NOTE: On Friday, December 6, 2024, the Millennium Institute of Technology and Entrepreneurship (MITE) hosted the launch of the book “The Security Imperative: Pakistan’s Nuclear Deterrence and Diplomacy”, authored by Ambassador Zamir Akram. This persuasive book examines Pakistan’s strategic defense policies, nuclear deterrence, and diplomatic efforts amidst global challenges.
The event was organized by the Center for International Strategic Studies Sindh (CISSS) in collaboration with the Karachi Council for Foreign Relations (KCFR). The ceremony featured thought-provoking addresses by prominent figures, including Lt. Gen. Khalid A. Kidwai, NI, HI, HI(M), Advisor Development National Command Authority (ADNCA); Senator (Retd) Javed Jabbar; Ambassador Qazi M. Khalilullah; and the author himself, Ambassador Zamir Akram. Of particular significance was the address by Lt. Gen. Khalid Ahmed Kidwai, whose remarks are shared here for their strategic value and relevance to the readers.
Senator Javed Jabbar, Ambassador Masood Khan, Ambassador and Begum Zamir Akram, Ambassador Qazi Khalilullah, Dr Faisal Mushtaq, Dr Huma Baqai, our special guests from the Balochistan Think Tank Network Brig and Begum Agha Ahmed Gul along with the BTTN faculty, ladies and gentlemen. Assalam Alaikum.
It’s always a great feeling to be in the company of Pakistan’s top professionals, renowned intellectuals, colleagues and friends. I am also honoured to have been asked by Dr Nadira Panjwani, who is probably traveling and not here, and Ambassador Zamir Akram, to speak at today’s book launch ceremony of Ambassador Zamir’s book titled ‘The Security Imperative – Pakistan’s Nuclear Deterrence and Diplomacy’. In fact I have been honoured for the fourth time with regard to this very important and unique work of Ambassador Zamir.
First, when he asked me a couple of years ago if I would write the foreword for the book, which as you might have seen, I did with the greatest of pleasure. Subsequently, he honoured me by asking to speak at two earlier book launch ceremonies as well, one in Karachi at Dr Masuma Hasan’s Pakistan Institute of International Affairs (PIIA), and the other time at Baluchistan’s premier think tank Baluchistan Think Tank Network (BTTN) at the Baluchistan University of Information Technology, Engineering and Management Sciences (BUITEMS) in Quetta. And now for the fourth time the invitation from Dr Nadira Panjwani and the Ambassador himself. Thank you all ladies and gentlemen.
First a bit of a background. I have had the privilege of knowing and working at a professional level with Ambassador Zamir Akram for over two decades now, as indeed I have had the privilege of knowing and working at a professional level with the two other outstanding diplomats and friends present here Ambassadors Masood Khan and Ambassador Qazi Khalilullah for about the same time.
I met Ambassador Zamir for the first time in Washington in June 2001 when he was serving at the Pakistan Embassy and I, as the Director General of the newly established Strategic Plans Division (SPD), was accompanying the Foreign Minister, an impeccable professional the late Mr Abdul Sattar in the early years of General Musharraf’s government. 9/11 had not happened yet and the international world order was fairly sane and stable; it had not transited just yet towards a degree of insanity and instability as we know it today ever since 9/11.
Among much else on the agenda of the visit, briefings to important Washington audiences about the newly established nuclear command and control system in Pakistan in the shape of the National Command Authority (NCA) and the SPD, and the resultant strengthening of the safety and security of Pakistan’s nuclear assets was a prominent briefing point. Pakistan had only recently then come out of the closet when the nuclear programme transited overnight from being a covert programme for a few decades prior, to an overt nuclear programme through the conduct of six nuclear tests at Chaghi on 28th and 30th May 1998 in response to India’s five. The disturbed strategic balance in South Asia, triggered by India’s nuclear tests of 11th and 13th May two weeks earlier, had thus been re-established and restored. Pakistan’s long standing dilemma of relative conventional forces asymmetry viz India’s conventional forces also stood redressed. The Indian sub-continent or South Asia would strategically and militarily never be the same again.
