In an analysis of the Pakistan Navy’s plans to expand its surface fleet (most notably through the purchase of four Type 054A multi-mission frigates from China), Quwa concluded that the effort – though poised to relatively improve the Pakistan Navy (PN) fleet – is likely to be insufficient for building credible sea-control capabilities for blocking the sea-lines-of-communication (SLOC) that India relies on from the Arabian Sea.
Rather, the Type 054A purchase aims to strengthen the existing effort of building credible anti-access and area-denial (A2/AD) capabilities by providing the PN’s anti-ship cruising missile (ASCM)-equipped fast attack crafts (FAC) (and to a lesser extent, its submarines) with another anti-air warfare (AAW) layer – i.e. a medium-altitude element to augment existing very/short-range air defence systems (V/SHORADS) and the Pakistan Air Force’s (PAF) combat aircraft-based coverages.
Read More: RIBAT-2018 (Part 1): Improving PAF-PN Interoperability
An analysis (with commentary by retired PAF Air Commodore Kaiser Tufail) of Pakistan’s efforts to bind its naval and air elements to guarding the country’s maritime interests | Read More
Though the A2/AD effort betrays the reality of Pakistan’s economic – notably its fiscal – limitations, it need not be a non-factor in shaping the naval security dynamics between India or Pakistan. Indeed, the inability to muster enough assets for total sea-control does not necessarily mean losing the ability to deter naval activity along one’s own maritime constraints (i.e. the SLOCs affecting Karachi and Gwadar).
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