Pakistan under attack

It should be clear by now that we are at war with ourselves as the enemy within grows more audacious by the day. Yet there are educated people in this country who continue to blame American foreign policy and the ever-potent ‘foreign hand’ for the wave of terrorism sweeping the country. This argument is deeply flawed on several counts.

For one thing, the Pakistani state threw its weight behind America’s Afghan policy in the late ’70s and after 9/11, and as such we are equally responsible for the fallout. It is also common knowledge that Pakistani intelligence agencies once provided logistical support to militant organisations that could further our ‘strategic depth’ interests in Kashmir and across the Durand Line.

It is argued that those behind the storming of the police training centre in Lahore on Monday, and the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team earlier this month, were so sophisticated in their methods that they must necessarily have had the backing of a foreign power. Such reasoning overlooks the fact that those who were freedom fighters a few years ago and are now labelled as terrorists were trained by the best in the business.

Let us assume for a moment, even if the truth lies elsewhere, that the terrorists who attacked Lahore on Monday were in the pay of an antagonistic neighbour. Does that absolve the Punjab government and the Pakistani state of the charge of gross negligence? Does it in any way disprove those who maintain that such incidents point to monumental intelligence failures and security lapses? It doesn’t matter who the paymasters might be.

What we have now are Pakistanis killing Pakistanis, Muslims killing Muslims. And while we are at it, let us discard once and for all the absurd notion that the people who carry out such dastardly acts cannot possibly be Muslims. They are Muslims. In fact, these terrorists and militants consider themselves to be far truer Muslims than those who oppose them.

The militants involved in Monday’s siege may have been overcome but it is time to hammer out a political and social consensus on this issue. It is time to show the kind of fervour the obscurantists demonstrate in abundance but the well-meaning couch in carefully chosen words. This is a fight and it cannot be won without throwing punches.

The country’s mainstream political parties need to draw a line in the sand and show the people, with no room for ambiguity, where they stand in this battle for the soul of Pakistan. The religio-political parties must also make their positions clear. President Obama says that US ground forces will not enter Pakistan. We would be well advised to not give them the chance. If we can’t do the job ourselves, others might do it for us. And that way lies disaster.