Pakistan United States - The end of an alliance?
Denouncing the pursuit of a perfectly justified missile program, claiming that it could eventually threaten them (this is simply impossible), the United States has just sanctioned Pakistan. A pretext to justify a strategic reversal: to counter China, India is promoted to ally. The end of an alliance perhaps, as Pakistan, relegated to second place, finds itself in a state of uncertainty and may well seek support from China. It's not likely to be a happy-go-lucky one, because s it knows it will lose a lot in the process.
Denouncing the pursuit of a perfectly justified missile program, claiming that it could eventually threaten them (this is simply impossible), the United States has just sanctioned Pakistan. A pretext to justify a strategic reversal: to counter China, India is promoted to ally. Pakistan, relegated to second place, finds itself in a state of uncertainty, and may well seek China's support. But it's not likely to be a light-hearted one, as it knows it will lose out significantly.
FACTS
On September 12, 2024, in view of the latest developments in Pakistan's ballistic missile program, which undermined ties between the United States and Pakistan, the State Department issued Executive Order 13382 sanctioning four Pakistani and Chinese entities (including the state-owned National Development Complex (NDC)) responsible for the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their delivery systems1. For Islamabad, these sanctions are in no way justified.
CHALLENGES
For Washington, it's a change of foot. To counter China, India is being promoted as an ally, while sanctioned Pakistan is having to consider turning even more towards China. In the long term, could we not imagine two couples facing each other: the United States and India, and China and Pakistan?
FORWARD-LOOKING COMMENTS
These sanctions must be seen in context. They are not unprecedented, and are only the sixth salvo to target Pakistani companies and their Chinese partners since 2021. The main target is now the Beijing Research Institute of Automation for Machine Building Industry (RIAMB), in business with the National Development Complex (NDC), a Pakistani state-owned group, notably to design test benches for large-diameter rocket motors. In addition, there are three companies: Hubei Huachangda Intelligent Equipment Company,
Universal Enterprise Limited and Xi'an Longde Technology Development Company Limited (aka Lontek), based in the PRC, and a Chinese intermediary Luo Dongmei (aka Steed Luo) 2.
U.S. grievances took on added significance when, on December 19, U.S. Deputy National Security Advisor Jon Finer declared: "Pakistan has developed increasingly sophisticated missile technology, from long-range ballistic missile systems to high-powered rocket engine test equipment." This is an emerging threat. Let these developments run their course, and they could give Pakistan the capability to strike targets far beyond South Asia, all the way to the United States". He added before the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace: "Frankly, it's hard for us to see Pakistan's actions as anything other than a new threat to the United States".
What's on the agenda
For those familiar with space technology, these diatribes are unjustified, as their dramatic predictions have no basis in fact. What's more, they won't work.
In 2025, the Pakistani missile of reference will still be the Shaheen-III, a solid-propelled medium-range missile with a range of 2,750 kilometers in its latest version. However, Pakistan is more than 11,000 kilometers from the United States, and achieving such a range cannot be the result of extrapolating from the Shaheen: it's a completely new-generation system that should be programmed in stages over decades. But this is not the case
Incidentally, Islamabad, which is focusing all its attention on its closest risk, a différenD with India, is not giving priority to range in its strategic outlook, but to strengthening its nuclear capabilities. So in 2017, when it began work on a new missile, the Ababeel multi-barrel missile was planned. Its second test on October 18, 2023 showed that its range would remain limited to around 2,000 kilometers.
But above all, for Pakistan, which has been invaded three times by India, deterrent forces are vital and can only be based on its own industrial base, with external aid remaining marginal. The Pakistani Ministry of Foreign Affairs is adamant that its space component is "indigenous", so sanctions will never have any significant impact3.
Reactions from Pakistan
So it's not the sanctions, but Jon Finer's statements that are causing the Pakistani Foreign Ministry to react. It insists that they are "devoid of rationality". It points out that the main threat to Pakistan comes from its eastern neighbor, India, and not from the West, and that claims that Pakistan's long-range missile program could be aimed at the United States are unfounded.
As for the sanctions, they are "discriminatory, unfortunate and biased". While India's recent missile developments, including the MIRV-capable Agni-V, the Hypersonic Gliding Vehicle (HGV) and the K4 submarine-launched ballistic missile, have implications for regional stability and are being ignored by the US, sanctions will further accentuate military asymmetries. They therefore have "dangerous implications for the strategic stability of our region and beyond." For it is clear that Pakistan cannot relinquish its right to develop capabilities that match the need to maintain a credible minimum deterrent as well as evolving and dynamic threats.
Seeking appeasement, the Foreign Ministry spokesman recalls: "Pakistan and the United States are old friends and partners. Pakistan has always sought to engage constructively with the US on all issues, including the need to pursue a balanced approach to security and stability in the region. We have never had ill intentions towards the US in any form, and have made monumental sacrifices for this relationship. Today, we are still suffering enormously from the consequences of American policies in the region.
Sanctions that the new administration can only strengthen
It should not be heard. For Pakistan faces a grim reality: it has little place in Washington's calculations following the US disengagement from Afghanistan, its great-power competition with China and its increasingly solid strategic partnership with India.
And Donald Trump's administration, for whom Pakistan is a haven for terrorists, is not about to lighten the mood. No leniency is to be expected from Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who was able to introduce a bill to strengthen Washington's strategic ties with India, going so far as to ban security assistance to Pakistan if it were found guilty of supporting sabotage efforts against India4.
So let's forget the sanctions. They are merely a sign that the United States is changing its strategic stance in a region it is moving away from: the last ties have been severed with Afghanistan - the United States stopped providing humanitarian aid through the United Nations in 2025, and until the end of an alliance perhaps: Good By Islamabad.
Islamabad, which can only dread and must prepare for the extinction, or at least a sharp reduction in American aid, must therefore look to China. (It will not gain from the change.) What's more, beyond economic and social considerations, seeking Chinese support could even become a strategic imperative for Pakistan if the growing security and defense cooperation between the USA and India takes shape.
Washington's hostility towards China makes it possible to imagine a new division of the world: two couples face to face: the United States and India, to which China and Pakistan would respond.
Edouard Valensi, Asie21
(1) Imposition of Missile Proliferation Sanctions on Three PRC Entities, One PRC Individual, and a Pakistani Entity, United States Department of State, 12/09/2024
(2) Ibidem
(3) Discriminatory U.S. sanctions and Fallacious Assertions on Pakistan's Missile Program, Institute of Strategic Studies Islamabad, 30-12-2024
(4) Trump 2.0 Appears Unfavorable for Pakistan - The Diplomat, 21/01/2025 18:37 https://thediplomat.com/2024/11/trump-2-0-appears-unfavorable-for-pakistan/ 4/8
