No one should have a statistical problem with the towering estimated figure of $ 38 billion that Pakistan has lost due to the war on terror. Pakistan has been left behind by decades in economic development by its big brother neighbour due to the proliferation of terrorism in the country. The problem of assigning the basic responsibility of such a huge loss: is the US solely responsible for our destructive discourse or are we are equally to blame for such a disastrous situation? Most likely, the figures have been computed and publicised at this time to tell the US and the world that we have had huge uncompensated losses in the war on terror. The US promised an annual assistance of over a billion dollars, which does not come close to making up for the losses suffered. We expect the US and the world to be grateful to us for offering such a huge sacrifice for the safety of the entire world. It is fine if this kind of reasoning is publicised for propaganda purposes but it would be a severe case of hallucination if we really start believing that we are suffering for the cause of saving the world. Such a belief is widely propagated by the security establishment, Imran Khan, Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) and naïve politicians who keep playing games. The propagation of huge costs due to the war on terror assumes or implies that Pakistan has been dragged into this war by the US and, therefore, all our losses are due to the American invasion of Afghanistan. No doubt, the US is an imperialist power and invasions have been its modus operandi in large parts of the world. However, the US invasion of Afghanistan had a different dimension other than its usual intrusion into South America or Africa where the basic motive was to safeguard the imperialist economic system. The US economic interest in Afghanistan was minimal and that was one of the reasons that it ran away from the area as soon as the Soviet Union was defeated. The US invasion of Afghanistan and the dragging of Pakistan into it have to be examined in a historical perspective. The fact of the matter is that the US had invaded Afghanistan from Pakistan as the Soviet armies occupied Kabul. The US-Pak invasion of the Afghan state through the mujahideen and other proxies had all the trappings of foreign intervention in a different form. When the armies of anti-Soviet mujahideen were recruited from around the world, trained, provided with sophisticated weaponry, including Stinger missiles, and inserted in Afghanistan as a large fighting force, it can be called nothing but an invasion. Pakistan was not only a willing partner but also a rather enthusiastic participant in this venture. All the religious parties, including the JI, who are now making noises about the American invasion of Afghanistan, were getting their dollars from the US for playing their part. One can put the entire blame on the US for terrorism inside Pakistan if the JI and other religious parties confess that the Nizam-e-Mustafa movement of 1977 was also funded by the US to get rid of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto because of his atomic programme. Then the JI and anti-Bhutto movement must have been used by the US to overthrow Bhutto and bring Ziaul Haq to power who, representing the religious constituency, laid down the basis of extremist/political Islam. The roots of extremist Islam and jihadism can be found in the anti-Bhutto 1977 movement and the JI’s support of the socio-theocratic engineering undertaken by Ziaul Haq. The US used the extremist/political Islam promoted by the JI and Zia to further its cause of international Islamic jihad against the Godless Soviet Union. As the US dollars were pouring in to keep everyone happy, jihad against the Afghanistan state was fine with the Pakistan military and religious parties. After the Soviets left Afghanistan and the US ran away after creating a huge mess, it was still fine with the Pakistan military to gain strategic depth and the religious parties were exuberant for the Talibanisation of Afghanistan and Pakistan. No one was counting the cost of this destructive path at that time, though it was not less than what we are incurring now. However, the course led to international jihad against the US and the West. The US had to undertake a second invasion of Afghanistan for its own security and that is the point from where the Pakistan army, JI and other Islamists want to start the tale of the war against terrorism. If we assign weight to the factors that have brought us to the present disastrous state of affairs, we may conclude that about 70 percent of jihadi terrorism is/was induced by religious parties and the military. Of course, the US used Pakistan to defeat the Soviet Union but our religious parties and military were undertaking jihadism to further their own agendas. We want to blame the US for everything without taking responsibility for our own doings. And, unless we realise our own mistakes, nothing is going to change. The writer can be reached at manzurejaz@yahoo.com