[🇧🇩] National Security of Bangladesh

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More capability, less autonomy? Bangladesh’s emerging security dilemma

As Bangladesh strengthens its military capabilities and security partnerships, it risks narrowing the strategic autonomy it seeks to protect.

www.thedailystar.net

More capability, less autonomy? Bangladesh’s emerging security dilemma

Mohd Amdadul Haque

 

[Saif]

Bangladesh between India and China: The dilemma of defence diversification

As Bangladesh deepens defence ties with India, China and others, the challenge is expanding strategic choices without creating new dependencies.

www.thedailystar.net

Bangladesh between India and China: The dilemma of defence diversification

Mohd Amdadul Haque

Bangladesh’s recent defence engagements with Beijing and New Delhi suggest a widening security portfolio. But having more partners does not automatically produce greater autonomy. The real test is whether diversification expands Dhaka’s choices or simply distributes dependence across several relationships.

Within six days, Bangladesh held two defence conversations that appear more significant when viewed together. On September 3, Bangladesh and China discussed professional military training, educational exchanges, technological cooperation and Beijing’s continued support for Bangladesh’s defence modernisation. Six days later, Bangladesh and India discussed joint military training, exchanges among military officials, disaster management, regional peace and maritime security. Neither meeting alone represents a major geopolitical shift, since Bangladesh has maintained defence relations with both countries for years. Yet their timing is notable because the government has simultaneously begun to articulate a clearer foreign policy position.

On September 10, Foreign Minister Khalilur Rahman said Bangladesh would pursue sovereign equality, strategic balance and the avoidance of excessive dependence on any single power or alliance. The important question, therefore, is not whether Bangladesh is moving closer to India or China. It is whether Dhaka can turn its expanding defence relationships into a coherent hedging strategy that strengthens military capability without sacrificing strategic autonomy.

Beyond simple India-China balancing

Describing Bangladesh’s current approach simply as “balancing India and China” misses an important point. The two defence relationships are fundamentally different. China has long occupied a prominent position in Bangladesh’s military modernisation. Chinese-origin aircraft, naval platforms, missile systems and other equipment have been integrated into the armed forces over several decades. More recently, Bangladesh has been considering further Chinese acquisitions, with discussions over J-10CE fighter aircraft and attack helicopters demonstrating the continuing importance of China to Bangladesh’s force-modernisation plans.

India’s role is different. It is not simply another defence supplier. Geography makes India a permanent security interlocutor. Bangladesh and India share a long border and a common maritime environment, while their security concerns intersect in areas such as disaster management, transnational crime, maritime safety and military-to-military communication. The latest bilateral discussion, therefore, centred on training, disaster response and maritime security, areas where cooperation follows naturally from geographic proximity.

Chinese Ambassador to Bangladesh Yao Wen meets Prime Minister’s Defence Adviser Brig Gen (retd) AKM Shamsul Islam on September 3, 2026, to discuss military training, educational exchanges and technological cooperation. Photo: ISPR

This difference can actually work in Bangladesh’s favour. Strategic autonomy does not require Dhaka to maintain mathematically equal relations with India and China, nor does Bangladesh need to buy identical amounts of military hardware from both sides. A more effective strategy would be functional diversification: cooperating with different partners in different domains according to Bangladesh’s own requirements. China may remain important for certain platforms, technology and military modernisation; India may be more relevant for neighbouring security, maritime coordination and professional military exchanges; other partners may provide capabilities that neither offers.

If Dhaka deliberately allocates different functions to different partnerships, its defence diplomacy becomes more sophisticated than simple balancing. The point is not to achieve symmetry between competing powers, but to ensure that no single relationship becomes dominant across all critical domains of national security.

Capability comes with long-term dependence

The greatest challenge lies in distinguishing military capability from strategic autonomy. A new fighter aircraft, submarine or missile system can strengthen Bangladesh’s immediate military capacity, but advanced defence equipment is rarely a one-time purchase. Aircraft require spare parts, weapons, technical support, pilot training, software and future upgrades. Naval platforms require servicing, specialised components and continued technical expertise. The relationship between buyer and supplier can therefore last for decades, which is why the strategic cost of a weapons system cannot be measured only by its purchase price. Bangladesh must also calculate lifecycle dependence.

The issue is not specific to Chinese systems. American, European, Russian, Turkish or Indian platforms can generate the same problem. The more technologically sophisticated a capability becomes, the more difficult it may be to operate and sustain it independently of its original supplier. This is particularly relevant as Bangladesh considers advanced platforms such as the J-10CE. Even if such an acquisition significantly improves its air-combat capability, Dhaka must consider whether missiles, maintenance, radar integration, software and upgrades would create a level of supplier dependence that narrows its future options. The key question should therefore be: what choices will this acquisition leave Bangladesh with ten or twenty years from now?

An agreement that expands immediate military power but limits future freedom of action may strengthen capability while weakening autonomy. This tension should sit at the centre of Bangladesh’s defence planning because strategic independence is shaped not only by what a country owns, but also by whether it can sustain, replace and adapt those capabilities without excessive reliance on a single external actor.

Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh Dinesh Trivedi meets Prime Minister’s Defence Adviser Brig Gen (retd) AKM Shamsul Islam on September 9, 2026. Their discussions focused on defence cooperation, joint military training and regional maritime security. Photo: ISPR

The Bay of Bengal makes hedging more difficult

Bangladesh’s maritime location adds another layer of complexity. The Bay of Bengal has become increasingly connected to broader Indo-Pacific competition. India views the Indian Ocean as a core strategic environment, while China’s growing economic and maritime presence has increased Beijing’s stake in the region. Bangladesh sits directly within this evolving strategic space. As a result, defence decisions made primarily for domestic requirements can easily be interpreted by outside powers as geopolitical signals. A submarine purchase may be viewed through the prism of Chinese maritime influence, a naval exercise with India may be interpreted as evidence of Dhaka moving towards an India-centred security framework, and a port or surveillance project may similarly attract strategic interpretations far beyond its immediate purpose.

