KARACHI: Prime Minister Imran Khan’s recent comments after his overture of peace talks with India amounted to a “strange and significant” statement nothing like anything from his predecessors, former military officers, and senior analysts have said.
Addressing government officials in Lahore on Sunday, PM Khan said that his country will not accept any act of hostility and will respond in kind if it comes to that. “Our wish for peace should not be mistaken as a sign of weakness,” he told bureaucrats of the Punjab government. His statement came a day after the Indian Army Chief Bipin Rawat threatened Islamabad with “retaliation” for allegedly killing a border guard and policemen in Indian-administered Kashmir.
“Prime Minister Imran Khan speaks from his mind,” Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry told Arab News.
A day earlier, PM Khan in a tweet said he was disappointed at what he described as “the arrogant and negative response by India” to his call for the resumption of the peace dialogue.
“The statement from PM Khan is a statement from the nation. This specific statement, and all other statements made by Imran Khan, are reflective of the true feelings of his nation,” the information minister added.
The tweet and address in Lahore invited reaction from the other side of the border. Former External Affairs Minister of India Shashi Tharoor said Khan had a “fairly clear level of military backing” and he “could be a wonderful face for peace or an effective voice for hostility, depending on what the army wants of him.”
Former military officers and defense experts in Pakistan, however, do not agree.
Tharoor is an eloquent orator and well-read commentator on regional issues but citing the age-old Indian rhetoric seems quite odd, said the Karachi-based defense analyst Waheed Akhter Bukhari.
“His whole argument relying on the ‘army running the show in Pakistan and civilian leadership being under their watchful eyes’ rhetoric is, in fact, an insult to the capabilities of ‘his longtime friend’ Imran Khan,” he said.
Khan is the first prime minister of Pakistan and among the very few people of his generation to have a Twitter account, and he uses it regularly, said senior analyst Shahzad Chaudhry, adding that what Khan expressed hadn’t come from anywhere else.
“India, in contradiction of the diplomatic norms, used very harsh language by saying that the ‘true face of Imran Khan has been exposed’ in response to his peace overture,” Chaudhry told Arab News. This, Chaudhry said, led the Pakistani premier to tweet the harsh statement but it was still not as harsh as it was interpreted by some in India and Pakistan.
Major General (rtd.) Ejaz Awan, a senior defense analyst, said previous governments were extra-diplomatic toward India but this time “the political and military leadership are on the same page.”
PM Khan’s language toward India ‘strange and significant,’ analysts say
PM Khan’s language toward India ‘strange and significant,’ analysts say
- The current political and military leadership are on the same page, say experts
- Imran Khan has a “fairly clear level of military backing,” says India
Pakistan army chief assumes role as first Chief of Defense Forces, signaling unified command
- New role is held simultaneously with Gen Asim Munir’s existing position as Chief of Army Staff
- It is designed to centralize operational planning, war-fighting doctrine, modernization across services
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s most senior military officer, Field Marshal Syed Asim Munir, formally took charge as the country’s first Chief of Defense Forces (CDF) on Monday, marking a structural change in Pakistan’s defense command and placing the army, navy and air force under a single integrated leadership for the first time.
The new role, held simultaneously with Munir’s existing position as Chief of Army Staff, is designed to centralize operational planning, war-fighting doctrine and modernization across the services. It reflects a trend seen in several advanced militaries where a unified command oversees land, air, maritime, cyber and space domains, rather than service-level silos.
Pakistan has also established a Chief of Defense Forces Headquarters, which Munir described as a “historic” step toward joint command integration.
In remarks to officers from all three forces after receiving a tri-services Guard of Honor at the General Headquarters (GHQ) in Rawalpindi, Munir said the military must adapt to new theaters of conflict that extend far beyond traditional ground warfare.
He stressed the need for “a formalized arrangement for tri-services integration and synergy,” adding that future war will involve emerging technologies including cyber operations, the electromagnetic spectrum, outer-space platforms, information warfare, artificial intelligence and quantum computing.
“He termed the newly instituted CDF Headquarters as historic, which will afford requisite integration, coherence and coordination to meet the dynamics of future threat spectrum under a tri-services umbrella,” the military quoted Munir as saying in a statement.
The ceremony also included gallantry awards for Pakistan Navy and Air Force personnel who fought in Marka-e-Haq, the brief May 2025 conflict between Pakistan and India, which Pakistan’s military calls a model for integrated land, air, maritime, cyber and electronic combat. During his speech, Munir paid tribute to the personnel who served in the conflict, calling their sacrifice central to Pakistan’s defense narrative.
The restructuring places Pakistan closer to command models used by the United States, United Kingdom and other nuclear-armed states where a unified chief directs inter-service readiness and long-range war planning. It also comes at a time when militaries worldwide are re-engineering doctrine to counter threats spanning satellites, data networks, information space and unmanned strike capabilities.
