Pakistan announced an 18% increase in its defence expenditure on 12 June 2026. This increase was brought forth despite severe fiscal pressures and IMF-backed economic reforms. This surge in the budget raises deeper questions about the reasons behind Pakistan’s heightened security concerns and for whom Pakistan is preparing.
Pakistan’s conventional security posture revolves around India; the reason appears quite straightforward, especially after the 1971 war. The Eastern Front of Pakistan was the centre of Pakistan’s strategic imagination, nuclear capabilities, military doctrine, force structure and positioning, defence spending, and foreign policy. Today, however, Pakistan faces a far more dynamic and complex threat environment.
Every nation, regardless of size or geography, relies on four interconnected pillars to maintain national security: external deterrence, a favorable strategic environment, economic resilience, and internal stability. While nations can often address pressures on one of these pillars, the ongoing erosion of multiple foundations of security can create profound dilemmas and strategic uncertainty.
For Pakistan, the broader concepts for each of these pillars are as follows: Nuclear deterrence serves as external deterrence, compensating for the conventional asymmetry with India; influence in Afghanistan aims to provide strategic depth; economic resources, alongside external support, sustain military preparedness; and internal stability enables the state to concentrate on external and regional threats. Together, these pillars offer a degree of security and clarity, even amid recurring crises.
Today, Islamabad is experiencing a gradual erosion of these security pillars and is struggling not only to identify which insecurities should take priority but also to determine how to address each of these challenges effectively.
Pillar 1: External Deterrence under Pressure
Pakistan used nuclear capabilities in its national security architecture, primarily shaped by the perceived need to offset India’s superior conventional and geographical capabilities. Hence, for Pakistan, nuclear deterrence proved to be a strategic equaliser, establishing a credible deterrence, especially during large-scale conventional conflicts. For decades, this was the bedrock of Pakistan’s security policy.
However, India has evolved its military responses, from surgical strikes following Uri to Balakot and most recently Operation Sindoor, which have introduced new complexities to this equation and a need for Pakistan to revise its security policy. Pakistan’s traditional assumptions and responses regarding escalation management and military signalling are being tested by technological change and new forms of limited warfare.
Pillar 2: The Strategic Environment Under Pressure.
The second framework of Pakistan’s security framework rested on maintaining a favourable regional environment, particularly focused on its western neighbour, Afghanistan. For decades, Pakistan viewed Afghanistan through a long-standing pursuit of strategic depth in Afghanistan. The objective was to ensure that Kabul remained free from hostile influence and did not serve as the platform for India’s Strategic presence. This was primarily sought to reduce the risk of strategic encirclement and ensure greater flexibility in addressing security challenges in its Eastern Frontier. Yet the developments that have followed since the Taliban’s return to power have challenged this plan of action. Relations between Islamabad and Kabul have deteriorated over issues ranging from the Durand Line to the presence of Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) operations against Pakistan. The ongoing Afghan-Pakistan war has further strained the ties. This deterioration is particularly significant given Pakistan’s long history of employing militant proxies as an instrument of regional influence, a move that has increasingly generated unintended security consequences and has further contributed to the complex threat environment that Islamabad faces today.
The result, therefore, is an intense strategic reversal, rather than providing a necessary alliance or flexibility to Pakistan. Afghanistan demands military preparedness and management of security concerns, which proves to be draining for Pakistan, as it now has to manage both Western and Eastern Frontiers. Therefore, strategic depth with Afghanistan, which was once viewed as a solution to insecurity, is now increasingly contributing to it.
Pillar 3: Economic Resilience Under Pressure.
Economic stability and resilience are an important foundation of military capability. No state can indefinitely sustain its security and strategic ambitions without economic resources. Pakistan’s economic challenges are well-documented and quite persistent. Rising debt obligations, IMF-supported reforms, inflationary pressures, energy insecurity, and constrained space continue to limit economic flexibility for Pakistan. This becomes a huge challenge when military modernisation increasingly requires investments in advanced technologies, drones, cyber capabilities, integrated command systems, and electronic warfare. Even though Pakistan’s major share of military modernisation occurs through external cooperation rather than indigenisation. The recent increase in defence spending reflects the difficult choices confronting Pakistan; its priorities are quite clear. They are choosing guns over growth. As Pakistan’s security requirements continue to expand, Islamabad does not have the required economic base to sustain its modernisation efforts under pressure. Therefore, the challenge facing Pakistan is not whether or not it can finance security today but whether it can sustain security tomorrow.
Pillar 4: Internal Stability Under Pressure
The resurgence of Internal Challenges in Pakistan is one of the most critical transformations in Pakistan’s security environment. The threat comes from a plethora of elements: The return of TTP as a major security threat, insurgency in Balochistan, attacks on Chinese interests and investments in Pakistan linked to CPEC, and persistent political polarisation, especially between the elected and military leave, has created a complex domestic security landscape. These internal challenges are forcing the reallocation of resources that were once primarily devoted to external deterrence. Hence, Islamabad’s focus is now shifting from nuclear deterrence and traditional military superiority towards counter terrorism operations, intelligence gathering, and infrastructure protection within its borders to promote internal stabilisation.
The challenges faced by Pakistan have resulted in a crisis of strategic prioritization. While Islamabad’s Military Establishment continues to see India as its primary strategic adversary, this is evident in its defense spending on military capabilities. At the same time, Islamabad is dealing with a growing array of internal and regional security challenges that increasingly compete for its attention and resources. The rationale they follow relies on military posture and investments in hard power to address security-related issues, which forces them to increase their military budget beyond their economic capabilities.
**Implications for India**
A distracted Pakistan benefits India, as Islamabad’s priorities become more diffuse. The Pakistani government must decide where and how to allocate its increased military budget, particularly concerning military modernization. Despite ongoing security pressures, Pakistan persists in investing in conventional military capabilities focused on India. The current state of insecurity in Islamabad necessitates the division of its resources across multiple areas. For Indian policymakers, this situation calls for a reassessment of long-held assumptions regarding how Pakistan perceives risk, views its eastern adversary, allocates military resources, and responds during crises. Consequently, a potential future may see competition between India and Pakistan shaped less by military imbalance and more by strategic distraction. Moreover, New Delhi should remain vigilant regarding these developments.