Bangladesh cannot prevent other powers from interpreting its decisions in geopolitical terms, but it can define the logic behind those decisions more clearly. Cooperation with India in search and rescue, disaster response, maritime safety or countering transnational crime serves clear Bangladeshi interests. It does not require Dhaka to adopt India’s broader strategic position towards China. Similarly, acquiring military equipment from China does not require Bangladesh to support Beijing’s wider regional strategic preferences.

The principle should therefore remain simple: cooperation with India should not mean participation in containing China, while cooperation with China should not require strategic distance from India. For Bangladesh, this distinction is essential because the Bay of Bengal is precisely where defence cooperation and great-power rivalry increasingly overlap. The challenge is to ensure that Bangladesh’s maritime policy remains centred on its own priorities rather than becoming an extension of someone else’s strategic competition.

More partners can also mean more dependencies

Bangladesh’s defence diversification already extends beyond India and China. In February, Bangladesh and Japan signed an agreement establishing a framework for defence equipment and technology transfer, joint research and development, and exchanges of military experts. Türkiye has also emerged as a significant partner, with Dhaka and Ankara agreeing to strengthen defence cooperation and explore deeper institutional and industrial ties. At first glance, expanding the number of defence partners seems exactly what a small state should do. If Bangladesh has several suppliers and security partners, no single country should be able to dominate its choices. But this logic has limits.

More partners do not necessarily produce less dependence. Bangladesh may reduce excessive reliance on one country while simultaneously becoming dependent on several countries in different areas. China could remain indispensable for one aircraft fleet, Türkiye for another system, Japan for particular technologies, and India for certain training or maritime functions. Instead of eliminating dependence, Dhaka could simply create multiple dependencies.

This does not mean diversification is undesirable. Distributed dependence may be strategically safer than overwhelming dependence on one supplier, but diversification must be managed carefully. There are also operational costs. Equipment from different countries may require separate ammunition, maintenance systems, training programmes and logistical networks. What looks politically attractive as diversification may become militarily inefficient. Bangladesh therefore needs to strike a difficult balance between political diversification and operational coherence.

The objective should not be to maximise the number of suppliers, but to create enough alternatives to prevent any single partner from becoming indispensable while maintaining a force structure that remains financially and operationally sustainable. For a small state, the most effective response to bipolar pressure may therefore not be to seek a perfect balance between two major powers, but to expand the range of credible alternatives available to policymakers.

Lt Gen SM Kamrul Hasan, Principal Staff Officer of the Armed Forces Division, and Japanese Ambassador Saida Shinichi sign an agreement on the transfer of defence equipment and technology on February 3, 2026. Photo: Collected

Hedging works only when Bangladesh sets the agenda

This leads to the most important issue. A country is not necessarily pursuing a hedging strategy simply because several major powers want to cooperate with it. China may offer aircraft or technology, India may propose military training, Japan may provide defence equipment, and Türkiye may offer joint production. Each proposal may make sense individually, but accepting several attractive offers does not automatically produce a coherent national strategy.

For hedging to strengthen autonomy, Bangladesh must determine its own priorities first. Dhaka needs to decide which capabilities are necessary, which forms of foreign dependence are acceptable, where domestic production should be developed, which areas require supplier diversification, and which sensitive capabilities should remain under stronger national control. Only after answering these questions should external partnerships be incorporated into Bangladesh’s defence strategy.

Otherwise, Dhaka risks allowing foreign offers to determine the structure of its armed forces rather than using foreign partnerships to implement a Bangladeshi strategy. This is particularly important now that the government has explicitly committed itself to avoiding excessive dependence on any single power or alliance. In defence policy, that principle cannot simply mean distributing diplomatic attention evenly among different capitals. It requires coordination between military procurement, foreign policy, defence-industry development and long-term strategic planning.

Successful hedging therefore demands more than saying yes to multiple partners; sometimes, strategic autonomy requires the ability to say no. A financing package may be attractive but create excessive lifecycle dependence. A sophisticated platform may improve capability but lock Bangladesh into a single technological ecosystem for decades. An offer of deeper security cooperation may be useful but come with political expectations that exceed Bangladesh’s interests. A small state demonstrates agency not simply by obtaining more offers, but by possessing the institutional capacity to reject offers that constrain its future choices.

Not choosing also requires a strategy

The September defence conversations should therefore not be interpreted as evidence that Bangladesh is choosing between China and India. Nor are two meetings enough to demonstrate that Bangladesh already possesses a fully developed hedging doctrine. What they reveal is a broader transformation in Bangladesh’s strategic environment. China remains important to military modernisation. India remains unavoidable because of geography and shared security concerns. Japan and Türkiye are expanding their roles. Other partnerships are also likely to grow as Bangladesh seeks new capabilities. This gives Dhaka greater choice, but it also creates a more complicated network of dependencies.

The success of Bangladesh’s defence hedging should therefore not be measured by how many partners it has or whether Beijing and New Delhi receive equal diplomatic attention. It should instead be measured by whether each new relationship leaves Bangladesh with more room for manoeuvre than it had before. That is the real difference between diversification and strategic autonomy.

Bangladesh does not need to choose between India and China, but refusing to choose is not a passive policy. It requires disciplined procurement, functional diversification, careful management of lifecycle dependence, greater domestic capacity and clear limits on how far external security cooperation should extend. For Bangladesh, therefore, the central question is not simply who it cooperates with today. It is whether, after entering those partnerships, Dhaka will still be able to make tomorrow’s decisions on its own terms. For a small state navigating an increasingly competitive Bay of Bengal, that may be the most meaningful measure of strategic autonomy.