There was nothing classified about the visit. This was open source information which needed to be disseminated in the power corridors of the then sole super power in order to provide reassurances all round that Pakistan’s nuclear assets were secure and were being handled professionally. The then Deputy Chief of Mission Zamir Akram and Ambassador Maleeha Lodhi took us around meeting and briefing whosoever they considered needed to be met and briefed. Amongst many others, two prominent individuals I recall meeting was the then Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Joe Biden, and the then Ambassador at large Mr Zalmay Khalilzad.
This first acquaintance with Ambassador Zamir Akram thereafter gradually transformed into frequent professional interactions on strategic issues which overlapped our respective national responsibilities. International diplomacy and military strategies are two faces of the same coin. These operate best in harmony so as to create synchronized and synergized strategic and policy effects for national security and furthering national interests. As a professional soldier I have never had a doubt that astute diplomacy is and always will be the first line of defence against all types of international threats particularly, in my context, against Pakistan’s nuclear programme. This first line of defence can never be allowed to be breached. I take great pride in mentioning that I have had the unique privilege of working in tandem with three of Pakistan’s finest diplomat-soldiers who have held that first line of defence up front boldly and solidly never allowing it be breached by an intruder – none other than the Akram brothers Ambassador Munir Akram, Ambassador Zamir Akram, and Ambassador Masood Khan.
Ladies and gentlemen, you can be certain that there was never ever a shortage of international threats especially during the infancy days of the nuclear programme. The programme was always in the eye of the storm and it took special genius, courage and professionalism of the highest order on the part of our diplomats to keep the hounds away.
Pakistan’s nuclear deterrence capability is the cornerstone of Pakistan’s security and is central, if I may, to Pakistan’s survival. Look around you in the Middle East and you will know what I mean. Non-nuclear Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Palestine, Iran, even non-nuclear Ukraine, drive home the message. You will probably agree with me if I say that this common wisdom is ingrained in Pakistan at the common man’s level. The Pakistani street owns Pakistan’s nuclear programme; it gets terribly perturbed when it smells the first sign of a potential threat. Follow the social media at such times and you will understand what I mean. Every once in a while, Pakistan’s senior leadership needs to come up and issue special statements to dispel the persistent speculations of a compromise on the nuclear programme. Such is the sensitivity and feelings of ownership at the popular level.
At the SPD particularly, Ambassador Zamir would bear me out, we have always till today, for 26 years, considered quality diplomacy and our first rate diplomats as Pakistan’s warriors at the frontier. The SPD, the Foreign Office and our key ambassadors in critical capitals work hand in glove to discuss and debate policy issues and take appropriate positions to secure Pakistan’s strategic interests. Ambassador Masood Khan and Ambassador Qazi Khalilullah are first hand witnesses to this integrated approach. Little wonder that Ambassador Zamir’s great expertise and experience continue to enrich SPD’s work as we hang on to him as our Adviser for the last 10 years.
Since Ambassador Zamir and I struck a chord of mutual respect fairly early, it was inevitable that the professional relationship would also transit into personal friendship to include our families as well. I can say without hesitation that we count the Zamir family amongst our valued friends. Thank you Sadia and Lubna. And this goes even deeper when we count, as I said earlier, Zamir Akram’s illustrious elder brother the world renowned Ambassador Munir Akram with whom also I was privileged to work in the early years. You can’t find better professionals than the Akram brothers anywhere in the world. They sit at the highest international professional rung. They have done Pakistan proud and the world respects them not only for their professional acumen but for their unflinching devotion to their country and its cause, and of course for being such perfect gentlemen-diplomats.
