Navigating Great Power Rivalry Through Defence Posturing: Pakistan’s Strategic Balancing in the US–China Competition (2013-2025)

Abstract

The escalating strategic rivalry between the United States and China has led to increasing systemic pressures on smaller and middle powers, especially those in the Indo-Pacific strategic region. The aim of this study is to review the strategic balancing by Pakistan in U.S.-China competition during 2013-2025 using Neoclassical Realism theory. It proposes that changes in the distribution of power among states create external pressures and constraints, but these pressures do not automatically determine state behaviour; rather, domestic factors such as civil–military relations, state institutions, elite perceptions, and political structures mediate how states respond. In the study, great power U.S.-China competition generates systemic pressure on Pakistan as external factor that is defined as independent variable, civil-military relation is the intervening variable that mediates the external systemic pressure and Pakistan’s strategic balancing is the dependent variable that translate Pakistan’s foreign policy. The study is a mixed-methods longitudinal case-study design, which involves quantitative analysis of defence-expenditure trends, frequency of military exercises with alliances in the Indo-pacific and arms transfer to rival blocs, a qualitative analysis that includes process tracing, content analysis, and information from official documents and relevant scholarly literature. The results of the study revealed that the overall military expenditure profile of the US remained strong as compared to China, however, the rate of military spending growth and military modernization is accelerated in China, leading to an increase in strategic competition and remained exerting systemic pressure. These pressures were greatly mitigated by domestic civil–military relations, which were characterized by military institutional autonomy, civilian de-assertiveness, continuity of strategic policy, and military participation in the process of security decision making. Further, the study exposed how Pakistan balanced its relations with great power by maintaining issue-based cooperation with the United States and building a comprehensive strategic defence partnership with China to achieve strategic autonomy and national security interests as much as possible. The study recommends that Pakistan's foreign policy should be pragmatic and a flexible one, security cooperation should remain continued in functional mechanisms with the USA while simultaneously comprehensive defence cooperation with China.