Mohd Amdadul Haque is a doctoral candidate in the Department of International Politics at Shandong University and an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at Gopalganj Science and Technology University.​

 

[Saif]

'Information must travel faster than the security threat'

'Information must to travel faster than the security threat'

en.prothomalo.com

'Information must travel faster than the security threat'

Prothom Alo English Desk
Published: 17 Sep 2026, 16: 16

The Bay of Bengal is no longer merely a regional body of water connecting South and Southeast Asia. It has emerged as a central theatre of contemporary Indo-Pacific strategy, a vital corridor for global trade and a shared space where the security, prosperity and stability of more than 1.8 billion people are deeply interconnected.

These observations were made by Maj. Gen. ANM Muniruzzaman (retd), President of Bangladesh Institute of Peace and Security Studies (BIPSS) at a recent expert roundtable held in the city. The roundtable on ''Strengthening the BIMSTEC Security Pillar: Progress, Challenges and the Way Forward'' was jointly organised on Tuesday by BIPSS and Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation at the BIMSTEC Secretariat in the capital.

BIMSTEC member states include Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand.

In his introductory remarks, Maj. Gen. Muniruzzaman pointed to the immense economic dynamism and growing strategic significance of the Bay of Bengal. He said that this was closely tied to the collective security of the region and that regional cooperation to this end had never been more urgent. This, he stressed, was why BIMSTEC had assumed greater importance than ever before.

The interdependence of the BIMSTEC states brings enormous opportunity, but it also means that instability in one part of the region can quickly affect the security and prosperity of others
He said it was imperative to identify how BIMSTEC can develop the shared capacity, trust, coordination and political commitment necessary to address the shared challenges of the region.

In his opening remarks, Secretary General of BIMSTEC Ambassador, Indra Mani Pandey, briefed the roundtable on the recent developments and activities of the initiative, highlighting the focus on maritime security, cyber security, space cooperation, Himalayan security council, anti-money laundering, drug trafficking, human trafficking as well and legal and law enforcement issues.

He pointed to the recent disastrous floods in Nepal and the direct implications to the region. This, he said, is an example why such an ecosystem is so important.

Speaking on illicit trafficking in drugs, he said BIMSTEC had signed an MoU with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) in April this year. He spoke of the other conventions and agreements taken up by BIMSTEC and highlight the need for concerted effort to implement these initiatives.

Maritime insecurity can disrupt food supplies, energy imports, digital cables and humanitarian operations at the same time. Climate disasters can cause displacement, economic distress and more
The keynote at the roundtable was presented by Dr Rasheduzzaman, Professor, Department of International Relations, University of Dhaka. He began with the observation that the interdependence of the BIMSTEC states brings enormous opportunity, but it also means that instability in one part of the region can quickly affect the security and prosperity of others.

BIMSTEC has just entered its 30th anniversary year and he felt this was cause for both celebration and honest institutional reflection.
Highlighting the focus on security, he said that regional connectivity cannot flourish if roads, ports, shipping routes and border areas remain vulnerable to conflict, trafficking and organised crime. Trade and investment cannot expand without secure financial systems, predictable maritime routes and confidence in digital transactions.

Similarly, energy cooperation required secure grids. Food security, public health, climate resilience and disaster preparedness were now inseparable from national and regional security. Accordingly, security was the very foundation of BIMSTEC. And broadly speaking, this comprises Counter-Terrorism and Transnational Crime, Energy, and Disaster Management.

Deliberating on the various partnerships of BIMSTEC, Dr Rasheduzzaman mentioned agreements signed between BIMSTEC and UNODC and the Indian Ocean Rim Association.

He also went on to point out that the security climate had changed and the security agenda focussing on threats such as terrorism, narcotics and natural disasters were not enough. He pointed out how these threats overlap. Maritime insecurity can disrupt food supplies, energy imports, digital cables and humanitarian operations at the same time. Climate disasters can cause displacement, economic distress and more.

After detailing on the expanding cyber threats, they keynote speaker zeroed in on crimes close to home, such as scam centres being set up in Chattogram only recently.

Other points covered in the keynote included weapons crossing borders, maritime security beyond naval security, mountain well-being which was now a part of regional security and more.

In conclusion, he said it was important for BIMSTEC to take further practical action to translate its declarations into tangible public good, protecting the lives, livelihoods and shared future of the 1.8 billion people in the region.

As the penultimate part of the roundtable, Gen. Muniruzzaman pitched a number of questions for an interactive session among the erudite audience who included maritime experts, security specialists, economists, academia, journalists, diplomats and more.

The roundtable concluded with closing remarks by Shafqat Munir, Senior Research Fellow and Head of the Bangladesh Centre for Terrorism Research (BCTR) at BIPSS. He said BIMSTEC needs to evolve into an engine of cooperation. The policy focuses needed immediate recalibration. He stressed the importance of institutional information sharing on security issues, saying information had to travel faster than the threat.

There was need also to up the application of AI while aggressively countering disinformation. As security was of highest concern, he ended with a strong recommendation for meetings among the defence chiefs of the BIMSTEC member countries.​

 

[Saif]

https://www.newagebd.net/post/opinion/315318/primacy-of-intellectual-foundation-i

DEFENCE DEVELOPMENT

Primacy of intellectual foundation – I
Mohammad Abdur Razzak 26 September, 2026, 00:00

WHEN Singapore was expelled from the Federation of Malaysia in August 1965, Lee Kuan Yew’s response was characteristically deliberate. His first concern was the intellectual architecture that would make defence possible. He understood that a credible military could not be raised from nothing; it required a conceptual foundation that addressed Singapore’s unique constraints and vulnerabilities.

