Description
Personalised digital communication has become a source of strategic uncertainty in contemporary international relations. This paper examines how foreign-policy actors in Pakistan interpret Donald Trump’s social media posts and public digital statements as possible signals of US policy. Rather than asking whether social media ‘matters,’ I investigate when personalised communication is treated as actionable diplomatic input, bargaining signal, domestic political theatre, agenda-setting device, or noise requiring verification through conventional diplomatic channels. I argue that Pakistani officials and foreign-policy elites interpret Trumpian communication through a hierarchy of credibility shaped by source authority, issue area, crisis intensity, and access to direct diplomatic channels. Posts concerning Iran, India, Kashmir, Afghanistan, China, or sanctions are therefore unlikely to be treated uniformly. Some generate urgency, media management, or backchannel clarification, while others are discounted as performative politics for US domestic audiences. To test this argument, I primarily use semi-structured interviews with Pakistani diplomats, politicians, retired officials, defence analysts, foreign-policy journalists, and think-tank experts, alongside analysis of selected Trump-era episodes in Pakistan-US relations. By shifting attention from the production of digital diplomacy to its external reception, I hope to show how security-sensitive states process ambiguity generated by personalised US leadership.