WestminsterResearch http://www.westminster.ac.uk/westminsterresearch Foreign Policy of Pakistan: a Critical Approach Bastos, M. This is an electronic version of a PhD thesis awarded by the University of Westminster. © Ms Maria Bastos, 2021. The WestminsterResearch online digital archive at the University of Westminster aims to make the research output of the University available to a wider audience. Copyright and Moral Rights remain with the authors and/or copyright owners. Foreign Policy of Pakistan: a Critical Approach Maria Inês De Almeida Duarte Bastos A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the University of Westminster for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy April 2021 Author’s Declaration I hereby declare I declare that all the material contained in this thesis is my own work. This thesis is carried out as per the guidelines and regulations of the University of Westminster. I further affirm that that no portion of the work referred to in the thesis has been submitted in support of an application for another degree or qualification of this or any other university or other institute of learning. Maria Inês de Almeida Duarte Bastos i Acknowledgements This thesis would not have been possible without the support of family, friends, and colleagues. I owe my gratitude to my Director of Studies, Professor Dibyesh Anand, and to my Second Director of Studies, Dr Frands Pederson. Their constant support, constructive criticism, feedback, intellectual stimulation, trust, and invaluable supervision have turned this project into an extraordinarily rich and stimulating endeavour. Without them there would be no thesis. I owe my gratitude to the Graduate School, and the School of Social Sciences (Centre for the Study of Democracy/DPIR), for their support, including financially, that allowed to present my work at various international conferences during the past three years. The Graduate School at the University of Westminster provided a stimulating learning programme, and I am honoured and indebted for having been selected to present my study poster at the Graduate School Annual Reception. In Pakistan I had the opportunity to work with supportive and encouraging colleagues at the School of Governance and Society, UMT, Lahore. I’m profoundly grateful to Mr Rahat ul Ain, for his wisdom, friendship, and support in the past years. Numerous students at UMT were also a source of encouragement through their kindness and bright minds. ii In London several colleagues and friends have contributed to ideas exchange and camaraderie. I would like to extend my sincere thanks to Anna, Amina, Eduarda (Duda), Hans, Pierre, Sabine. Other friends lent a great deal of support. I’m indebted to Jolanta and Dev for their hospitality and friendship. I am very thankful to Neil for his timely help and patience in reading the thesis and helping with useful comments. To Helen I owe my gratitude for her support, constant encouragement, and for to be so caring ever since. I would like to extend my gratitude to Dr Nitasha Kaul for the extremely useful comments at the different stages of progress of this thesis. My family has been the most supportive, a source of fortitude. Time and again they had the patience to listen to me, often countering with humorous remarks, and joy. I am particularly indebted to Amir for his invaluable support and encouragement. I would like to extend my thanks to his mother for her constant prayers for my wellbeing and success. Lastly, there are no words to describe how I am indebted and owe my gratitude to my daughter Sumayyah. When I started this journey, she was younger. She folded a ten rupees note, put it inside a small red jewellery box, and congratulated on my admission. Little she knew how precious her constant encouragement would be, and how she would have to deal with her mum’s work pressure, endless days of no real fun for a child, and periods of absence. Sumayyah is growing into a bright, capable young person, from whom I learn and take solace every day. I dedicate this thesis to her. iii Abstract This thesis examines the interlinking between identity and security in the context of foreign policy in Pakistan. Foreign policy constitutes one of key national policies in Pakistan. Since the country’s inception in 1947, foreign policy has had an unwavering influence on the construction of the state, and of her relations with the international community. The distressed conditions the new state of Pakistan faced in the years after her emergence, led the early leadership to procure security in relations with other international partners, like the US and China. Yet, it was mainly her relations with India that motivated this search for security, which was mostly translated into assembling a fairly large military force. Unsurprisingly, the armed forces, namely the army in association with a militarised intelligence started control the country’s foreign policy decisions. The study and analysis of Pakistan’s foreign policy has followed a conventional approach to International Relations theory. This approach, as the thesis argues, neither permits to investigate how foreign policy is shaped by the interlinking between security and identity, nor allows to contextualise how militarism as an ideology becomes interwoven with security, identity, and masculinity. Thus, this study uses feminist and postcolonial approaches to answer these questions. It focuses on Pakistan’s relations with China, India, and the United States to identify representations of the interlinking between security and identity, as well as representations of militarism. The thesis makes an original and innovative contribution to knowledge in three ways: it applies a feminist and postcolonial approach to the study of Pakistan’s foreign policy, an area that iv has hitherto been dominated by mainstream IR realist/neo-realist approaches; it puts forward an innovative approach to study the links between state identity and foreign policy, and to ascertain how militarism grows out of this relationship, and it encourages and contributes to new possibilities for study and analysis in the context of South Asian foreign politics and beyond, centred around militarism. v Table of Contents AUTHOR’S DECLARATION ......................................................................................I ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .........................................................................................II ABSTRACT ........................................................................................................... IV LIST OF ACRONYMS ............................................................................................ IX INTRODUCTION AND METHODOLOGY ............................................................. 12 INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................... 12 RESEARCH QUESTIONS AND CONTRIBUTION ................................................................. 26 METHODOLOGY ...................................................................................................... 28 FIELDWORK AND INTERVIEWS .................................................................................... 31 LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY ...................................................................................... 37 CHAPTER STRUCTURES AND OUTLINES ........................................................................ 38 CHAPTER I .......................................................................................................... 45 KEY ASPECTS OF FOREIGN POLICY IN SOUTH ASIA AND PAKISTAN ................ 45 1.1 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................. 45 1.2 FOREIGN POLICY IN PAKISTAN ......................................................................... 48 1.2.1 FOREIGN POLICY IN THE 1950S ..................................................................... 51 1.2.2 THE 1971 WAR AND BANGLADESH INDEPENDENCE .......................................... 59 1.2.3 RE-AFFIRMING ISLAMIC IDENTITY: A PATHWAY TO NUCLEAR PAKISTAN ................. 67 1.3 CONCLUSION .................................................................................................... 87 CHAPTER II : ....................................................................................................... 89 PAKISTAN, MILITARISM AND ITS AGENTS ....................................................... 89 2.1 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................. 89 2.2 THE ROLE OF RELIGION IN CONSTRUCTING FOREIGN POLICY, IDENTITY AND SECURITY .. 97 2.2.1 MAPPING ISLAMIC RELIGION IN PAKISTAN’S FOREIGN POLICY .............................. 99 2.2.3 THE ZIA-UL-HAQ LEGACY OR THE POLITICS OF CONTINUATION ........................... 104 2.3 THE ROLE OF THE MILITARY IN FOREIGN POLICY ................................................. 115 2.3.2 A SECRET FOREIGN POLICY TOOL? THE ROLE OF THE ISI .................................... 122 2.3.2.1 THE ISI’S INFLUENCE IN AFGHANISTAN AND KASHMIR .................................. 129 2.4 CONCLUSION .............................................................................................. 136 vi CHAPTER III ....................................................................................................... 137 THE CONSTRUCTION OF PAKISTAN’S RELATIONS WITH CHINA ........................ 137 3.1 INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................