THE development of military power is conventionally understood through the lens of hardware acquisition, troop number, war ship and aircraft and spectacular drills and manoeuvres. Beneath these visible manifestations lies a deep layer, the intellectual foundation, on which credible defence establishments are constructed to deliver credible deterrence. Without defence doctrine, policy, defence white paper and industrial strategy that constitute the indispensable intellectual architecture that precedes, leads, shapes force development and guide forces in combat, military modernisation become a collection of disconnected procurement decisions rather than a coherent expression of national strategic purpose.

Definition

THE intellectual foundation of defence is composed of the conceptual frameworks — doctrine, policy, strategy and defence industrial vision that give purpose, direction and coherence to a nation’s military establishment. It is the cognitive architecture that answers the foundational questions. Why does the nation need armed forces? For what purposes will they be employed? How will they be organised, equipped and sustained? And what relationship should exist between the military, the state and society?

Defence doctrine constitutes the first element. The authoritative statement of how military forces will be employed to achieve national objectives. Doctrine encompasses operational concepts, tactical principles and the organisational logic that binds capabilities to strategy. It provides for a common intellectual framework that enables joint operations and guides training and equipment choices.

Defence policy forms the second element. The formal expression of a state’s security intentions, threat perceptions and strategic priorities. Policy translates national interests into defence requirements, establishes the parameters for military engagement and defines the relationship between military power and other instruments of national power. A coherent defence policy provides for the strategic compass that stops force development from becoming directionless.

Defence industrial policy constitutes the third element. The framework governing how a nation develops, procures and sustains its military capabilities. This encompasses decisions about indigenous production versus foreign acquisition, technology transfer arrangements, research and development investment, and the balance between military self-reliance and strategic partnerships.

Strategic culture and national security concept form the fourth element. The deep set of beliefs, assumptions and values shape how a nation conceives of security and the role of military power. This includes the nation’s understanding of its geopolitical environment, historical experiences of conflict and vision of its place in the regional and global order.

Defence white paper constitutes the fifth element. The comprehensive public document synthesises and articulates the full spectrum of a nation’s defence posture for a defined period. Unlike policy documents that may remain classified or doctrine manuals confined to military audiences, the white paper serves as the principal unclassified instrument of strategic communication, addressing the parliament, the armed forces, allied governments and the domestic populace alike. It consolidates threat assessments, fiscal projections, capability development road maps and force structure plans into a single coherent narrative while also signalling strategic intent to potential adversaries and partners.

Role of elements in build-up

DOCTRINE provides for the operational logic that determines force structure. A doctrine emphasising territorial defence will produce different capabilities than one focused on power projection. It shapes training curriculums, officer education, troop skills and the professional identity of the armed forces.

Policy provides for the strategic direction that determines the scale and character of military investment. It establishes prioritisation among competing requirements, defines the threat environment and sets the parameters for alliance relationships and international defence cooperation.

Industrial policy provides the sustainability framework that determines whether a force can be maintained over time. It governs the balance between indigenous capability and foreign dependency, shapes technological trajectories and influences the long-term affordability of defence commitments.

Strategic culture provides for the legitimising narrative that sustains public support for defence expenditure and conscription. It creates the social consensus necessary for military institutions to function effectively within democratic societies.

The white paper acts as a formal bridge between abstract policy guidance and tangible resource allocation, providing for the transparency and accountability that sustains civil-military trust, anchoring annual defence budgets in long-term strategic logic and offering a fixed reference point against which subsequent procurement decisions, organisational reforms, and operational commitments can be measured and justified.

Need for periodic review

THE intellectual foundation of defence cannot remain static. Geopolitical shift, the rise of new powers, the decline of old ones, the emergence of new threat domains etc demand continual reassessment. Technological change transforms the character of warfare, rendering obsolete doctrines that were once valid. Domestic political evolution alters the relationship between military institutions and society. Periodic strategic reviews, defence white papers and doctrinal revisions are, therefore, essential mechanisms for maintaining the relevance and effectiveness of the intellectual foundation.

Singapore’s addition of a sixth pillar of digital defence to its total defence framework in 2019 exemplifies this adaptive process. The recognition that cyber threats and disinformation campaigns had become existential challenges required an expansion of the conceptual framework that had guided Singaporean defence thinking since 1984.

Singapore: foundations before forces

Strategic imperative: When Singapore was expelled from the Federation of Malaysia in August 1965, it faced an existential predicament. A city-state of two million people, with no natural resources, no territorial depth and no military tradition, it was surrounded by larger neighbours with whom relations were fraught.

Lee Kuan Yew’s response was characteristically deliberate. His first concern was not to acquire weapons or raise troops but to think through the intellectual architecture that would make defence possible. He understood that a credible military could not be raised from nothing; it required a conceptual foundation that addressed Singapore’s unique constraints and vulnerabilities.

Conceptual framework: Lee articulated several foundational principles that would shape Singapore’s defence development. The first was the principle of self-reliance: Singapore could not depend on others for its security. This was not mere nationalist sentiment but a hard-headed assessment of geopolitical reality. As Lee later expressed it: ‘Without a strong economy, there can be no defence; without a strong defence, there will be no Singapore.’

The second was the principle of deterrence through credibility. A small state could not match its neighbours in size, but it could create a military capable enough to make aggression prohibitively costly. This led to the concept of a ‘poison shrimp,’ small but unpalatable to any predator. The objective was not to win a conventional war against a larger adversary but to ensure that any attack would impose unacceptable costs. Since the 1980s, Singapore has evolved its strategy from that of a ‘poison shrimp’ to a ‘dolphin.’ While the ‘poison shrimp’ was a purely defensive deterrent, the ‘dolphin’ strategy implies a more proactive, agile, and intelligent approach, friendly but capable of swift and decisive action when provoked.

