Taking control of our national strategy

In many ways we are a state and nation in transition and face many challenges at both domestic and international levels. National security challenges top all of them in urgency, social impact and positive influence on progress. Peace, stability and social order are the primary objectives of a national-security policy. No state or society can achieve them without a national strategy that is revised routinely to make adjustments for threats from domestic elements and international powers.

On many counts, our national strategy needs an overhaul from those who frame it. This means that the institutions that take part in developing it should review the threats to the nation and also the nature of such threats. The American raid in Abbottabad, the presence of al Qaeda leaders and a melange of terrorist groups, driven by religious ideology, ethnicity or just mercenaries, employed by our adversaries there, show a crisis of national strategy. One may use different terminology to explain the prevailing security situation, but the matter of reviewing and rewriting is as urgent as the nature of the existential threat we face.

How can we go about redoing this? First, reworking the national strategy doesn’t mean that every aspect of the existing strategy (whatever it is or whatever it seeks to achieve) is in the process of being rejected without proper evaluation. We must have a rational, utilitarian approach to retain what is useful and reject what is irrelevant. Second, pragmatism, not ideology, must be the keyword in defining national strategy. What it means is that goals must be realistic, achievable and essentially embedded in our primary national interests. The second part is always about the best means available and within our reach. This also leads us to the question of power and how we can mobilise our national resources so that we can build and expand an indigenous technology base which can then help provide increased security to our people. At the same time, we should be autonomous enough to take hard decisions to preserve our national security.

Another important aspect of formulating national strategy is its inclusiveness. No person or institution can appropriate patriotism or exclusive responsibility to formulate national strategy since the latter affects every citizen, social group and part of the country. As indicated above, a national strategy is related to a state’s collective national existence and progress. Therefore, the essential logic of being a political community is that we work this out together through collective thinking and wisdom. The elected political executive must take the lead and greater responsibility in reformulating national strategy. There are issues of competence, capacity and commitment to inclusive policy formulation. But these are not unique to Pakistan — every country in the world faces them. The political executive can bring better leadership, competent researchers and more resources to the national security think-tanks that have traditionally been occupied by sycophants, job-seeking leeches and a ridiculously incompetent lot. It is time to restructure them so that they can contribute meaningfully to the national strategy discourse.

One more important point to consider is transparency in national strategy. This should be present at all levels, when the primary goals are being formulated and when the threat assessment is being done. For long, a select group within the security establishment has drawn our national strategy without much participation from academic experts, diplomats and public representatives. Sadly, much has been done in an opaque manner, and this continues to create distrust between the political and security institutions of the country. Even with the best of intentions, the national security establishment has failed to create a national ownership of national strategy.

The 12-point agenda passed by parliament on May 13 can be a new beginning for reshaping national strategy. Now, it’s time for a coherent, well-thought-out and participatory national strategy. Our future progress hinges on it.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 16^th, 2011.