EDITORIAL: TTP’s expanding insurgency and the Afghan Taliban’s refusal to rein it in despite repeated requests and warnings from Islamabad meant a surgical strike inside Afghanistan was inevitable. And a recent terrorist attack that killed 16 Pakistani soldiers in South Waziristan, conducted by TTP insurgents that slipped into and out of Pakistan so conveniently, was clearly the straw that broke the camel’s back and forced a game-changing response from the Pakistani military.
It is important to note that the go-ahead was given precisely when a Pakistani diplomatic delegation was carrying out detailed discussions with the Afghanistan high command, so it’s not as if the Afghan Taliban were caught off guard. Pakistan would’ve communicated just why it put its foot down and just what it expects from the Taliban leadership.
The word in Islamabad is that even though it understands the Taliban’s reservations about opening a direct front with TTP, lest it drives the latter into the embrace of ISIS at a very inopportune moment, it still expects the militia to be moved away from the Pakistani border. Otherwise, the situation will get much more serious.
It’s not just stakeholders in Pakistan – especially people who have lost loved ones to TTP’s senseless violence – but also the country’s strategic partners that feel Islamabad took too long to hit TTP at its base and show the Afghan government it means business. TTP’s hit-and-run attacks have not only snowballed into another proper insurgency – with headlines speaking of dead soldiers and police officers almost every day – they have also halted crucial Chinese projects in the country.
Let’s not forget that the Taliban promised to neutralise TTP after they came back to power in Kabul, which would not have happened so smoothly without active Pakistani support. But they went back on their word and, in fact, aided the TTP insurgency; even helping them buy time and relocate back into Pakistan by pressing Islamabad to talk to them as equals.
It’s also important to remember that Pakistan conducted a similar attack in March last year, but took its foot off the gas too quickly and allowed TTP to go back to its troublesome ways. The lesson for this time is that the military should not relent till it starts seeing concrete results on the ground.
Interestingly, while the Taliban have launched an official protest about violation of its airspace, etc., they haven’t yet made too much of a fuss about the attack per se. Since these are times when the Afghan government is actively trying to forge ties with China and Russia in order to increase trade and improve their country’s economy and standard of living, it could well be that they are ok with sorties into their country as long as only terrorist infrastructure is hit.
Either way, there’s no doubt that TTP is an element of instability for the entire region. That’s why even Beijing and Moscow are pressuring Kabul to eliminate all terrorist groups from their soil as a precondition to normalization. It’s best if the Taliban heed this advice and start behaving like a responsible government. In many ways, it’s already run out of time to make the right choice.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
Comments
Comments are closed.