Sir: Ever since Trump became president of the United States, he has consistently accused Pakistan of providing safe-havens to terrorists. Every time he makes his views about Pakistan public, the state and the people of Pakistan refute his allegations. However, such refutations and denials are invariably emotional in nature, and are more or less devoid of introspection. Every time Trump reiterates that Pakistan is not doing enough against terrorism, we respond by citing our sacrifices in the war against terror. We, at that time, adopt a defensive posture that prevents us from revisiting objectively our past policies vis-a-vis militant groups. Even before Trump became the president of the US, there had been a strong narrative in Pakistan that criticized the security establishment’s soft corner towards Afghan-centric and India-centric militant groups. Not very long ago, in the early days of Gen. Kayani’s tenure as COAS, there was a strong perception among the people of Pakistan that their state differentiates between the so-called good Taliban and the bad Taliban. Even presently, when the US and India have been leading a forceful international campaign of trying to portray Pakistan as a state that sponsors terrorism, a person like Hafiz Saeed is given official protocol in Quetta. Meanwhile, extremist religious parties are getting mainstreamed into politics, the mastermind of APS massacre is interviewed in positive light and the bigots who lionize Mumtaz Qadri and who laid a siege around the capital of the state were ‘paid for their services’. The much touted national action plan has seen little progress beyond the legitimization of the anomalous military courts. Against this backdrop, when the outside world accuses us of being soft on terrorists, are they not absolutely incorrect? The truism that actions speak louder than words looks especially pertinent to our response to the US’ so-called allegations. We must set our house in order before we accuse the world of not believing in our words. Besides, it must be noted that contrary to the common perception, Trump is not a (complete) fool. He is after all, the president of the sole super-power. He does not just utter words impulsively. As past months have demonstrated, before he utters anything, detailed policy-work has already been completed. Only then does he articulate his views in his idiosyncratic style, and that articulation is then followed by declarations of detailed policy by some official spokesperson. Rahat Naseem Karachi Published in Daily Times, January 8th 2018.