Ambassador Zamir and I continue to work closely on and off to this day, even as I speak, on subjects of our common professional national responsibilities – he the experienced nuclear diplomat par excellence and the SPD taking care of the robustness of the nuclear deterrence. Both responsibilities converge nicely to create synergized strategic imperatives for Pakistan’s national security, strategic stability, and relative peace in South Asia. Hence the title of the book ‘The Security Imperative – Pakistan’s Nuclear Deterrence and Diplomacy’ could not have been more aptly chosen by Ambassador Zamir; the title says it all.
Strategic deterrence and diplomacy go hand in hand. I would like to quote a few passages from the foreword of the book to recall what I had to say there.
“Security Imperative is a fascinating story, professionally told, of how Pakistan’s diplomacy and our top rate diplomats – always the first line of defence – provided Pakistan’s nuclear weapons programme with an international protective umbrella – the great wall – from its infancy in 1972 to its dramatic overnight transition from a covert capability to an overt demonstrated capability on the high noons of 28th and 30th May 1998. The earth shaking tremors were recorded accurately in real time at worldwide monitoring sensors including by the intricate network of over 300 monitoring stations of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) where I was shown the graphic records during a visit; it was a proud day in Vienna!
And then from 1998 onwards the resultant diplomatic tremors had to be managed by Pakistan’s diplomacy and brilliant minds like Ambassador Zamir Akram for over two decades, through the maze of sanctions and denials, up to the full maturity and operationalization of the programme as a robust, operationalized nuclear deterrent force; a force which has literally outlawed major wars in South Asia and has secured Pakistan from India’s kinetic aggressive designs for all times. All through these difficult years, Pakistan’s outstanding diplomats were always in the forefront in keeping the wolves away – and Ambassador Zamir Akram, in a variety of appointments whether in Pakistan at the headquarters, at the Prime Minister’s Secretariat, or outside Pakistan in Washington or at Geneva, was at the center stage of events as Pakistan’s diplomat-warrior. I hope he would not mind if I use a term for him that is being grudgingly applied by the west for the smartest of Chinese diplomats – Wolf Warriors. I think Ambassador Zamir fits the bill! He gave right back to everything that was thrown at him by Pakistan’s international detractors – never compromising on Pakistan’s interests. He has seen history closely and narrates it superbly from the advantage of not only enjoying a ringside diplomat’s seat but also being a critical player at critical periods of Pakistan’s nuclear history.”
I have further mentioned in the foreword, “There were major professional overlaps between the SPD’s work and Ambassador Zamir Akram’s diplomatic responsibilities as Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the Conference on Disarmament (CD) at Geneva – as the nuclear programme’s first line of defence. Our work required the closest of coordination and synergy in order to get it right – despite the entire world except China lined up against Pakistan. There was no room for errors; and right we got it, much of it because of the smart diplomatic circles that Ambassador Zamir Akram wove around the international hounds preying at Pakistan!
Pakistan’s crowning success has been at the Conference on Disarmament (CD) Geneva. The prevention of ‘commencement of negotiations’ on the proposed Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty (FMCT) has been stalled successfully almost single handedly by Pakistan for over two decades for the straight forward reason that the proposed Treaty is not in Pakistan’s security interest – period! And for this Pakistan’s superb nuclear diplomacy pioneered most ably by Ambassador Munir Akram, Ambassador Masood Khan and Ambassador Zamir Akram, amongst others, deserves the highest accolades,” unquote.
There was an entire gamut of strategic-cum-operational compulsions viz Indian military’s fast maturing hard hitting Cold Start Doctrine in the period 2005-2015, and Pakistan’s linked need, therefore, to produce adequate stocks of the fissile material called Plutonium, which we did not have at the time, for our smaller or tactical nuclear weapons not only in order to plug our inventory gaps at the tactical level but to strengthen the full spectrum of nuclear deterrence comprehensively – we needed time, lots of it, in terms of years and years. If Pakistan were to mindlessly succumb to international pressures and agree to the commencement of negotiations of the Fissile Material Cut Off Treaty, FMCT, the strategic consequences would have been catastrophic strategically, militarily and politically. That is why every single political government sitting in the National Command Authority had to briefed anew on change of government, and to the credit of each one of them, they registered and approved the need and without hesitation gave the SPD and the Foreign Office clearance to keep the FMCT at bay. Ambassador Zamir Akram’s hand at Geneva, and of those who followed him subsequently, thus stood greatly strengthened and Pakistan’s diplomacy never looked back and was that much robust for that.
