Cash-strapped Pakistan chooses to strengthen navy instead of economy

December 4 is celebrated as Navy Day across the country, marking the occasion when India’s naval forces, as a part of Operation Trident, inflicted a heavy loss on Pakistani ships during the 1971 Bangladesh liberation war. The combined military action by the Indian Navy had led to a massive monetary loss for Pakistan, and more importantly, it had helped enforce a naval blockade between East and West Pakistan, thereby blocking the supply of American weapons via Karachi. This operation went down as one of the finest moments for India’s naval prowess, instilling a deep-seated fear in the political and military elite of Pakistan as well.

Since then, India’s navy has become an even more formidable force, acquiring the ability to project power across vast realms of the Indian Ocean and beyond. However, there is an interesting turn in the regional dynamics now with China looking to back Pakistan’s naval expansion by helping it become a 50-ship navy. China, which has long deployed a strategy to encircle India in the maritime domain, is now throwing its weight behind Pakistan to alter the balance of power in the region. While noting this development at a press conference ahead of Navy Day, the Indian Navy Chief Admiral Dinesh Tripathi also disclosed how these new ships and submarines are either being made in China or China is providing active support to Pakistan to construct them. Needless to say, Pakistan’s growing naval acumen would have implications for India, presenting an elevated security challenge, a fact that is also being acknowledged by the defence establishment.

Chinese assistance or anti-India alliance?

In 2015, Pakistan had signed the largest defence contract ever in its history when China agreed to provide it with eight submarines—four to be manufactured by Wuhan-based Wuchang Shipbuilding Industry Group in China and four to be built in Karachi with Chinese assistance under a transfer-of-technology arrangement.

Although Pakistan is not the only country in the Indian subcontinent to seek Chinese help in building submarines, Bangladesh had also signed a contract for refurbishment and delivery of two Chinese-made submarines in 2012. But the scale at which Pakistan has enlisted Chinese assistance is much larger in comparison. The first of the eight advanced Hangor-class submarines was launched in April this year at the Wuhan shipyard, with Pakistan all set to induct these submarines by 2028 into its navy.

These submarines are equipped with air-independent propulsion, providing them with an element of stealth. In addition to this, Pakistan has also acquired Tughril, an advanced warship built at the Shanghai shipyard that is capable of multiple missions due to its capacity to launch surface-to-air and surface-to-surface missiles. Besides Tughril, Pakistan has also acquired Taimur, a powerful guided missile warship from China. These ships are a part of a four-ship deal announced by these two countries in 2018, of which two other ships were formally inducted in 2023 as PNS Tippu Sultan and PNS Shah Jahan by the Pakistan Navy.

All this is part of Pakistan’s efforts to expand its naval fleet to become one of Asia’s largest by inducting 50 surface warships and a subsurface fleet of 11 submarines. Of the 50 ships that Pakistan is aiming to induct, at least 20 are expected to be major vessels such as frigates and corvettes. Here it is also taking active help from Turkey as well, where they are jointly building a MILGEM corvette that will be equipped with state-of-the-art sensors and weapons systems. It’s one of the main shipyards, the Karachi Shipyards and Engineering Works, which is also undergoing a major overhaul to build heavier ships such as destroyers and frigates in the future.

In its quest to build naval prowess, Pakistan is getting full support from China, whose own strategic goals are aligning very well with Pakistani ambitions. China’s increased forays in the Indian Ocean Region are hardly an understated fact now, as its maritime links with countries in India’s vicinity have only grown in the recent years. China has already acquired the Gwadar port in Pakistan with strong prospects of it being used as a military base to project power in the Indian Ocean Region.

Recently there has been a spate of terrorist attacks on China-Pakistan Economic Corridor projects in Balochistan where Gwadar is located, further providing China an opening to deploy its own military to secure these facilities. Just last week, China has enlisted three Chinese private companies to do this job in Pakistan as well as Myanmar, another war-torn country.

The fact that China is providing submarines and other ships to Pakistan means that the involvement of PLA Navy staff would increase in the country, who would use the pretext of repair, maintenance, and training to get a foothold in Pakistan. Interestingly, top military officials and analysts in the country have themselves been very forthcoming in offering Gwadar as a military base to China so that it can monitor Indian as well as American naval activity in the region. China, which is already facing the heat of increased collaboration between the US and India in the Indo-Pacific, is likely to benefit from this arrangement. It is for this reason that China is investing in Pakistan’s naval ability, knowing fully well that a capable Pakistani navy is in its own strategic interest.

Guns over bread

Despite Pakistan trying to match India’s efforts to become a leading naval power in Asia, its economy is hardly a match for the Indian economy. Military power of any country is a function of its economic strength, which means that a strong national economy would naturally provide more opportunity to spend on military and defence. However, in the case of Pakistan, the opposite is true. The country is an IMF addict, with its persistent dependence on bailouts reflecting the structural problems that its economy faces. Last month, its attempt to secure a $7 billion help from the IMF went awry after the government failed to meet some basic conditions such as adequate tax collection, reining in inflation, and boosting manufacturing activities.

The failure of the Pakistani economy to provide a respectable standard of living to its people has led to massive political unrest in the country, with almost every province except Punjab, as well as the Pak-occupied Kashmir region, witnessing separatist activities. One of the worst-hit provinces is Balochistan, where the pro-liberation militants have also started to target Belt & Road projects, leading to increased concerns from China.

Anyway, the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) has become a white elephant that was initially touted as a game-changer but has now become a burden with Pakistan finding it difficult to meet its payment obligations. In fact, it is partly due to the high import bill generated by CPEC that Pakistan has to regularly return to the IMF for a bailout. Pakistan is officially the largest debtor in the world, owing a mountain of debt to the Chinese.

With the country’s economy already becoming a victim of Chinese designs, it is replicating the same in the domain of the military as well. In an event where Pakistan would fail to meet its debt commitments, there is a high chance that the Chinese would seek assets in return. But Pakistan is still trying to balance India’s growing naval prowess at a time when its economy is not allowing any additional expenditure on defence at the cost of selling its sovereignty to China. In fact, India’s naval chief was completely accurate when he said that Pakistan is choosing weapons over the welfare of its people. But knowing Pakistan, which has always lived in the delusion to equate its power with India with little means to actually do so, the naval expansion looks like a plan set in stone. This obviously leaves India with no choice but to continue building a state-of-the-art navy for itself.

The author is a New Delhi-based commentator on geopolitics and foreign policy. She holds a PhD from the Department of International Relations, South Asian University. She tweets @TrulyMonica. The views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views.