Pakistan Labels India as Existential Threat, Strengthens Military Ties with China: US Intelligence Report

Pakistan Labels India as Existential Threat, Strengthens Military Ties with China: A US intelligence assessment report has divulged disturbing revelations about Pakistan's military objectives for the upcoming year, emphasizing a continued progression of nuclear modernization, cross-border hostilities as that it is receiving consistent economic and military support from China.

The report titled '2025 World Threat Assessment' was formulated following an agreement between India and Pakistan to cease military activity against one another on May 10 while retreating away from the pathway of all out war.

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"During the next year, the Pakistani military’s top priorities are likely to remain cross-border skirmishes with regional neighbors, rising attacks by Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan and Baloch nationalist militants, counterterrorism efforts, and nuclear modernization. Despite Pakistan’s daily operations during the past year, militants killed more than 2,500 people in Pakistan in 2024," it said.

Following the Pahalgam terrorist attack in Jammu and Kashmir, the Indian Armed Forces struck with missiles aimed at terrorism-based infrastructure throughout Pakistan. This undeniable act of aggression created a stark escalation in hostilities between the two rival nuclear powers, with both parties undergoing multiple rounds of missile launches, drone operations, loitering munition attacks, and increased artillery strikes occurring between May 7 - May 10.

The report also mentions the fragile security environment developing in South Asia cultivated on a complex nexus of terrorism, historical hostility between neighbouring states, and developing military and nuclear modernization efforts.

China as primary defense partner

Pakistan leans heavily on China for economic and military assistance. China and Pakistan hold various joint military exercises every year, including an announced air exercise for November 2024. "Pakistan primarily is a recipient of China’s economic and military largesse, and Pakistani forces conduct multiple combined military exercises every year with China’s PLA, including a new air exercise completed in November 2024," the report said.

"Foreign materials and technology supporting Pakistan’s WMD programs are very likely acquired primarily from suppliers in China, and sometimes are transshipped through Hong Kong, Singapore, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates. However, terrorist attacks targeting Chinese workers who support China-Pakistan Economic Corridor projects has emerged as a point of friction between the countries; seven Chinese nationals were killed in Pakistan in 2024," it added.

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Nuclear moderation and procurement

Pakistan is not only upgrading its nuclear enterprise, but also carefully safeguarding its nuclear materials and command-and-control systems. It almost assuredly acquires WMD-applicable items with the use of foreign vendors and intermediaries.

External affairs minister S. Jaishankar had unequivocally stated on Sunday that India would 'never surrender to nuclear blackmail' in the context of tensions with its neighbouring state. "India has zero-tolerance for terrorism. India will never give in to nuclear blackmail," he said.

India as strategic threat

Pakistan has consistently viewed India as an existential threat. Pakistan is pursuing military modernization, including battlefield nuclear weapons, to counter India's clear conventional military advantage.

"Pakistan regards India as an existential threat and will continue to pursue its military modernization effort, including the development of battlefield nuclear weapons, to offset India’s conventional military advantage," it said. Pakistan-Iran relations

In January 2024, Pakistan and Iran each conducted unilateral airstrikes in the wake of each other's cross-border terror incidents. Since then the two states have had multiple high-level meetings to reduce tensions.

"Pakistan and Iran have taken steps, including high-level meetings, to deescalate tensions after the two countries conducted unilateral airstrikes on each other’s territory in January 2024 in response to cross-border terror attacks," the report said.

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