Bacha Khan university. But where the total number

No wonder then, the highest number of attacks in Pakistan were recorded around 2009-2010. Since then, the number has witnessed a steady decline, due to the sustained operations and not the removal of leaders only.

Nacta in a report at the beginning of this year said that terrorist-related incidents dropped 58 per cent from 2,060 in 2010 to 681 attacks in 2017. It also reported that more than 200,000 combing operations were carried out throughout the country. Indeed, Fazlullah may be remembered today as the mastermind of the particularly despicable attack on children at the Army Public School, Peshawar, and on the Bacha Khan university. But where the total number of attacks under him is concerned, the figure did not match the number of attacks carried out by his predecessors.

Another (sometimes) unintended impact of a decapitation strategy is the factionalisation and splintering of the parent organisation as successive leaders tend to lack the authority or charisma of their predecessors. This has been a permanent feature of the TTP since the death of Baitullah.

Hakeemullah was only able to take over the TTP after his chief rival, Waliur Rehman, was given control of South Waziristan, the main bastion of the militants.

This factionalism worsened after the deaths of these two. By 2014, there were multiple reports of breakaway factions as none of the leaders enjoyed the clout of Baitullah and the kind of influence he wielded. A prominent faction was Jamaatul Ahrar, led by Omar Khorasani, which broke away from Fazlullah in the same year; it claimed to have carried out some of the ugliest attacks in the country such as the one in a park in Lahore in 2016. Splintering in itself can lead to more violence as many militant organisations show.

In other words, the death of a leader, however, high profile, can prove to be a moment of celebration but it is not a sure-fire sign of victory. It is and should be seen as nothing more than a small battle in a long war.

The real war is won through the consistent dismantling of the network, their sanctuaries, their training grounds and recruitment centres, and their financial systems. All of this, however, is a piecemeal effort and doesn’t make for sensational headlines as does the death of a notorious individual.

Who wants to read small and vague news items about raids which led to perhaps the arrest of a few unknown people or some undisclosed amount of intelligence instead of celebratory headlines about the death of Baitullah or Osama bin Laden? The former is hard to understand and sell to the public, while the latter is comprehensible good news which tends to become an end in itself. But these targeted deaths wouldn’t achieve anything if they happen in a vacuum. There is no reason to not rejoice at the death of Fazlullah but it is far more important to remember why he had been forced to hide in Afghanistan for so long.

Bacha Khan university. But where the total number

Posted by Zaheer Zubair

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