The General’s Republic: How Pakistan’s military hijacked the state (IANS Analysis)

New Delhi, June 29 Pakistan's political landscape has long been orchestrated not by its elected representatives but by the opaque influence of its military elite, whose grip on the nation's trajectory grows ever more evident with each successive episode. The recent visit of Pakistan’s Army Chief, General Asim Munir, to the United States—noticeably unaccompanied by the Prime Minister—serves as a striking indication of how far civilian authority has been marginalised.

If this were not a sufficiently telling sign, Pakistan’s peculiar nomination of Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize further underscores the surreal and unaccountable hybrid regime now presiding over this nuclear-armed state. In this unfolding drama, it is not the democratic will but the triad of Allah, America, and the Army that dictates Pakistan’s fate—a trinity that has empowered its generals with unrestrained influence while exacting profound costs from the very nation they claim to defend.

It is widely acknowledged that Pakistan’s military has long exercised disproportionate influence over foreign affairs, national security, and internal governance. Yet General Munir’s solo diplomatic foray in Washington, absent the country’s elected leader, signifies something even more disquieting: the total institutional marginalisation of civilian leadership.

In a functioning democracy, the Prime Minister serves as head of government, the principal figure in bilateral diplomacy, and the voice of the citizenry on the global stage. Munir’s lone presence was not simply symbolic—it conveyed an unequivocal message to both the international community and Pakistan’s own populace: the Army is the central agent of the state; the Prime Minister is merely ceremonial.

The distorted rationale was further exposed through the bewildering act of nominating Donald Trump—a figure whose presidency was marked by disorder and polarisation—for the Nobel Peace Prize. Even by Pakistan’s frequently opaque and labyrinthine political norms, this gesture was confounding.

Yet, when interpreted through the prism of military realpolitik, a grim logic emerges. Trump symbolises a yearning for transactional diplomacy, authoritarian leadership, and covert negotiations that bypass democratic structures.

Pakistan’s military, which has long prospered through bilateral engagements that marginalise civilian leadership, perceives in Trump an ideal counterpart—someone who engages directly with generals rather than governments.

The nomination has little to do with peace or diplomacy. It is, rather, a calculated overture—a political courtship extended from Rawalpindi to Mar-a-Lago.

More telling, however, is how these developments reflect the underlying architecture of Pakistan’s political framework. The Defence Minister, Khawaja Asif, recently extolled the so-called "hybrid system"—a euphemism for the military-civilian power dynamic that is far from equitable. In his own remarks, he commended this Frankenstein construct as a viable model, laying bare the tragic paradox wherein elected representatives not only accept their diminishing relevance but actively endorse it.

One might expect such a structure to be imposed upon reluctant politicians. Yet, as a pointed tweet observed: "It’s not that the civilians have ceded space... it’s that they have cheered on their own marginalisation." The betrayal extends beyond institutional decay—it is a moral failure, a surrender of democratic integrity."

The tweet strikes at the heart of Pakistan’s political malaise. In any healthy democracy, military overreach is met with civilian resistance, protest, and defiance. In Pakistan, however, civilians have often extended the ladder. The PML-N, PPP, and even the once-principled PTI have each, at different junctures, prioritised immediate political advantage by siding with the military rather than upholding long-term democratic norms.

This complicity has eroded civilian authority, normalised coups without the need for tanks, and fostered a political class more concerned with navigating the corridors of power than exercising meaningful governance. A more recent tweet — "Allah, America and Army have always been the dominant forces in Pakistani politics. While the generals have amassed power and wealth as a ‘front-line state’, the nation has borne grievous losses. The Trump-Asim Munir meeting marks the death knell of civilian rule”—resembles a final elegy for Pakistan’s democratic ambitions.

It reveals the core paradox within the country’s strategic posture. Since the Cold War, Pakistan’s military has exploited its geopolitical location and strategic value to amass significant political power and attract foreign assistance. The United States, in search of a dependable South Asian partner, repeatedly chose generals over institutions. This enduring gamble, played across decades, has enriched the military while leaving the nation depleted—economically, politically, and morally.

The so-called front-line state designation evolved into a euphemism for enduring dependency. Pakistan’s military exchanged national sovereignty for security-related funding, yet these financial inflows rarely benefited the wider population.

Infrastructure deteriorated, education was marginalised, and healthcare systems collapsed. Meanwhile, the General Headquarters in Rawalpindi thrived—expanding housing schemes, corporate ventures, and even political entities.

The consequences of this Faustian pact were not borne by the generals, but by civilians—deprived of agency, stifled in dissent, and reduced to passive observers of their own governance.

Within this context, General Asim Munir’s meeting with Donald Trump transcends a mere diplomatic engagement; it starkly underscores the fact that Pakistan’s military is now independently conducting foreign relations, free from parliamentary scrutiny or public accountability.

This is evocative of a state within a state—except the inner state no longer feels compelled to operate in the shadows. It strides openly into the White House, delivers public statements, nominates foreign leaders for peace prizes, and orchestrates the installation, management, and removal of civilian administrations at will. And all of this occurs with the silent consent—at times, the enthusiastic endorsement—of those it has systematically rendered powerless.

Perhaps most damning is the near-total absence of public indignation. Pakistanis have become so habituated to military dominance that even the most overt manifestations of authoritarianism provoke little more than indifference. A quiet fatalism pervades the national psyche—a collective resignation to the belief that the Army will govern, irrespective of constitutional order.

Consequently, when a Defence Minister extols a hybrid regime, or an Army Chief assumes the diplomatic stage in Washington without the Prime Minister, it scarcely raises eyebrows. The boundary between the abnormal and the accepted has long since dissolved. Yet this trajectory is ultimately untenable.

The military’s growing consolidation of authority is not merely politically corrosive—it is strategically perilous. No nation can endure indefinitely under the dominion of its own armed forces.

The systematic erosion of civilian institutions, the ritualised subjugation of elected officials, and the economic prioritisation of military interests do not constitute a formula for national resilience. Rather, they serve as indicators of institutional decay. Pakistan’s gravest threat is not foreign—it is domestic: the entrenched militarism that refuses to recede, and a civilian leadership unwilling to resist.

While the generals may believe that another endorsement from Washington or the rise of another transactional figure like Trump will cement their dominance, history is not so easily deceived.

Every short-term alliance with a foreign benefactor carries a long-term price. American backing is never perpetual. Its interests do not reflect the aspirations of Pakistan’s people, but rather its own shifting geopolitical priorities.

When those priorities change -- as they inevitably do -- the military risks being left with a nation bereft of legitimacy, lacking public confidence, and increasingly marginalised on the world stage. It is not yet too late to change direction. But for such a course correction, Pakistan’s civilian leadership must rediscover its resolve.

It must cease applauding its own subjugation. It must confront an inconvenient truth: a state governed by generals is no democracy, and a citizenry living in fear is not free. Civilian leaders must challenge the myth that the military is the country’s only functional institution and commit instead to building the strength and credibility of civilian governance.

Most importantly, they must reject the illusion that the Army and the people are one and the same. They are not. One is meant to serve the other—and so it must.

The Trump-Asim Munir episode may, in retrospect, be seen as a defining moment—not because it altered the status quo, but because it laid it bare. It exposed a civilian government so enfeebled that it stood by mutely as its authority was overtaken on foreign soil. It exposed a military so emboldened that it no longer sees the need to maintain even the facade of democratic legitimacy.

And it exposed a political class so deeply complicit in its own disempowerment that it has come to regard marginalisation as a form of merit. This is not a hybrid arrangement. It is a hostage scenario. And, tragically, Pakistan is fast exhausting its time to mount a rescue.

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