Terrorism, memory and the politics of simplification

KP’s terror surge demands historical clarity, not political point-scoring

An intense and emotionally charged debate is once again underway over the stance of the Government of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa on terrorism, particularly following recent statements by provincial leadership questioning dominant narratives on militancy and cross-border dynamics.

Federal representatives and their political allies have accused the provincial government of echoing the Afghan Taliban's line, while the ruling party in the province maintains that its position has been selectively interpreted and politically weaponised.

Amid this charged environment, a meeting of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Apex Committee — chaired by the Chief Minister and attended by the Corps Commander — was a welcome reminder that when the stakes are existential, institutional sanity tends to prevail. It reaffirmed a simple but often forgotten truth: all stakeholders are ultimately in the same boat. The situation, therefore, demands comprehension rather than caricature, and strategic clarity rather than tactical point-scoring.

There is little room for disagreement on one fundamental point. Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa is once again experiencing a sustained surge in terrorist violence. The year 2025, now behind us, recorded the highest number of terrorist incidents in the province since the post-2014 decline, surpassing even 2024 levels.

More than 600 attacks were reported during 2025, with fatalities exceeding 1,300, making it the deadliest year in over a decade for the province. This trajectory, entering 2026, should alarm policymakers across the political spectrum.

Yet the gravity of the moment requires more than rhetorical outrage or moral grandstanding. It calls for a calm, historically grounded and holistic understanding of militancy in Pakistan - one that resists the temptation of convenient simplifications.

A question frequently glossed over in contemporary debate is whether terrorism existed in Pakistan before the formal emergence of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in 2007. The answer is unequivocally yes.

In the aftermath of 9/11, Pakistan became a frontline state in the US-led "war on terror". This alignment triggered violent blowback from a range of jihadist and sectarian groups that had either been nurtured during the Afghan jihad of the 1980s or had emerged in the 1990s amid Kashmir-focused militancy and sectarian conflict.

Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa was an early and primary theatre of this violence. As early as 2004, the province recorded 41 militant incidents and 168 fatalities, figures that rose steadily over the next two years.

By 2006, incidents in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa had increased to 95, with nearly 500 deaths, even though the TTP had not yet come into formal existence. These attacks were carried out by a fragmented but deeply embedded militant ecosystem rather than a single centralised organisation.

Before the formation of the TTP, multiple jihadist and sectarian outfits were already operational in and around Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. These included tribal militant commanders, sectarian groups such as Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, and splinter factions linked to Afghan Taliban commanders and Al-Qaeda.

Over time, elements from the so-called "Punjabi Taliban" — drawn from banned outfits such as Jaish-e-Mohammad, Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and Harkat-ul-Jihad-e-Islami — also gravitated towards the expanding insurgency.

The formation of the TTP in 2007 did not create militancy; it consolidated it. That year alone, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa witnessed 281 incidents and nearly 1,922 fatalities, marking a dramatic escalation. The TTP functioned as an umbrella organisation, bringing together tribal, sectarian, urban and transnational militant actors under a unified command and ideological framework, transforming dispersed violence into an organised insurgent challenge.

The tribal belt descended into deep instability well before large-scale military operations were launched. By 2008 and 2009, the situation had reached catastrophic proportions. Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa recorded 502 incidents and over 3,000 fatalities in 2008, followed by 843 incidents and nearly 5,900 deaths in 2009 — the deadliest year in the province's history.

Militant commanders established parallel administrations, enforced their own justice systems, collected taxes and openly challenged state authority. Peace agreements such as Shakai and Sararogha, rather than restoring stability, provided militants with legitimacy and strategic breathing space, further eroding the credibility of the state.

The insurgency in Swat after 2004 is often simplistically attributed to Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi (TNSM). This obscures a more unsettling reality. In its initial phase, militancy in Swat was driven not by TNSM as an organised movement, but by splinter groups of Jaish-e-Mohammad aligned with Al-Qaeda, operating under the leadership of Ibn-e-Amin.

The Chapparial Bank dacoity case is instructive: those arrested were hardened Jaish-e-Mohammad operatives, revealing an early fusion of ideological extremism with organised crime. These networks were later absorbed into the TTP, gaining organisational depth and converting a localised criminal-jihadist problem into a full-blown insurgency.

The period from 2007 to 2014 represents the most violent phase in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa's history. Even after the 2009 peak, fatalities remained high, with over 1,100 deaths annually in 2010 and 2011. The Army Public School tragedy in December 2014 marked the grim culmination of this era.

Subsequent military operations, intelligence-based interventions and financial disruption produced a significant decline in violence after 2015. That relative calm, however, bred complacency.

Since 2021, terrorism has steadily resurged in the province: 169 incidents in 2021; 225 in 2022; 472 in 2023; over 700 in 2024; and more than 600 in 2025, with a corresponding rise in fatalities. The trend is unmistakable and carries into 2026.

Any serious discussion on terrorism must move beyond simplistic binaries and politically convenient narratives. Militancy in Pakistan is the outcome of a complex interplay of historical state policies, regional geopolitics, governance failures and ideological radicalisation. External factors, including developments in Afghanistan, do matter, but reducing the debate to accusatory soundbites neither advances policy nor improves security outcomes.

What is required today is not emotional outrage or selective memory, but institutional recall, strategic clarity and a unified national approach — one that learns from past mistakes rather than repackaging them under new political slogans.