By 2011, the unquestioned national consensus – the greatest source of strength for the nuclear programme – enabled Pakistan to transit to the policy of Full Spectrum Deterrence while remaining within the broader contours of Credible Minimum Deterrence. By then, we at the SPD had covered all bases: strategic, operational, tactical, land, air, and sea. And in all those difficult years and decades, it were super diplomats like Ambassador Zamir Akram and his fellow professionals who shielded the nuclear programme from international pressures.
Before ending, I would like to place before you the strategic effects that have been generated in the last four decades on the large size Indian military machine by Pakistan’s nuclear capability articulated through its robust nuclear policy of Full Spectrum Deterrence. Progressively over these decades the Indian military machine has been neutered to a point of being rendered quite irrelevant in South Asia’s war fighting paradigm. Consequently, India’s military doctrines have also been compelled to gradually adjust to the ground reality of a Pakistani Full Spectrum Deterrence nuclear capability visible over the horizon in support of its strong conventional forces duly integrated into Pakistan’s deterrence and security strategies.
Similarly, in the last four decades India’s political approach towards Pakistan has also slowly but noticeably undergone a change because of the new reality as India’s politicians reconciled to the futility of attempting to coerce Pakistan through threats and direct strategies. India eventually had to adopt low cost indirect strategies like hybrid warfare and fifth generation warfare to hurt Pakistan internally in the western provinces, and on the western borders; a deflective reaction to Pakistan’s nuclear capability having blocked options on the eastern borders. That Pakistan is finding a degree of in-cohesion and imbalance in responding effectively to the indirect Indian strategies for some years ought to be a matter of serious concern to Pakistan’s politico-military leadership.
It was because of Pakistan’s developing nuclear capabilities, which are the focus of Ambassador Zamir Akram’s work that India’s war fighting military doctrines, in turn, started to transit and taper off, in stages. From General K. Sundarji’s gung-ho “mechanize, mobilize and hit” doctrine, laid out ever so cleverly in 1986-87 in the deserts of Rajasthan under the cover of the infamous Exercise Brasstacks, to General V.P. Malik’s and General Padmanabhan’s “limited war under a nuclear overhang” as in the battle ready but failed Operation Parakaram of 2001-02, to the lukewarm deployments subsequent to the Mumbai attacks of 2008, to the still-born “Cold Start Doctrine” which got neutralized with the first test of Pakistan’s Nasr missile as a tactical nuclear weapon in 2011, to the pathetic specter of the late General Bipin Rawat’s fake “strategic strike” of 2016.
These military war fighting doctrines were finally reduced to the humiliation of the “Indian Air Force’s failed Balakot strategic strike” of 26 February 2019 which was anything but. The resultant IAF losses when the PAF struck back in force the next day through Operation Swift Retort, and Wing Commander Abhinandan’s appreciation for Pakistan’s fantastic tea, compelled Prime Minister Modi to call it quits, symbolizing and indirectly recognizing the prevalence of a strategic balance in South Asia where the specter of a potential nuclear Armageddon deterred further military escalation.
During these critical decades as Pakistan’s nuclear capabilities strengthened generating the aforesaid strategic effects on India, Pakistan was fortunate to have outstanding diplomats like Ambassador Zamir Akram who worked hand in glove with our strategic planners to ensure that the first line of defence would never be breached. For over five decades since 1972, when the nuclear weapons programme was first conceived, Pakistan’s diplomats and diplomacy have ensured successfully that the international environments would not create any detrimental effect on the nuclear scientists and engineers as they worked day and night, year after year to deliver on the assigned national task. Historically and strategically speaking, the reality is that the very basis of the conception and development of Pakistan’s nuclear capability ever since 1972 has been to ensure that strategic balance viz India will never again be allowed to be disturbed to Pakistan’s disadvantage. That, the bitter lessons of the disastrous 1971 War will be learnt and not forgotten. That, the subsequent asymmetry in favour of the Indian military in certain critical areas of conventional forces will be rendered irrelevant because Pakistan chose to develop a robust nuclear weapons capability at the tri-services level as The Great Equalizer. Pakistan’s nuclear programme was and will always remain India-centric.
