Pakistan has always had to deal with tough borders and neighbors who do not play fair. For years, it has been trying to figure out how to modernize its military without destabilizing the fragile democratic system. On November 15, 2025, President Asif Ali Zardari signed the 27th Constitutional Amendment, a major restructuring that merges top leadership roles, abolishes the Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee, and mandates closer collaboration among the Army, Navy, and Air Force. Some view it as overdue housekeeping in a world where threats come from land, cyberspace, and politics. Others see it as a risky power shift that places too much authority in one set of hands. Grounded in Article 243, which clearly situates the armed forces under the federal government, the reform raises a fundamental question: is this modernization or overreach?

Across the globe, nations have found ways to integrate their armed forces without concentrating power in a single office. In the United States, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff coordinates among the Army, Navy, and Air Force to plan and synchronize strategy without directly issuing operational commands. India introduced its Chief of Defence Staff in 2019 with a similar goal: to unify its services under a single planning framework while keeping each branch........

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