In 1990, the Combat Development Directorate was created by the Army GHQ in Rawalpindi, with Major-General Ziauddin Butt becoming its first director-general.^{: xvii [5]} The directorate concerning with nuclear weapons development and delivery mechanism reported directly to army chief or the chief of general staff.^{: 388 [5]} The combat development directorate functioned until 1998 with Lieutenant-General Zulfikar Ali Khan its final director when the strategic planning division was created as a security secretariat of the National Command Authority in 2000.^: x [5]

The Strategic Plans Division has its own paramilitary force that is responsible for providing provision of security to country's strategic sites and protecting the nuclear materials.^[6] The Strategic Plans Division Force is heavily armed, which is reflective of the anticipated capabilities of an adversary likely to attempt an assault against a nuclear material-holding sites.^[7]

The Strategic Plan Division also serves as a "program manager" of nation's strategic and deterrence program and provides guidance as well development on weapons production at the ministry of defense's national weapons laboratories to maintain the minimum credible deterrence.^{: 388–400 [5]}

The leadership appointment of the Strategic Plans Division comes directly from the Army HQ in Rawalpindi.^[8] Designated as a Director-General, the general officer is a three-star rank who reports directly to chief of army staff.^[8] There are four security directorates for each strategic organization and each directorate is led by Brigadier.^[9]

Initially, the active-duty members of the Pakistan Armed Forces provided the security of the agency but the agency now has started hiring its own personnel. The selection standards in terms of intelligence and physical standards for these candidates are even higher than army due to very sensitive nature of their duty. At start, these recruits were trained at Pakistan Army's training centers^[9] but since 2012 SPD has been training these recruits in its own academy known as Pakistan’s Centre of Excellence for Nuclear Security (PCENS)^[10][11] located in Chakri near Rawalpindi.^[12] This training facility is modeled on US National Nuclear Security Administration's Federal Protective Forces academy.^[9]

Special Response Force (SRF) is the special forces unit^[13] of SPD Force with the strength of 25,000 personnel.^[14] SRF is based on training techniques of SSG and has retired SSG commandos as training staff.

SPD Force's primary weapons are G3, Type 56 and Type 81 assault rifles.