Introduction:
The Pakistan Navy (PN) and Pakistan Air Force (PAF) conducted a joint exercise in the North Arabian Sea – RIBAT-2018 – from 24 February to 06 March 2018 to “validate … war fighting concepts under evolving multi-faceted threats” involving both “conventional and sub conventional” threats.[1] RIBAT-2018 placed “special emphasis” on enhancing the “interoperability between naval and air assets”.[2]
The joint-exercise contributes to Pakistan’s efforts to secure its littoral waters and its exclusive economic zone (EEZ). In part, this security is to occur through a credible anti-access and area-denial (A2/AD) posture for conventional threats along with a robust coverage and reaction element asymmetrical challenges.
This specific exercise tends to both aspects, but with an emphasis on effectively leveraging Pakistan’s air assets with its naval surface platforms. For example, the utilization of aircraft radars on maritime patrol aircraft (MPA) for stand-off range targeting and guiding anti-ship missiles (AShM), among other tasks. The exercise also drew upon the PN’s coastal and logistics units.
However, RIBAT-2018’s relevance relates to another aspect, i.e. the importance Pakistan could be placing on strengthening its maritime air operations capabilities. The specific technical aspects of this area have been discussed in previous Quwa Premium articles. This article will lean on the organizational aspects of the conventional warfare aspect, such as how the PN and PAF collaborated in previous years to fulfil their respective maritime operations requirements and the future of these service arms’ cooperation.
The Pakistan Navy’s Mission
The PN’s current – and projected – force-size dictates that its primary objective is to implement an A2/AD strategy to deter activity towards Pakistan’s coastlines (and its coastal assets, such as ports), sea-lines-of communication (SLOC) or sea lanes and to secure its EEZ from enemy force presence and criminal activity. Granted, securing the aforementioned areas are the objectives of all navies (with some given additional tasks, such as expeditionary operations and sea-control in other regions), but A2/AD adds nuance that is relevant to the PN and, in general, the Armed Forces of Pakistan.
Technically, one can state that A2/AD is the role of every military. However, the reality of the term in the defence studies and analysis realm is that A2/AD is the threat or obstacle the US and Europe face in their respective strategic theatres, such as East Asia and Eastern Europe, respectively. In other words, A2/AD is the means that the likes of China, Russia and Iran would use – through a multitude of assets such as guided stand-off range weapons (SOW), submarines and aircraft, among others – to prevent US (et. al) access to an area of interest and, if that area is comprised, to deny it from being of strategic value by contesting it.
The inherent assumption in this categorization is that the party deploying A2/AD is, at the broadest level of perspective, weaker (e.g. quantitatively smaller and qualitatively inferior) than its intruder. The extent of weakness varies between countries, e.g. China is a respected power with strong conventional warfare capabilities, while Iran is currently at the fringe in the way of modern conventional weapons, thus heavily reliant on asymmetrical strategies. If seen through a spectrum, Pakistan would reside in the middle of it.
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