The third was the principle of total defence. Military power alone was insufficient. Security required the mobilisation of the entire society, ie economic resilience, civil defence, social cohesion and psychological preparedness. When Singapore formally adopted total defence in 1984, it was one of the first modern states to embrace such a comprehensive conception of national security. The framework has since evolved to encompass six pillars: military, civil, economic, social, digital and psychological defence.

The fourth was the principle of national service. A citizen army, and not a large standing force. Lee recognised that Singapore’s limited human and financial resources could not support a large regular army. The National Service, introduced in 1967, created a large reserve force that could be mobilised in crisis while maintaining a small, professional core in peacetime.

Doctrine and policy development

THESE principles were translated into concrete doctrine and policy. The Singapore Armed Forces was designed not as a mirror of western militaries but as an institution adapted to Singapore’s specific circumstances. The doctrinal orientation shifted over time, from a focus on conventional territorial defence in the 1970s to more sophisticated concepts of network-centric warfare and ‘third-generation’ capabilities in subsequent decades. The armed force’ third-generation transformation began in the early 2000s and leveraged new military technology and the concepts of network-centric operations, precision strike, unmanned capabilities, and computers and communications systems to establish an advanced networked force.

Defence policy was articulated through periodic white papers and strategic reviews. The 2004 Defence Review, for instance, dealt specifically with threats and sought to outline the security environment likely to prevail over the medium term. This iterative process of policy development ensured that the intellectual foundation remained aligned with evolving geopolitical shifts.

Singapore also built a defence industrial base that was carefully calibrated to its strategic needs. Rather than attempting to achieve complete self-sufficiency which would have been economically unsustainable, Singapore pursued a strategy of developing niche capabilities while maintaining access to international defence markets. This approach enabled the armed force to acquire advanced systems while progressively building indigenous research, development and manufacturing capacity.

The intellectual foundation that Lee and his colleagues constructed enabled Singapore to build, from nothing, one of the most capable armed forces in Southeast Asia. The force is now a professional, technologically sophisticated force with a credible deterrent capability, all achieved within constraints of a small population and limited territory. The important insight is that the intellectual work preceded the force-building. Singapore knew what kind of military it needed, why it needed and how it would sustain it before it acquired a single tank or aircraft.

To be continued.

Mohammad Abdur Razzak, a retired commodore of Bangladesh Navy, is a strategic affairs analyst.​

 

[Saif]

https://www.newagebd.net/post/opinion/315441/primacy-of-intellectual-foundation-ii

Primacy of intellectual foundation – II
Mohammad Abdur Razzak 27 September, 2026, 00:00

A file photo shows an army contingent leaving on a UN peacekeeping mission in 2022. | Bangladesh Sangbad Sangstha

BANGLADESH lacks the think tanks, strategic studies institutes and civilian defence intellectuals that in other nations provide for the continuity of strategic thought and serve as a bridge between political leadership and military expertise. Consequently, defence planning has been episodic and personality-driven rather than systematic and enduring, with each administration’s approach reflecting the preferences of the military leadership of the moment rather than accumulated strategic wisdom.

Modernisation

BANGLADESH’S Forces Goal 2030, initiated in 2009 and revised in 2017, represents a fundamentally different approach to defence development. The programme was designed to enhance the capabilities of the Bangladesh Armed Forces through restructuring, expansion and acquisition of advanced equipment. Its principal purposes were to set development priorities, ensure consistency in development undertakings, yield the best value for investment in defence and promote indigenous manufacturing.

A closer examination reveals a troubling absence. As Global Security notes, details of Forces Goal 2030 are ‘extremely sparse and fragmentary.’ The programme has been described as fundamentally the ‘preferred choices’ rather than the product of a coherent national strategic vision.

The defence policy framework has been weak and discontinuous. Only in 2018, Bangladesh approved its first defence policy document since independence: the National Defence Policy 2018. This means, for more than four decades, Bangladesh’s armed forces operated without a formal strategic policy framework.

The National Defence Policy 2018, a significant advancement, came nearly a decade after Forces Goal 2030 had been initiated. The modernisation programme was, thus, launched without the policy foundation that should have guided it. Capabilities were pursued before the intellectual framework that should have given them purpose and coherence.

Consequences

THE absence of a robust intellectual foundation has had predictable consequences. First, force modernisation has been heavily import-dependent, with a review of acquisitions revealing that ‘activities linking transformation and indigenisation are missing.’ The modernisation is characterised by procurement from a range of countries without a coherent industrial strategy to build domestic capacity.

Second, the programme has been viewed as reflecting ‘preferences’ rather than a unified strategic vision. This is the natural consequence of modernisation in the absence of an intellectual architecture that would subordinate service-specific interests to national strategic requirements.

Third, while individual platforms, including new infantry divisions, warships, and aircraft, have been acquired, Bangladesh remains a nation with modest military capabilities relative to its regional neighbours and strategic challenges.

Fourth, and most significant, Bangladesh has not developed the strategic culture and societal consensus that sustains effective defence in the long term. The relationship between military institutions and civilian society remains contested, with periodic interventions in politics.

Fifth, inextricably linked to the preceding points, the absence of a robust intellectual foundation has coincided with, and arguably enabled the dramatic involvement in commercial enterprises, a development that fundamentally compromises the institution’s martial character. What began as welfare trusts for retired personnel is evolving into a sprawling corporate empire. The army has been running many profit-making businesses under its welfare trust, Sena Kalyan Sangstha. Experiences of Pakistan, Myanmar and Indonesia, where militaries run vast corporate empires, demonstrate that self-generated resources often ‘prod the armed forces to take an abiding interest in the politics of the country, often undermining the institutions that support and sustain public participation in the process of nation-building.’

