Countering the Hegemon: Pakistan's Strategic Response

The dynamics of South Asian security are in a transition phase. On the one hand is India with her economic, military and strategic rise, and its propping up as a strategic bulwark to China and on the other Pakistan faced with multiple internal, external, economic, military, and strategic constraints. It is argued that the constraining environment makes it critical for Pakistan's national security to take drastic doctrinal and strategic initiatives to prevent the emerging hegemon's coercive tactics. This requires a well-calculated doctrinal, command and control, and architectural restructuring as a response strategy that vertically strengthens its nuclear deterrent posture. Additionally, Pakistan has to evolve a mechanism for pre-delegation of authority to its regional commands - central, northern and southern - well interfaced with the National Command Authority (NCA) along with resilient delivery systems to robustly reinforce its nuclear deterrent capabilities. Vertical strategic strengthening would go a long way in not only deterring the rising hegemon's military muscle with an adequate array of strategic, non-strategic battlefield nuclear weapons with multiple delivery systems but, at the same time, by being well-integrated with NCA's organizational configurations, make its doctrine effective.