I may be wrong but as far as I know, no country in modern times has raised their standards of living substantially without being friends of the west or at least seen to be harmless. Including China, no Nixon no growth rate. Maybe Japan...but they got nuked for their troubles LOL.
True
Honestly we're in a tough spot
To protect our people and way of life( it won't be an old school Russian style invasion but something like 2019 bombing run or invasion of AJK and GB, this what next offensive will look like imo, they'll try this for thier domestic audience as long as they can finish the war off in around 72 hour's leadership won't hesitate, this atleast how I feel ) - it's China - not west and not playing both sides, it is simply China for practical reasons
And I live in US, I love the country and cause of this reasons I see China in a slightly negative light, so you're not talking to iron brother simp but every smaller country needed a strong and dependable ally, west isn't cut our for that role so look east
But on the other hand our economy can only grow by playing both sides, relationship with both
So you know it's a very tough decision but I'll go for our sovereignty over economy (that doesn't give our rulling elites easy way out of this lack of economic growth, asia, Europe, ME is still open, Iran is killing it even with sanctions
So You can still grow but granted it's much, much harder to grow without western support)
When Baba Jinnah said this, he was laying down what's in front of us as a country
Our nation requires tough decisions, China is that bitter pill
Although IK believes in playing both sides which I think is bad for Pakistan, our nation isn't built for that role