Recent developments

THE 2024 political changeover and the subsequent change in government have created an opportunity for reassessment. The new administration has signalled its intention to reshape the forces and formulate a modern national security strategy, reflecting Bangladesh’s realities, national interests and future threat.

Critics have noted that the Forces Goal 2030 plan needs re-evaluation under current strategic realities. The geopolitical landscape has shifted, with India’s assertive posturing, China’s growing regional influence and the shifting Indo-Pacific strategic architecture; and, importantly, the social security burden of 1.3 million Rohingyas all demand a more sophisticated strategic response.

Several interlocking factors have persistently impeded the development of a robust intellectual foundation for defence in Bangladesh. The legacy of military interventions in civilian governance has fundamentally distorted the relationship between military institutions and the state. This history has fostered a culture where the armed forces have operated with considerable institutional autonomy, often shaping defence priorities from within rather than being guided by a coherent political strategic vision.

The absence of a strong, institutionalised civilian defence policy establishment has compounded this problem. The dominance of service-specific rather than joint perspectives has further fragmented the intellectual foundation. The three services — the army, the navy and the air force — have historically pursued their own modernisation trajectories with very limited integration under a unified strategic concept. This is evident in the character of Forces Goal 2030, which critics have described as reflecting the preferred choices of individual service than a coherent, joint vision for national defence. The absence of a robust joint doctrine, a framework that would subordinate closed-minded service interests to overarching national strategic requirements, has meant that procurement decisions, force structuring, and training have proceeded along parallel rather than convergent lines. The result is a military that has acquired individual platforms and capabilities without developing the operational concepts and integrated command structures necessary to employ them effectively as a unified force.

THE geopolitical position has also contributed to this intellectual deficit in ways distinct from smaller states facing existential threats. Situated between India and Myanmar, with the Bay of Bengal to the south and China’s influence extending westward, Bangladesh confronts a complex but diffuse security environment where no single, clear-cut threat has compelled the kind of strategic clarity that existential vulnerability demands. The perception of manageable rather than imminent peril has allowed successive governments as well military leaderships to defer the difficult intellectual work of articulating a comprehensive defence doctrine, prioritising immediate political concerns over long-term strategic thinking. This has been further reinforced by the politicisation of the security discourse, where defence issues have often been framed through the lens of domestic political contestation rather than national strategic interest.

Even the landmark National Defence Policy 2018, while representing a significant step forward, came more than four decades after independence and nearly a decade after the initiation of Forces Goal 2030, underscoring the extent to which capability development outpaced and proceeded in the absence of the policy foundation that should have guided it. The cumulative effect of these impediments has been a defence establishment that possesses growing material capabilities but lacks the intellectual architecture — the coherent doctrine, the unifying policy framework, the institutionalised strategic culture, necessary to transform those capabilities into genuine national power.

Conclusion

THE Singapore case studies demonstrate that the intellectual foundation of defence is not an optional extra but a requisite for effective force development. Doctrine, policy, industrial strategy and strategic culture provide for the conceptual architecture that gives military capabilities purpose, direction, and sustainability.

Singapore’s experience shows that even a small state with limited resources can build a credible military if it first develops a clear intellectual framework. Lee Kuan Yew understood the work of thinking. Defining threats, articulating principles and designing institutions must precede the work of building. The Singapore Armed Forces is the product not just of budget and procurement but of decades of intellectual labour that has kept the force aligned with strategic realities.

Bangladesh’s experience offers a cautionary tale. Forces Goal 2030, conceived without a robust policy or doctrinal foundation, has yielded material expansion rather than transformational change. The programme’s import dependence, service-specific orientation and limited strategic coherence reflect the absence of the intellectual architecture that should have guided it.

The contemporary strategic environment, characterised by geopolitical competition, technological disruption and hybrid threats make the intellectual foundation of defence more important than ever. The nations that fail to invest in strategic thinking, doctrinal development and policy coherence will find themselves acquiring capabilities that do not serve their purposes while those that prioritise the intellectual work will be better positioned to build forces that are fit for purpose.

Concluded.

Mohammad Abdur Razzak (safera690@gmail.com), a retired commodore of Bangladesh Navy, is a strategic affairs analyst.​

 

[Saif]

https://www.newagebd.net/post/opinion/321289/military-justice-and-the-price-of-command

Military justice and the price of command

Abdul Monaiem Kudrot Ullah

ISPENT much of my adult life in the armed forces, where discipline was never a decorative word. It was the difference between a ship that could be trusted in an emergency and one whose crew discovered, too late, that obedience had become a ritual. A warship cannot function if every sailor chooses which order to obey, which officer to recognise or which faction deserves his allegiance. Military justice exists for exactly this reason: it is the machinery by which a state keeps its armed men answerable to a lawful chain of command.

That machinery was tested to breaking point in the closing months of 1975. This article does not attempt to relitigate the politics of November 7. It asks a narrower question: what does a military justice system require in order to function, what did Bangladesh’s armed forces need in order to recover it, and was Ziaur Rahman right to put the restoration of discipline ahead of personal sentiment and political convenience?

When the chain of command breaks

WITHIN a span of barely twelve weeks, the Bangladesh Army had witnessed the assassination of the head of state, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, on August 15, the continued influence of officers acting from Bangabhaban outside the conventional chain of command, the counter-coup of November 3 led by brigadier Khaled Mosharraf, and the placing of the army chief, major general Ziaur Rahman, under house arrest. On the same morning, four Awami League leaders of the liberation wartime government in 1971 were murdered inside Dhaka Central Jail. The jail killings and the counter-coup were distinct events, and proximity in time is not proof of orders; responsibility must be established by evidence, not by association.

