Pakistan: Some lessons: Different approaches to militancy

CONSIDER the difference in responses: the US obtains intelligence on a possible attack against its embassies and consulates in the Middle East and North Africa and it issues a global alert and shuts 21 missions on Sunday; Pakistani law-enforcement agencies and government officials receive specific intelligence on an impending jail raid in D.I. Khan and end up taking defensive measures that collapsed at first contact with the enemy. In the tale of those two episodes lie many lessons. For one, the threat of global jihad, especially from Al Qaeda, has far from disappeared. With so much emphasis on Al Qaeda and the Pak-Afghan region, it is all too easy to forget that global jihadists come in many stripes and are quite easily able to hop from one country to another. So even if Al Qaeda’s active presence has been diminished in Pakistan, there is zero room for any kind of complacency: other jihadists, global and local, continue to own swathes of Fata, while the US drawdown in Afghanistan could attract fresh attention of militants looking to establish Islamist fiefdoms in various parts of the world. The broader lesson remains, though, one that Pakistani authorities, civilian and military, appear unwilling or unable to absorb: coordination, capacity and will — without those elements, Pakistan’s war against militancy will never be won. What is equally overlooked, however, is that even a modicum of increase in competence and will on the state’s part could have dramatic effects on the fight. Consider the propaganda video of the Bannu jail break that has recently been released by the TTP. What was believed to be a highly sophisticated and superbly organised raid in fact looks fairly amateurish and rudimentary on camera. In one sense, that is an even greater indictment of the security forces tasked with defending the Bannu jail and ensuring its inmates remain under lock and key. But in another sense, it indicates that even a small increase in preparedness by the state can thwart significant disasters. Perhaps the greatest lesson that needs to be learned here is clarity about who the enemy is. The US, for all its confused, contradictory policies in Afghanistan, has since 9/11 focused relentlessly on Al Qaeda, a group that explicitly targets the American state. Here in Pakistan, even groups that explicitly target state and society somehow attract sympathy and even understanding. In that environment, it’s little surprise the militants can wreak so much damage with so little intellectual and organisational firepower.