KARACHI: Asian states biggest defence spenders in world
By Our Reporter
KARACHI, Sept 17: Countries, like Pakistan, which do not make adequate investment in social sector and do not have the financial strength to match their defence preparedness, have been advised by experts to look at force multipliers and technological upgrades.
This was the consensus of experts who presented their papers in the second session of the international seminar held in connection with Ideas-2002 on Monday.
However, general participants maintained that in a country where non-military investment is negligible, the marketing exhibitions like Ideas 2002, for the capital-intensive military hardware and technology, represent the specific mindset.
While the suffering common-man is being subjected to inconveniences on the pretext of security, the organisers took pride in achieving a certain level of expertise in internationally marketable military hardware.
Many people raised questions as to why such exhibitions be held in the centre of the city when the people are inconvenienced and humiliated in the name of security. Meanwhile, according to experts, Asian countries are among the largest defence spenders in the world. Despite a dip in 1997, a constant military build-up has taken place region-wide over the past 20 years.
They believe that in the Pakistan-India scenario, a key reason that prevented war between India and Pakistan were actually the weapons of “mass destruction”. Perhaps it had not been the long range weapons, there may have been another 65 or 71 style regional war, said Haroon J. Qureshi.
Actually the long range delivery systems have also changed the role of strike aircraft; the reliance of deep penetration delivery aircraft has greatly been reduced.
The key programmes in the India-Pakistan scenario, he said, include ICBMs like the Prithvi, Agni, Akash, Trishul and very recently Bramhos PJ-10 1st generation anti-ship super-sonic cruise missile. The six new squadrons of SU-30MK are a major induction.
India has relied greatly on leasing assets from Russia, including Beriev A-50/A-50U Mainstay airborne, early warning aircraft, IL-78MK Midas air-to-air fuel tankers, TU-22M backfire and TU-124M Bear surveillance aircraft. It has also leased six kilo class nuclear-powered submarines, and the 45,000 Tons Admiral Gorshkov is likely to be inducted.
On the Pakistani side, Ghauri, Shaheen, Ghaznavi and Abdali ballistic missiles have added tremendous delivery abilities, Baktar Shikan anti-tank and Anza short-range MANPAD and anti- aircraft missiles.
The Augosta-90 induction in Pakistan is a major development, not only because of a clear transfer of technology but also because this is one of the very few AIP programmes in the world. Al-Khalid tank and Talha APC programmes have had good success.
India has lately established closer military ties with Israel, perhaps due to common ideological enmity towards Muslims; the cooperation includes deployment of two squadrons of Searcher- II UAVs, up-gradation of M-46 guns to 155mm, MAPO / Elbit Indian MIG-21-93 upgrades and huge transfers in electronics and E1-op surveillance equipment.
The Indian LCA fighter and Arjun Tank and UAV programmes have not been too successful. Similarly, the HS-748-based airborne early-warning system had to be totally abandoned.
Dr Sang-jin Lee of South Korea maintained that the continuous increase of military expenditure in Asia is mainly contributed by the strong increase in South Asia, while military expenditure in East-Asia increased more slowly and reduced sharply in Oceania.
The two major spenders in South Asia are India and Pakistan during 1992-2000; military expenditures of two countries account for 75 and 17 per cent, respectively of total expenditures in South Asia.
He emphasised that a strong need of Asian countries is to pool the capital and sophisticated technology from the Western companies to improve competitiveness in defence market. Allowance for foreign ownership is a useful policy to do this, but Asian countries don’t want to be dependent politically and economically on the other countries.
While world military expenditure significantly shrunk between 1992 and 2000, military expenditure in the Asian region increased significantly more that 15 per cent for the same period, he said.
Looking at the current trend of military equipment procurement and tensions and armed conflicts in the Asian region, military expenditures and arms production / import will continue to increase through the near future. Several Asian countries have announced plans to increase their equipment procurement and, at least to maintain the current procurement level since the 1999.
Tensions and armed conflict in the Asian region caused to increase arms import and or domestic arms production. Asian defence market will become dynamic and its share will be significant to the world.
According to Edy Prasetyono of Indonesia, defence build-up in the region is the result of multiplicity of causes, basically underlining that the region is now faced with some uncertainties. Chief among these is the question about the nature and the extent of US military presence in the region, the potential competition and conflict between China, Japan, and India, other regional conflicts, such as the Korean problem and Taiwan issue, territorial disputes, and maritime security in East Asia and Southeast Asia.
