Daily Times

“Don’t worry, everything will be okay”. 17 months, 100 deaths, and 300 casualties later, ex-DG ISI Faiz Hameed’s assurances have proven to be hollow and baseless. Everything, in fact, is not okay. We do, indeed, need to worry.

On the 30th of January, 2023, Peshawar suffered a devastating terrorist attack, incurring over 100 deaths. The perpetrators, the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), have since attempted further attacks on police stations in Mianwali and Waziristan. With an 84 per cent increase in TTP attacks since the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, Faiz Hameed’s peacekeeping visit to Kabul has proven to be a failure. But the resurgence of extremist outfits in Pakistan points to a wider failure of the national security stratagem, with one overwhelmingly obvious idea:

You do not negotiate with terrorists.

The base premise behind the formation and functioning of terrorist groups is the disruption of state apparatus through violent means, with the aim to enforce an ideology in the most gruesome of ways. The TTP’s ideological inspiration is rooted in two key positions: the imposition of the Afghani Taliban-style Sharia system in Pakistan, and the complete separation of tribal areas along the Durand Line from the Pakistani state.

Any and all attempts to negotiate would require concessions from the Pakistani government. Practical implications aside, an average Pakistani should be horrified at the prospect of the State granting relief to an organization that has massacred Pakistanis for decades. Perhaps the only reminder that one would need is of the APS attack. For a terrorist organization to grow bold enough to murder more than 200 children in an army school, and then to be provided concessions, is the most morally reprehensible position for a democratic government to be in. Some crimes simply cannot be forgiven.

We, however, ended up forgiving them.

In 2021, after the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, General Faiz Hameed visited Kabul and birthed the brilliant idea to bring the TTP to the negotiating table. After a three-year-long military campaign against the TTP, which ended up in many militants being killed, arrested or ousted from Pakistan, our wise policymakers from the GHQ decided to concede ground and called a ceasefire, effectively allowing TTP to regroup in the months that followed. The ultimate forgiveness came when the government released Muslim Khan, along with another TTP commander, from imprisonment. The propensity of the Pakistani establishment to violate all fundamental moral responsibilities towards the people is nothing short of amusing.

But then again, for a state that successfully murdered two generations of Bhuttos, justified successive martial laws and currently enables the rampant growth of human suffering, perhaps arguments assigning the moral high ground would not be the most compelling. What one could expect, however, is the basic understanding that negotiations would definitely loosen the noose around TTP, and the subsequent leakage of extremism would kill hundreds. Apparently, our common-sense department is as empty of a cabinet as our foreign reserves.

Pakistan’s negotiations with TTP resulted in them demanding a reversal to the 25th Amendment, in which FATA was integrated into KP and a return towards the tribal socio-political hierarchy. The intention is clear: use FATA’s lawlessness as a vehicle to launch operations within the rest of Pakistan, handicap the armed forces, and dismember whatever hope Pakistanis have towards a peaceful future. The tables must turn, and the noose must tighten around Pakistan’s neck this time. And the TTP, unlike the Pakistani government, would not be naïve enough to loosen it anytime soon.

Pakistan is already at war, one that it will lose.

The course of action for any policymaker should be clear. For our next move, we already have a successful blueprint: Operation Rah-e-Rast, which expelled the TTP from Swat in 2009, and Operation Zarb-e-Azb, which stomped on their strongholds across Waziristan and FATA. But blueprints are also to learn from. In addition to a heavy military operation across the board, Pakistan needs to speed up the process of integrating ex-FATA into KP. Although the 25th Amendment has, on paper, combined the two regions, there is a significant vacuum of political and administrative infrastructure. Ancient traditions, like jirgas, still dictate the functioning of the social fabric, while a general disconnect from the rest of Pakistan has left many residents isolated. Other mechanistic failures, like the lack of investment in the developmental sectors, have fostered an atmosphere ripe for the TTP to extract militants from.

Along with a comprehensive military operation and a coordinated effort to rapidly uplift ex-FATA, Pakistan must reconsider its diplomatic strategy with the Afghan Taliban. Long ago, the discourse for dichotomizing ‘good’ Taliban and ‘bad’ Taliban dominated the front pages of Pakistani broadsheets. Once again, we must search for clarity on this subject. The Afghan Taliban are in power, and it would be extremely impractical to point a gun at them. At the same time, Faiz Hameed’s approach of appeasement resulted in them refusing to uproot the TTP bases in Afghanistan. It is thus essential for Pakistan to finally leverage the dependency of the Afghan economy on Pakistani trade routes, and call for a comprehensive expulsion of the TTP from the region altogether.

The ghosts of Zia, Musharraf and Faiz Hameed will haunt us for eternity, but in the graveyard of time, there arises a millisecond of opportunity, a key to shut the doors on the past. We have that opportunity right now. Wait too long, and it will slip.

Load your revolvers, and start shooting across the Khyber. Then, perhaps, everything will be okay.

The writer is a journalist and a student of law. He can be reached at ahmadbintahir@gmail.com