Pakistan’s Foreign Policy

Pakistan’s Foreign Policy  

Foreign policy of a nation is always predicated on where you want to go as a sovereign nation and an independent state. This is the basic determinant of a country’s foreign policy. In our case, at the time of our independence, like Alice in Wonderland, we just did not know which way to go and this turned out to be the first ‘dilemma’ of our foreign policy. In June 1949, our acceptance of Stalin’s invitation to our prime minister to visit Moscow was quickly matched with a similar invitation for Liaquat Ali Khan to visit Washington.

For any country, it is important who its neighbours are, as their attitude, irrespective of their size or power, has a direct bearing on its personality and character, and on issues of its security, development and resource allocation. We could not change our geography nor choose our neighbours. We had to live with geopolitical realities no matter how challenging they were. In doing so, our sole consideration had to be how to safeguard and preserve our independence and territorial integrity. Geography thus placed on Pakistan the onerous responsibility of consistent vigilance and careful conduct of its relations not only with its immediate neighbours but also with the rest of the world.

The foreign policy of a country, and the way it is made and pursued, is inextricably linked to its domestic policies, governance issues and political situation. A country’s standing in the international community always corresponds directly to its political, social, economic and strategic strength. No country has ever succeeded externally if it is weak and crippled domestically. And domestically, the tally of our woes includes loss of half the country, leadership miscarriages, governance failures, politico-economic debacles, societal disarrays and militant perversities. This indeed is the sum total of our post-independence history.


Foreign policy of a nation is nothing but an external reflection of what you are from within. Terrorism is our sole identity now. We are seen both as the problem and the key to its solution. Whether we accept it or not, in other countries, Pakistan’s name instantly raises fear and concern. We need to change the world’s perception of our country, which surely has many reasons and assets other than terrorism and violence to be recognised as a responsible member of the international community. To do so, we will have to free ourselves of the forces of extremism, obscurantism, intolerance, militancy and violence

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No country has ever succeeded externally if it is weak and crippled domestically. Even a superpower, the former Soviet Union, could not survive as a superpower because domestically it was weak and crippled. Our problems today are also domestic, rooted in governance failures. Even our external difficulties are extensions of our domestic failures. We need domestic consolidation, politically, economically and socially. To be at peace with the world, we need to be at peace with ourselves.