Little did the Obama administration know that just one incident like the clandestine raid of the Osama compound could consign the Pak-US anti-terrorism co-operative relationship to a cul-de-sac. A realisation of that mistake was indicated here on Friday as US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and US Army Chief Admiral Mike Mullen met the Pakistani leadership with a view to mending fences.
Not only did she concede that Pakistan should be part of the Afghan reconciliation process, but also looked forward to strong bilateral relations in future. But the visitors also made some demands that are not easy to meet now that the warmth that once pervaded the relationship has gone and the 'do-more' call is treated by the people of Pakistan as an insult.
She may be right in concluding that in the wake of Osama's death, the bilateral relationship has arrived at a "turning point". But that is hardly the reason that Pakistan will launch a military operation in North Waziristan. Pakistan is already confronted with a huge challenge of a stepped-up Taliban campaign to avenge bin Laden's killing. Since that raid, much of water has flown under the bridge.
There is now, in the field, a unanimous parliamentary resolution which seeks not only a halt to US drone attacks, thinning of its intelligence presence in Pakistan but also the initiation of a peace process in the troubled tribal region. And the imperative to deal with the Taliban by means other than the military is being driven home on a day-to-day basis. On the very eve of Clinton's visit, they struck the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa city of Hangu.
As the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan's rampage to avenge Osama bin Laden's killing goes on, the government offices in Hangu came under a deadly attack on Thursday evening. The residents of the city have the bad luck to be the terrorists' target for a string of terrorist attacks, of which the latest was the most devastating.
Officials said a suicide-bomber rammed a van packed with 450 kilos of explosive material into a building, causing a massive explosion which killed over 30 people and injured twice that number, some critically. A number of shops, houses and a restaurant were also badly damaged. The city of Hangu sits on the main route to and from the settled areas to the tribal agencies of Orakzai and Kurram.
The agencies' adjoining areas are believed to be infested with the Taliban militants and other nefarious elements involved in kidnappings, smuggling and drug trafficking. The original target of the bomber is said to be the district police and administration offices, but the van's engine failed and he exploded some distance short of his goal.
The Hangu attack has come within a day of the TTP attack on a police station in Peshawar, which was also massive in terms of explosives used and the casualties it caused. By all accounts, the Taliban leadership is living up to its promise to inflict far more lethal loss of life and property to avenge Osama's death.
May be in the rest of the country, the concerned agencies can intercept the bombers, but not in the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa towns and cities that border the tribal agencies. There the terrorists drive their explosive-laden vehicles straight in to the targets in an audacious manner without fear of being challenged.
It is not that they are welcome. The problem is the enormity of the threat that the terrorists pose and the potential to carry out that threat. By now it should be amply clear to the government that the Tehrik-e-Taliban is run by a clutch of ingenious planners; has at its disposal an unlimited supply of suicide-bombers; and is not short on weapons and financial resources. It also seems to have put in place an efficient intelligence network throughout the country that keeps it posted with all the relevant information to help conceive, plan and execute attacks. Add to this the tribal tradition to take revenge and you are going to live with terrorism for as long as one or two generations.
We should not forget that consequent to the relentless military operations and indiscriminate drone attacks, a large number of non-combatant men, women and children have been killed, leaving behind angry kith and kin that would go to any limit to take revenge. They may not be sworn to the Taliban ideology or religious extremism but certainly they are highly combustible stuff, too eager to join hands with the TTP, even as suicide-bombers.
Unfortunately, however, the Pakistani leaders, both civil and military, have not been able to see the problem of terrorism stemming from our tribal region and why it tends to flourish in its correct perspective. At one point of time we were in love with the Taliban and as they captured power in Afghanistan, we were one of three countries in the world to host their embassy in Islamabad. And then we ditched them because we couldn't take the American pressure and launched a military operation against their sympathisers in Pakistan.
The fact is that theirs was not a military challenge that it should have been countered by force. It was a socio-political challenge, coming as it did from their backwardness and under-development and should have been handled by political means by way of talking to the angry tribal people. That after so much of unnecessary bloodletting in the tribal areas and the rest of Pakistan, the dialogue with tribal people is still not contemplated is indeed a national tragedy.
One had hoped that the meeting of the Defence Committee of the Cabinet would signal a departure from the military-specific approach, but that was not to be. If the government is determined to fight the Taliban by "all means" as decided by the DCC, one doesn't see the TTP shirking its 'responsibility' to fight. No doubt, as one senior retired Pakistani diplomat said the other day, 'we are now in a free-fall and what matters now is whether we survive or not'.