R Krishna Das
A deputy superintendent police (DSP) along with two constables were killed in a militant’s attack carried out by Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) on Sarband police station in Peshawar late Friday night.
This is one of the fresh incidents carried out by the militants even as Pakistani authorities watch the escalating tension as mute spectators. It is now high time that Pakistani generals and political leaders should clearly tell its people why TTP could not be destroyed.
From the history of warfare, one knows weapons alone cannot win a war; motivation is crucial. The Pakistan military’s India-centric cadet and defence colleges are echo chambers that do not prepare officers mentally for combating a still deadlier enemy like TTP.
The figure speaks: By official counts, there were 70,000 deaths from terrorism in 2002-2014, whereas Pakistanis killed in all four Pakistan-India wars add up to around 18,000.
If Pakistan is to eventually defeat TTP and its masters in Kabul, their soldiers must know what they are fighting for and why. An ideologically confused army cannot hope to fight and win. Without a clearly spelt-out cause, there cannot be strong motivation. Else Pakistan will lose and TTP will triumph, as has been happening.
The bizarre, strange and erratic behaviour owes to an ideological vacuum that is creating space for various unhealthy speculations. With Kabul clearly supporting TTP, is the pre-2021 good-Taliban, bad-Taliban philosophy still intact for Pakistan?
The Pakistani rulers created a blunder and massive strategic miscalculation to help lift the Afghan Taliban into power. Its then ISI Chief landed in Kabul and proclaimed to be the kingmaker and strategist to design the future plan of the new regime.
Ironically, the security managers used state propaganda machinery to assure Pakistani citizens that the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban are somehow different. That delusion stands fully exposed now.
Kabul’s new rulers openly taunt Pakistan, dismissing possible Pakistani air or land incursions against TTP sanctuaries inside Afghanistan. Pakistan has created for itself yet another hostile neighbour and another nightmare. The women in Pakistan are most worried. For, they are well aware of what is happening with the women in the neighbouring country.
Tactical blunders are also making Pakistanis increasingly anxious. TTP’s top guns like Muslim Khan and, earlier, Ehsanullah Ehsan, were secretly released to prepare ground for negotiating with terrorists. Giving into their demands has greatly emboldened the terrorists.
Over 100 attacks have occurred in the last 50 days. The most disastrous among them was last week’s capture of the Counter Terrorism Department by the TTP militants in Bannu.
A 600,000-strong army with nuclear weapons and advanced American-Chinese weaponry seems helpless for securing Pakistan’s borders.
