately become a significant component of our air defence system.
Mustaqbil will bring the best Pakistani minds to bear on this project. Some of our best minds now work abroad. We will encourage them to come back to participate in building a new Pakistan – a vibrant, democratic Pakistan – the Pakistan of their dreams, and ours.
Mustaqbil commits to protecting and enhancing our strategic defence capability. This is a critical component of our overall defence strategy. It raises the potential cost to any would be aggressor to an unacceptable level. Effective strategic deterrence will permit us to scale back our conventional capabilities. And this will mean that scare resources now committed to conventional defence can be redeployed to sectors where they are needed the most: education, health, poverty alleviation.