EDITORIAL: The Dec 20 TTP attack in South Waziristan that cost the military 16 precious lives must force a cold re-think and hard reset of the security strategy. There’s no doubt that the approach in place since TTP went active again, which is to react to individual terrorist attacks, is not working.
The enemy is able to regroup and bounce back stronger every time. It’s also clear enough by now that simply requesting the Afghan government to clamp down on TTP camps on their side of the border is not going to work.
It appears, from the rush of statements following the terror attack, that while the government sorts out how to make Kabul listen to reason, the army is going to cleanse border areas on the Pakistani side, at least, and employ a wholesome strategy on the lines of the military operations from last decade that dismantled TTP’s infrastructure in the tribal area and sent insurgents running across the border.
That is exactly what is needed. The soft approach, of waiting for the next attack and then going after the cell that orchestrated it, is not enough of a deterrent. Security forces must do whatever is necessary to completely root out all manner of terrorist presence in the border area.
It will, however, be important to do a few things that were left undone, or incomplete, last time. The first is to empower and train the police force, which is the first line of defence, instead of always relying on the army to get the job done.
Even though the first TTP insurgency completely changed the security landscape, the police force was not given the attention that it should have been. And all these years later, it remains under-funded and inadequately trained to meet the sort of challenges that have cropped up again.
Another concern that reached the press last time was inadequate intelligence sharing among the dozens of agencies working towards the same goal. This was also included in the National Action Plan (NAP) that was hammered out after the APS tragedy in Peshawar but, according to widely published news reports, was not implemented properly.
There’s one more thing that will be needed this time to keep TTP’s new insurgency from inflicting yet more pain on the state and the people. The political elite will have to show the maturity to put their petty differences aside to meet the threat that affects the entire country.
As things stand, the chief minister of the province that faces the most attacks spends most of his time agitating against the government in the centre. And whatever reasons either side has for its chosen strategy, such confrontation provides the ideal opportunity for the enemy to strike right at the heart of the state.
2024 is ending as the bloodiest year in a long time, with almost 900 militant attacks and more than a thousand deaths from them. These statistics reflect very poorly on a state that was supposed to have learnt the right lessons from an insurgency a whole decade ago.
Let’s not forget that we lost more than 80,000 people to that wave of terrorism. It’s time to nip this evil in the bud before it gains any more momentum. For that everybody, the military and the political elite will have to play their part.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2024
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