Today, five decades later, I can say with confidence that Pakistan’s nuclear weapons capability has delivered successfully on its essential objective and purpose – deterrence of aggression by India thereby ensuring peace in South Asia. No more disasters like 1971. Resultantly, one can be quite certain that major wars like the ones in 1947-48, 1965, 1971 and perhaps even lesser standoffs like the 1999 Kargil War, stand clearly outlawed in South Asia. However much India may want to attempt to tilt the conventional forces balance in its favour, Pakistan’s robust nuclear capability of Full Spectrum Deterrence will keep pace and ensure that the two nuclear powers will exercise restraint and responsibility whenever contemplating the possible employment of the military instrument in pursuit of political policies and objectives. In my judgement both India and Pakistan have seemingly absorbed the relevant strategic lessons of our relatively short history especially post-1971. Prevalence of strategic stability in South Asia ever since is the outcome.
And therefore, when seen against the gradual erosion and regression of India’s politico-military choices, to me it sounds comical and a bit Quixotic to hear India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Defence Minister Rajnath Singh threatening every now and then that India will chase infiltrators inside Pakistani territory, and for the born again Hindutva Foreign Minister Jaishankar to say that Pakistan’s nuclear capability should be ignored while planning to take Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan. Such statements at the highest political levels can only fall in the category of political bluster borne out of the frustration of seeing one of the world’s largest militaries standing deterred against Pakistan’s robust nuclear capability.
There should never ever be a doubt in anyone’s mind, friend or foe, that Pakistan’s operationally ready nuclear capability enables every Pakistani leader the liberty, the dignity and the courage to look straight into the Indian eye – and never blink.
I would also like to recall that nearly 80 years of geo-political and military history post World War II, reinforces the universal wisdom that nuclear powers do not fight direct wars. The wars in Korea, Viet Nam, Afghanistan, and now in Ukraine for nearly three years, reinforce the universal wisdom that nuclear powers do not fight direct wars. Lately though it seems that the US, NATO and Russia are determined to turn that universal wisdom on its head through the acute brinksmanship in their nuclear dance of death and destruction as the Ukraine War probably heads towards a closure of some kind early next year. In the context of South Asia however, I do not see any reason why India and Pakistan would want to defy that time tested logic and risk Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) of the worst kind. The illogical logic of MAD is as relevant to South Asia as it is to Europe, to Trans-Atlantic, and to Trans-Pacific. The strategic stability paradigm in South Asia has clearly shifted towards a more balanced equation. I think Pakistan can breathe easy and, perhaps, utilize this extended and open-ended “window of peace” to focus on the resolution of its severe internal challenges, foremost being political stability, the economy and terrorism, not at all in that order but simultaneously and in parallel.
To sum up, all in all, Ambassador Zamir Akram’s The Security Imperative – Pakistan’s Nuclear Deterrence and Diplomacy is an excellent account of Pakistan’s superb diplomatic maneuvers of almost the entire journey of the five decades of Pakistan’s nuclear programme, linked events and interesting episodes along the way. Ambassador Zamir Akram was fortunate to be invariably there where the action was most of the time throughout his long distinguished career.
As such the authenticity and factual accuracy of the diplomatic history of the programme is assured. I think all Pakistanis owe our smartest salute to this diplomat-warrior for not only being there for Pakistan whenever it mattered but also for putting this historical account together for the benefit of posterity. It is genuinely a valuable addition to an otherwise barren landscape. Thank you Ambassador Zamir Akram.
And thank you ladies and gentlemen.
