Leaving aside the hyperbole that inevitably hangs around the neck of any event attended by the political aristocracy, the prime minister made some valid points. Alongside, the commitment to provide the nation’s defenders with the best equipment, there was an acknowledgement that conflict and the tools to fight conflict with are ever-changing, and there was a rolling necessity to develop devices that are appropriate to asymmetric warfare and cyberspace. Today’s conflicts are fought with computers, as well as guns, rockets, aircraft and tanks. To fight effectively against non-state actors today, yesterday’s weaponry serves poorly. War is an expensive business and not only in terms of lives lost. Every round fired has a monetary cost. There is a need to develop cost-effective equipment when compared with other producers of defence materials — many of whom are as keen to sell to Pakistan as Pakistan is keen to sell to them. Pakistan has a history of joint development of major defence items, as well as the capacity to diversify its product range to market in niches around the world. A number of Western nations are reportedly already importing defence products from Pakistan — which they would not be doing if they were not satisfied with the bangs they were getting for their bucks. Pakistan has already developed small battlefield drones, and there is a rapidly expanding market globally for them to be used in both civil and military environments — perhaps a market for our own products. All in all — a good IDEA.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 3rd, 2014.
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