The Centre for Strategic and Contemporary Research (CSCR) conducted the third webinar of a series titled “Altered State of the World Post COVID-19: Opportunities and Challenges” on Thursday, 16 April 2020. The webinar had a three-member panel comprising of experts Dr Rabia Akhtar, Mr Michael Kugelman and Mr Syed Javed Hassan. The session was moderated by Dr Salma Malik. 

In her introductory remarks, Dr Malik – CSCR’s Policy Advisor and Assistant Professor at the Department of Defence and Strategic Studies, Quaid-i-Azam University Islamabad – gave an introduction of the Centre and apprised the audience about the series of webinars that the Centre is conducting as the world faces the Covid-19 crisis. She invited the first speaker, Dr Rabia Akhtar, by leaving a question as to how she perceived security dynamics including deterrence and strategic profiling in a post-pandemic South Asia and the world at large.

Dr Rabia Akhtar is Director Centre for Security, Strategy and Policy Research and the Head of Department, School of Integrated Social Sciences at the University of Lahore. She stated her first point of reference that the disease has emerged as a non-traditional security threat which makes the traditional concept of deterrence irrelevant. She underscored that it is possible that in the future, the United States (US) adds virus attacks as a non-nuclear security threat as it included cyber-security in its Nuclear Posture Review 2018. She also added that a lawsuit is taking shape against China, accusing it of the violation of international law on infectious diseases and not informing the World Health Organisation about the outbreak in time. There is a possibility that a US-led coalition demands China to compensate for the losses that other nations suffered due to alleged Chinese violation of international law. Dr Akhtar expects such hostilities to emerge in a post-pandemic world where the threat matrix will be expanded, and the great power insecurity will give way to even greater military spending. She quoted the US Indo-Pacific Command’s recent call for $20.1 billion as additional spending to support her argument. She said that realism is not dead and the world is about to witness its comeback. Liberal order will suffer, she concluded. 

Mr Michael Kugelman was the second speaker of the webinar. He is Deputy Director and Senior Associate for South Asia at Wilson Center. He maintained that there is a possibility that the pandemic wakes up the region’s policymakers to perceive non-traditional security threats. Non-traditional security threats are clearly present in South Asia in the form of water scarcity and climate change. The region has the least renewable water availability in the world. Mr Kugelman was of the view that the pandemic will prompt policymakers across the region to allocate more policy space to non-traditional or human security threats.The region’s strategic elite has ample awareness of the nature of the threats, but the implementation of the required policies is not sufficient. He believed the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) to be a silver lining in an ideal situation amidst a renewed gesture of cooperation in it recently. However, he stated that the pandemic will make the regional governments go more inward to rebuild stressed economies and will be less concerned with cooperation. This might facilitate populism and democratic backsliding in the region. He does not expect the region’s economic disconnectivity and political volatility to ease. Regarding the US policies toward South Asia, he said that the US is likely to enhance engagement with littoral states of the region. He concluded that however, the US government will prioritise economic recovery over engagement in South Asia. Therefore, he does not expect much forward movement on the US’ Indo-Pacific strategy. 

Chairman, National Vocational and Technical Training Commission Mr Javed Hassan was the third speaker of the session. He ruled out the possibility of enhanced cooperation and eradication of economic and strategic hostilities. He noted that capitalism will reassert itself in a more competitive setting post-pandemic. However, the scenario does provide an opportunity to upheavals and political unrests. Regarding Pakistan, he maintained that the economic vulnerabilities need to be reassessed. There is a correlation between fatality rates due to the pandemic and the number of youth in the country. But whether Pakistan and its youth will be able to benefit from the opportunities that the scenario provides remains a question. He asserted that the Pakistani youth should be trained to participate in the global economy. China might want to invest their new capacities in Pakistan and a considerable technology transfer is around the corner. The policymakers and the youth must remain steady to benefit from these opportunities.  

The webinar was attended by a considerable number of audiences and a handsome number of questions were asked. While responding to a question regarding the conspiracy theories about a bio-warfare and lab-engineered nature of COVID-19, Dr Rabia Akhtar stated that there is no evidence at the moment to declare COVID-19 as a bio attack. The current consumers of information are very prone to conspiracy theories. However, she believes that the pandemic has exposed the global vulnerabilities to bio-attacks nonetheless.The shortage of ventilators and protective equipment and the limitation of health infrastructures manifest these vulnerabilities. Mr Javed Hassan was asked a question as to how much the modestly educated Pakistani youth can benefit from distance learning. He responded that a significant number of young population from urban centres can participate in distance learning, but the education standards and other hurdles do make it difficult. He rated the prospects for distance learning five on a scale from one to 10. Mr Michael Kugelman was asked how the US is likely to use COVID-19 in the Afghan peace process. He responded that this question has become more tenuous and precarious in the current scenario. There is a possibility that the US will use the pandemic to accelerate its troops’ withdrawal from the country with “protecting the American lives” being the most important objective of the US foreign policy.

Dr Salma Malik concluded the session expressing her gratitude to the Centre and the distinguished panelists. She emphasized the need to have a realistic perspective on the current scenario and added that how we strategise today will affect the world we live in tomorrow.