Then came November 7, and with it the deaths of Khaled Mosharraf, colonel Khandker Nazmul Huda and lieutenant colonel ATM Haider. Contemporary diplomatic reporting spoke of a succession of governments, widespread killing and the fear of something close to civil war. Whatever label one attaches to those days, the institutional fact is plain. Officers had become political actors, soldiers were weighing orders against factional preference and no one could say with confidence who held lawful command.

In such a barracks, a court martial is a fiction. A tribunal presumes that someone can convene it, that someone will obey its sentence and that the accused recognises its authority. Remove the hierarchy and none of these presumptions survives. This is why the restoration of command was not a political luxury but the precondition of any military justice at all.

Gratitude is not a command

THE uprising of November 7, in which lieutenant colonel Abu Taher was a key figure, secured Zia’s release. It is here that the character of the man was tested. A leader freed by others carries, in every human sense, a debt. The easy course for any commander in that position is to let gratitude govern policy: to tolerate the parallel structures of his liberators, to leave their organisations armed and unchallenged and to postpone the reckoning with indiscipline.

Zia declined that course. Taher’s Biplobi Shainik Sangstha, the soldiers’ organisation associated with the uprising, and the armed civilian wing of its political patrons represented, whatever the sincerity of their members, a second chain of authority inside the army. An institution cannot have two. I believe it to be the mark of a professional soldier that he understood this at the moment when sentiment pulled the other way. The law of command knows no creditors. A commander who allowed personal gratitude to displace institutional duty would have confirmed the most dangerous principle of that season: that soldiers may free, depose or install commanders by force, and that the armed forces answer to whoever last held the barracks.

The grievances of ordinary servicemen deserved a hearing. But they deserved it through lawful channels, not through the barrel of a gun. Restoring order, in that sense, was not an act against the soldiers’ welfare. It was the only foundation on which their welfare could later be protected.

Justice built for emergencies

MILITARY justice differs from civil justice by design, and understanding that design is essential to judging what followed. Courts martial, and above all the Field General Court Martial convened in conditions of emergency or active service, are summary instruments. They are fast, they sit in secrecy where the situation requires it and their findings are made final within the military chain, with no appeal and with the jurisdiction of the ordinary courts excluded. These are not accidents of drafting. They are deliberate trade-offs: the law accepts reduced procedural comfort in exchange for speed and finality, because an army in crisis cannot afford to have every disciplinary decision suspended for years in litigation.

The tribunal that tried Taher sat in Dhaka Central Jail under martial-law provisions. Reporting on the case records that sentences were delivered on July 17, 1976, without a right of appeal under the governing provisions and that Taher was executed on July 21. One may regret the severity of the sentence and one may argue that capital cases deserve more protection than the law then provided. But a legal order must be judged first on what its own rules said at the time. By those rules, the verdict was final and the route of judicial review was closed.

The judgment of 2011

ON MARCH 22, 2011, the High Court declared the military tribunal and its proceedings illegal and unconstitutional, quashed the sentences, and, according to reporting on the judgment, characterised the execution as a premeditated killing and attributed responsibility to Zia. The full judgment was released in 2013.

With respect to the learned judges, I find the reasoning difficult to accept on three grounds. First, in my reading, the judgment applies the standards of a restored constitutional order to a proceeding that the law of its own day placed beyond appeal and beyond review. The no-appeal and ouster provisions are the very heart of the question, yet they appear to receive too little weight against the court’s sense of what justice required. A court may, of course, hold that such provisions can no longer stand. What it should not do is treat them as though they had never existed.

Second, the judgment blurs two separate orders of law. A system designed to be non-judicial, with finality vested in a military confirming authority, cannot be fairly assessed as if it were an ordinary criminal trial that had simply skipped its appeal. If every finality clause can be reopened by a civilian court decades later, then no military sentence in any era is secure and every commander who relies on the law of his day is acting on a promise that the future may revoke. That uncertainty is corrosive to discipline.

Third, there is a question of fairness in attributing a personal killing to a man who had been dead for thirty years, who was not before the court and who could offer no answer. A judgment may rightly examine the legality of a tribunal. Findings of personal guilt against the absent dead call for a standard of proof and a right of reply that the proceedings could not supply.

The disorder that makes justice impossible

NONE of this is meant to excuse, still less to celebrate, the violence of those months. The politicisation of the barracks was the root of the catastrophe. The assassination of August 15, the counter-coup of November 3 and the killings of senior officers during and after November 7 were not episodes of discipline. They were its negation. Each coup bred its own victims and its own tribunals, and each was justified by its authors as a rescue of the nation. A soldier who learns that rank can be overturned by a mutiny, and a sentence by the next political season, learns that nothing binds him.

The cost of that lesson fell on the army itself and on Zia personally: he met his own death in a coup in 1981. The pattern shows why the work of restoring hierarchy, reasserting the authority of the state and returning the soldier to the barracks was not a partisan project but a patriotic one. That heroic work stands as an act of institutional rescue, accomplished against the pull of personal gratitude and against the pressure of armed factions.

Mutiny and the law: lessons from other constitutional systems

NO SERIOUS constitutional system treats mutiny as an ordinary crime, and none treats the punishment of it as lying beyond the reach of law. Democracies accept two propositions at once: that mutiny strikes at the survival of the state and that the machinery for punishing it must be bounded by rules fixed in advance. How each country strikes that balance differs and the differences are instructive for Bangladesh.

The Indian experience is closest to our own legal heritage. The Army Act, 1950 treats mutiny as a distinct and grave offence tried by court-martial and Article 33 of the Indian Constitution empowers parliament to restrict or modify the fundamental rights of the armed forces so that their duties are properly discharged and discipline is maintained. When soldiers convicted by a General Court Martial after the 1984 mutiny at the Sikh Regimental Centre, Ramgarh, came before the Madhya Pradesh High Court in Kulwant Singh vs Union of India (1991), the court accepted that it could review a court-martial but held that its power was no wider than over civilian proceedings. It would correct an error apparent on the record, a serious procedural breach or a denial of natural justice; it would not re-weigh the evidence and the petitions were dismissed. Both halves of that balance deserve notice: judicial respect for the finality of military process and judicial insistence on a minimum of natural justice. When India later wished to add a further layer of protection for service personnel, it was parliament that did so, through the Armed Forces Tribunal Act, 2007, which provides for appeal to the Supreme Court with leave.

