The war goes on

War against terrorists is to be a long one & if we are to win it, all stakeholders must work at full capacity

The hope that the war on militancy was being decisively won through armed action in the tribal areas and other territories floundered with the attack on the Badhaber Airbase on the outskirts of Peshawar. The audacious attack has highlighted that despite the offensive launched against them, militants still maintain the capacity and capability to strike. Yes, this ability may have been reduced by a significant degree, but it certainly has not been eliminated entirely. In this particular case, while the militants may not have met with outright success, the attack nevertheless has warned the government, the security apparatus and the citizenry that the Taliban will not go away quickly and can still strike at sensitive military installations. While they may have been largely driven away from the tribal areas, they continue their actions in urban centres and it seems we have not yet found the means to stop them.



At Badhaber, around six to seven terrorists, dressed in constabulary uniform, apparently attacked the base from two different directions in the early hours of September 18 and were able to kill at least 18 persons, most of them offering prayers at a mosque. An army captain, who attempted to take on the militants, was also martyred. Thirteen militants are said to have died as well. The details, of course, as in all such matters, at this stage are not entirely clear. But we have the basic picture. So, what is to be done now? In the immediate aftermath of the tragedy, the army and air chiefs rushed to Badhaber. Their visit will come as some consolation to those who lost comrades in the attack. But we also need a longer-term strategy. In the first place, our intelligence networks need to be able to gather more information in a timely manner. There clearly also needs to be better coordination among the various military and civilian agencies in this regard, so that advance warnings about planning and tactics of terrorists can be generated, and effectively countered. This is an area we have floundered in. The war against terrorists is to be a long and arduous one and if we are to win it on all fronts, all stakeholders, including our intelligence apparatus, must work at full capacity so that we can defend our urban centres as well as our tribal areas.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 19^th,  2015.

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