NSP: will it make us secure?

The PTI government has launched a National Security Policy (NSP), a document meant to describe how a state aims to provide for the security of its people. A national security policy provides an overarching ‘national’ vision for the strategic direction of a country and seeks a ‘collective’ understanding of threats and risks as well as the values and principles intended to guide the nation forward. This therefore necessitates employing a ‘whole of the nation’ approach – bringing together all stakeholders, particularly critical voices within a polity, forging consensus and giving due ownership to all segments of society.

Unfortunately, unlike the National Action Plan (NAP), the National Internal Security Policies (2014 & 2018) and Vision 2025 formulated by the PML-N government, the NSP failed to achieve this. Neither parliament nor opposition parties were consulted in the policy formulation process. Even provinces, that have the biggest stake and responsibility in the domain of internal security, were not duly consulted. The policy doesn’t even meet the ‘whole of government’ principle for implementation, what to talk of the ‘whole of nation’ principle that is critical to defend against the threats of fifth generation warfare. Yet, the NSP claims itself to be the ‘first ever’ national security policy and, even more ludicrously, the ‘first ever’ to introduce the notions of ‘economic security’ and ‘citizen-centric security’.

The obsession of being called ‘first’ must have been spilled over from the narcissistic attitude of PM Imran Khan. Because if anyone has read Pakistan Vision 2025 developed in 2014 that offered a holistic framework of economic security and national cohesion, they would not make such sweeping claims on thin ground. For example, Vision 2025 specified national security as a key enabler to achieve our goals. It stipulated: “without an environment of peace and security, economic development can neither be meaningful nor sustainable.” Not to mention, unlike the NSP which has become partisan, Vision 2025 was officially endorsed by all major political parties including our worst critics (the PTI).

The fact is that the PML-N government initiated the process of codifying security policies in Pakistan soon after it formed the government in 2013. At the time, Pakistan was engulfed with existential security threats emanating from terrorism and extremism. The number of terrorist incidents peaked at 1806 in 2013-14 – culminating into the most grotesque of all tragedies, the APS attack.

The PML-N government did not flinch when faced with such severe security crises. In its first year, the government came up with the country’s National Internal Security Policy (2014) and complimented it with the development of the National Action Plan in the same year. The government went out of its way to build consensus on this sensitive issue. All political parties as well as state institutions at both the federal and provincial levels were consulted. The ownership and support thus generated gave the real impetus to suggested policy actions ranging from soft to hard measures to curtail this menace.

By 2018, the number of terrorist attacks had declined by over 70 percent. In order to consolidate the gains made in the struggle against terrorism, and to achieve sustainable peace, a comprehensive security framework with focus on non-kinetic interventions and reforms was developed in the form of the National Internal Security Policy (NISP) 2018 which aimed to tackle structural sources of insecurity in the country and provide a broader vision to establish positive peace. Unfortunately, rather than adopting NISP 2018, the PTI government wasted three and a half precious years just rehashing the PML-N’s Vision 2025, NAP and NISP 1 & 2 into NSP. As terrorism rears its head again, the government must be made answerable for wasting time and losing momentum in the nation’s fight against terrorism and extremism.

Even after more than three years, the grand vision the government has come up with is nothing but a copy-paste of the PML-N’s strategy, as I shall demonstrate below. This may still have been acceptable, if the government were actually following the said policy prescriptions as well. The fact is that in practice, the government’s actions are completely opposite to what the PML-N’s policies and its own NSP suggests. This shows a complete lack of leadership, vision and capacity to understand and resolve the complex challenges faced by the country.

The NSP suggests a strong economy is essential for traditional and human security and advocates pro-growth economic policies. In reality, the PTI has wrecked the economy through its mismanagement and incompetence. It pursued fiscally irresponsible policies that shrank the size of the economy from $315 billion in 2018 to $280 billion in 2021. The PML-N on the other hand, increased the size of the economic pie and doubled tax revenues which translated into record increases in spending in the social sector, infrastructure development and the defence budget.