The United Kingdom places the same offence in statute. Under the Armed Forces Act 2006, mutiny and failure to suppress mutiny are separate offences, and imprisonment for life is available for each. The constitutional limit lies elsewhere. Since the Bill of Rights of 1689, the crown may not keep a standing army in peacetime without the consent of parliament, which is why the disciplinary code of the British forces has been periodically renewed by parliament and never left to the executive alone.

In the United States, mutiny is likewise a grave offence under the Uniform Code of Military Justice and a court-martial may impose death. Yet Article 71 of the Code provides that a sentence of death may not be executed until it has been approved by the president and, where appellate review applies, until the legality of the proceedings has been finally resolved. The gravest penalty is thus surrounded by layers of review and entrusted to the elected head of state.

Germany took a different path. Its Basic Law permits federal military criminal courts only in a state of defence or for soldiers serving abroad, and the legislature has not established them, so German soldiers are tried in the ordinary courts.

The choice reflects a national history of militarism, and it shows that the right design for military justice is a matter each constitutional order settles for itself.

Four reflections follow. First, mutiny is treated as a grave offence everywhere. Second, where military tribunals exist, their special procedures and limited civil review are accepted as part of the price of command. Bangladesh’s own Article 45 reflects the same logic: the Part on fundamental rights does not apply to a provision of disciplinary law relating to members of a disciplined force, so far as the provision is limited to the proper discharge of their duties or the maintenance of discipline. Third, the degree of finality is fixed by constitution or statute, through parliament, and not left to later reinterpretation; where a system has wanted more review for its soldiers, it has legislated for it. Fourth, capital sentences attract the most careful safeguards of all.

A fair accounting

A REPUBLIC must be able to look at its own past without flinching. But looking honestly means resisting the temptation to turn history into a courtroom where one side arrives already innocent and the other already condemned.

The High Court has a constitutional duty to guard the republic. That duty is not an inconvenience to be endured when the verdict is unwelcome; it is one of the foundations on which the state stands. I do not question the good faith of the judges who examined Taher’s case. Yet I confess that the judgment unsettled me. It brought me face to face with questions about military justice that I had long understood through the discipline of service, the authority of command and the laws governing the armed forces. It forced me to confront the uncomfortable distance that can open between what a military institution regards as lawful procedure and what a constitutional court recognises as justice.

Taher’s supporters and many legal scholars have argued that a secret trial for a capital offence, conducted without a right of appeal, cannot be made just simply because the rules of the regime permitted it. A closed door does not become a door to justice merely because the state has locked it. Nor can the finality of a sentence establish the fairness of the process that produced it. The constitutional guarantees of a republic cannot be switched off whenever a government declares an emergency or places its authority under martial law. These are serious arguments, and they deserve to be heard without suspicion or resentment.

But another question remains, one that deserves equal seriousness. How should a constitutional republic define the boundary between military justice and civilian judicial review? Where does the need to preserve discipline end and where does the obligation to protect the individual begin? What safeguards must exist when the sentence is irreversible and the consequences extend beyond the accused to the authority, cohesion and credibility of the armed forces?

These questions cannot be settled by invoking military discipline as though it were a magic phrase that silences every objection. Neither can they be settled by pretending that military institutions can function without a coherent system of command, defined offences and enforceable procedures. Discipline is not the enemy of justice. Properly constituted, it is one of justice’s instruments. But when discipline is separated from legality, it risks becoming the language through which power excuses itself.

The lesson Bangladesh should draw is not that military justice must stand beyond the reach of the courts, nor that every military proceeding should be treated as inherently suspect. It is that the boundaries must be established before the next crisis, not improvised after the damage has been done. Constitutional provisions and legislation should define the relationship between military tribunals and civil courts, the circumstances in which summary procedures may be used and the safeguards required for the confirmation and review of capital sentences. They should also clarify which legal standards govern past proceedings and how changes to those standards apply prospectively, without prejudging questions of constitutionality or allowing procedural reform to become an instrument of retrospective impunity.

The purpose is not to give commanders a shield against scrutiny. It is to ensure that commanders, soldiers, prosecutors and judges understand the law before they are called upon to act under pressure. A system that leaves its most consequential questions unresolved invites uncertainty into the very institution whose effectiveness depends upon clarity.

My appeal, therefore, is to the government, the attorney general and parliament. Let them address the legal uncertainty surrounding military justice with the seriousness it deserves. Let parliament clarify the statutory framework, let the government place reform on a transparent footing and let the attorney general help establish a principled understanding of the relationship between military discipline and constitutional review. The objective should not be to erase an unwelcome judgment or to insulate past decisions from scrutiny. It should be to ensure that the law is clear, the safeguards are credible and future cases do not leave the country arguing, decades later, over the foundations on which a sentence was imposed.

A republic cannot ask its soldiers to live by discipline while allowing the law governing that discipline to remain clouded. Nor can it protect the dignity of the armed forces by weakening the constitutional institutions that give their authority legitimacy.

The chain of command must hold. But it must hold within the law. That is not a concession to disorder. It is the difference between an institution that merely commands obedience and one that deserves it.

Abdul Monaiem Kudrot Ullah, a retired captain of the Bangladesh Navy, is a public commentator and strategic voice on geo-strategy, state power, civil-military relations, supply chain dynamics and democratic transitions across the Global South.​