Pakistan's military spending: Socio‐economic dimensions

Abstract

In the past years, Pakistan's defence expenditure has always been on an increase and on the higher end. Even though Pakistan's fragile economy has been unable to support it, the military spending in Pakistan has been at the cost of development expenditure. The factors claimed by Pakistan to be behind the high defence spending are the perceived security threat from India, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan which gave an opportunity to the Pakistani military to fulfill its long desired modernisation plans, and domestic factors such as societal violence and sectarianism. However, the fact remains, that the military enjoys immense control over the decision‐making process in Pakistan and, thus, the defence budget has been prioritised over the social sector. This is evident in the form of the retarded growth of the social sector in Pakistan. An increasing non‐development budget has also entailed huge cuts in the development budget and, thus, has badly affected Pakistan's economy. Initially, the declining development budget was financed through debt. Consequently, debt repayment and debt servicing increased the non‐development budget. With the progression of time, borrowing financed the non‐development budget also. Currently, Pakistan is in a position where new loans are being acquired to repay the old ones. Thus, the defence expenditure has added to the miseries of Pakistan in a spiralling manner.