The NSP suggests redistribution to deal with the grievances and push factors that force people to take up violent paths. One of the six pillars of NISP 2018 was redistribution. Similarly, the emphasis on national cohesion through ‘unity in diversity’, recognition of minority communities and gender mainstreaming were also key dimensions of NISP 2018. Pursuing reconciliation with armed groups where possible and working towards regional peace were also two of the six pillars of NISP 2018 that have been reproduced in NSP using the same language.

The NSP emphasizes geo-economics, another idea taken squarely from NISP 2018 and Vision 2025. While the PML-N put this to practice through CPEC, the PTI government has in practice stalled the progress in this direction. The NSP advocates not joining geo-strategic camps, and maintaining cordial relations with both China and the US. The fact is that under the PTI, Pakistan’s relations have soured with both world powers. During the PML-N’s government, while our relations with China soared even higher under CPEC, we also initiated the US-Pakistan Knowledge Corridor with annual 1,000 PhD scholarships for ten years to promote cooperation with the US in higher education. The PML-N government expanded the size of the Fulbright Scholarship Program by becoming the first country to make a matching contribution. Today, the American president is not even interested in speaking to our prime minister on the phone.

Take any aspect of the NSP and you will find the PML-N’s vision and demonstrable performance reflected in that. Compare the same with the PTI’s approach and you will see actions completely in the opposite direction.

Along with the similarities with the PML-N’s vision, there are four key aspects where the NSP remains silent. First and second, it provides no commitment to democratic consolidation and ensuring basic freedoms, particularly freedom of speech in the country. This is not surprising given the party’s record on hounding opposition parties through bogus and politically motivated cases and attacks on the lives and livelihoods of journalists and other dissenting voices. This reveals the PTI’s truly authoritarian and fascist face that did not even find it worthy to pay lip service to these issues in its so-called ‘historic’ national document.

Third, despite its tall pre-election claims, the PTI has simply dropped the ball on the institutional reforms needed to effectively implement any national policy. The first R in NISP (2018), Reorient, proposed a complete overhaul of the state’s security apparatus, especially much needed reforms in the justice and law enforcement sectors to achieve the desired results. During its tenure, the PML-N focused extensively on evolving a community policing model and using technology, for example the Safe City projects, to bring much-needed efficiency. Model police stations and modern facilitation centers were established to improve police-citizen interactions. A comprehensive strategy to improve investigation and prosecution was developed. The PTI, on the contrary, has stalled progress in this direction. Its modus operandi has only been to officiate unnecessary transfers and posting of senior government officers on a whimsical basis, demoralising key institutions such as the police and the bureaucracy.

Internal security threats are the real challenges that Pakistan faces to ensure peace and stability for economic development. The chapter on internal security is vague and nowhere. Extremism and sectarianism have been dealt with in a small paragraph, which even a high school student can write better. The policy guidelines in the document neither provide any vision nor any framework. The readers are advised to have a look at NISP-2018 and judge for themselves.

Fourth, technology is changing the security paradigm in all its dimensions rapidly. The NSP is silent and at best makes a cursory reference. Technology advances are making it unthinkable to reckon military strength by counting soldiers, tanks, and airplanes. Advanced electronics and robots can already make a defensive conventional army more effective than an offensive army larger in terms of pure firepower. Smart robotic weapons can spot and destroy enemy tanks, planes, and military concentrations.

Superior electronic warfare can enable forces to block enemy communications while preventing them from jamming ours. Similarly, computer-assisted management of battle information makes possible highly focused military actions. Likewise, innovation in Artificial Intelligence, big data, cloud computing, automation & robotics, biotechnology, nanotechnology and space technology are reshaping the landscape of future economy and security.

The NSP is a resounding vindication of the PML-N’s vision, strategy and approach to national security and a damning indictment of the PTI’s capacity, practices and performance proving that the PML-N is the only political party that has the capacity and commitment to deliver concrete results on issues of critical importance for national security.

The writer is an MNA and former minister for interior, planning, development and reforms. He tweets @betterpakistan and can be reached at: betterpakistan@gmail.com