ABSTRACT
The Indian Muslim elite that helped create Pakistan, and led it in its formative years, consciously oriented Pakistan's foreign policy towards a paradigm designed to create a unique Pakistani identity. Islam and Islamic unity were the principal drivers of this ideological foreign policy, which fit in with the leaders' conviction that Islam could be a substitute for nationalism as the basis of Pakistani identity. The core of this ideological foreign policy rests on a particular perception of Pakistan's security environment. According to Benedict Anderson, nations are 'imagined communities', and how they define themselves and perceive others helps determine both their domestic and foreign policies. The ideology that framed Pakistan's foreign policy and shaped its national identity both within and without was influenced by the aspirations of the Muslim elite in pre-partition India, the two nation theory of the 1930s-40s and the perceived threat from India.
