How far is Pakistan to Afghanistan?

M A Hossain, 

Pakistan has been suffering from terrorism for the last three decades. Due to its strategic position, Pakistan became a centre stage of terrorist activities. The menace of terrorism has adversely affected the social fabric, political structures, Institutions and economic growth of Pakistan. Following the Taliban takeover in neighbouring Afghanistan, this incipient Terrorism has destabilized domestic politics and predisposed Pakistan to an imminent Civil War.

Pakistan was created on the basis of the precepts of the Islamic religion in 1947. Oddly enough, Pakistan was eventually not ruled by the fundamental causes of its formation, rather the political power was transgressed into the grip of a bureaucratic class and inevitably, the people became frustrated and changed their territory, shape, and strength in 1971.  During the 1980s, President Zia Ul Haq tried to implement the Rule of Islam and many religious Institutions developed in the society. While this stride of President Haq was unfailingly a people-pleaser, it helped the various extremist groups like the Taliban or Al-Qaeda(AQ) to perpetuate their roots in Pakistan. 

In the era of the Cold War, the Soviet Union intervened in Afghanistan in 1979 predominantly to disseminate communist ideology. The US and her Western allies utilized Pakistan as the supreme logistic channel for the Taliban resistance to counter the ideological conflict. The military aid from Pakistan, the US, and financial backing from Arab countries enabled Afghans to drive the USSR out of Afghanistan in 1989.  AQ and Taliban possess the same ideology.

After the 9/11 attack, the US accosted AQ of this heinous act of aggression, and in retaliation attacked Afghanistan in 2001.  Taliban are 46% Pashtun of the Afghan 35 million whereas the same tribes are 15% of Pakistani 215 million and formed its offshoot Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan(TTP) in Federally Administered Tribal Area (FATA) in Pakistan. Some of those TTP leaders had previously fought against the USSR in Afghanistan and took control of most of the FATA. TTP wanted to fight against the US in Afghanistan and also asked the Pakistan government to discontinue her support to the US. In response, the Pakistani government allied with the US on the "War on Terror" campaign.

The landscape of terrorism in Pakistan might have been changed after the Siege of Lal Masjid in July 2007.  A total of 154 died, mostly women and children. Immediately, AQ declared war against the Pakistani Government and its security agencies. Before the Lal Masjid incident, AQ and TTP considered Pakistan as a buffer state in this region.

To overcome the threat of terrorism, the Government of Pakistan launched a military operation "Operation Rah-e-Haq" against TTP in the Swat district in 2007. This operation continued in phase -2 and phase 3 consecutively in 2008 and 2009.  Another military operation "Zarb-e-Azb" was launched in its territory near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border in June 2014.

Pakistan got itself intertwined in the war in Afghanistan. Besides involvement in this war, Pakistan was also plagued by ethnic and sectarian conflicts among different factions and separatist nationalistic movements as another source of terrorism.

Pakistani newspaper "Dawn News" reported that the Pakistan economy suffered a total loss of USD 126.79 billion since 2001 due to the war on terror. According to the report by Brown University's Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, 23,372 Pakistani civilians and 8,832 Pakistani security personnel were killed, directly or indirectly, in the war on terror. Ex-Premier Imran Khan lambasted the "War on Terror" as America's war, where Pakistan was dragged into it and paid a high price of losing over 80,000 soldiers and civilians as well as billions of dollars in infrastructural damage. Approximately 150 thousand security personnel are deployed in Swat, Malakand, and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa regions for counter-terrorism operations, but it costs billions of dollars from Pakistan's exchequer.

The "War on Terror" has exasperated the different militant and extremist groups in Pakistan. It created difficulties for the Pakistan army and police to manage the law and order situation. Pakistan does not have the luxury of requiring resources available to guard the Pak-Afghan border, which offers a very difficult terrain to control. The unmanned army drone strikes killed and maimed thousands of innocent civilians. Military operations in the name of the "War on Terror" against their own people have infuriated people. Besides this, corruption, injustice, and intervention of the military establishment in politics irk the society in score to go for alternatives.  TTP offered prompt justice and better governance, which gained popularity among the tribal people. Moreover, military operations made approximately 4 million Internally Displaced Persons (IDP).

Terrorism, conflict, and violence are destroying both the physical and human capital of Pakistan. It often resulted in the collapse of health and educational infrastructure. Terrorism and political turmoil affected the inflows of FDI, economic growth, domestic investment, and tourism and increase the unemployment crisis.

The Pakistani rupee is one of the weakest trade currencies in the world. Present rising utility costs, food prices and potential hikes in interest rates have brought an imbroglio in politics.

Moreover, the volatile geopolitical situations and growing convergence between China and Pakistan cast a shadow over Washington's approach towards Islamabad. Now, its somersault policy with superpowers has caused severe detriment to common people that have diverted their support from the government to the Islamic fundamentalist.

Pakistan is already submerged in the quicksand of TTP/AQ the way the USA rolled back from Afghanistan. Survival from the assassination attempt of Imran Khan has saved Pakistan and delayed the civil war. In my opinion, militant groups do not trust the Pakistani government and people do not agree to carry the burden of unsustainable military expenditure in the name of security. The prediction of civil war in Pakistan seems more imminent, and the takeover of Pakistan (or partial territory) by Islamic fundamentalists would be the xerox scenario of Afghanistan 2.0.

This article published at :

1. Daily Asian Age, BD:22Nov22.

2. South Asia Journal, NJ,USA:23Nov22

3. Modern Ghana, Ghana :23Nov22

4. Review Nepal, Kathmandu :23Nov22

5. Daily Observer, BD :26Nov22

Al-Qaeda, Global terrorism and threat to democracy

M A Hossain, 

Long ago, on one fine autumn afternoon, my friends and I were discussing which one of our friends who had escaped the get-together in that café to penalize. An army general sitting next to us was intrigued by our excitement and dragged his chair closer to us, bringing his vaporized coffee mug.

With very friendly interaction he advised us his theory “channelize, canalize and penalize” as a solution. Two decades of my hawkish eye on the Islamic extremist movement, I find the general’s theory appropriate here.

After World War II, the dollar became the strongest and only international trade currency. In the early 1990s, the world started a reorientation that strengthened the dominance of the Western capitalist economic system, supplanted the primacy of the nation-state with transnational corporations and organizations and eroded local cultures and traditions through Western culture.

The Western nations have enjoyed supremacy in the military and economy and they have been ferrying their capitalistic and democratic ideologies around the world, which are consumerist and materialistic in nature.

Now, Western nations have reached the peak of their vertex in terms of lifestyle, consumerism and prosperity. This creates an ideological vacuum and people have become frustrated. We have found widespread cases of suicide and mass shootings in Western societies, which are flagrant examples of this claim. An Islamic ideology is starting to fill the void.

I will dwell upon one jihadist organization, al-Qaeda (AQ) which has spectacularly gained its capabilities in acting as a transnational militant organization. During my research, I find, interestingly, it is the AQ that lays down the gauntlet for the United States on the battlefield.

 AQ founder Abdullah Azzam first accentuated global jihad among all militant organizations. Before that, various Islamic extremist organizations fought for sharia (Islamic rule) sporadically and locally. AQ members around the world gathered in Afghanistan to fight against Soviet occupiers.

In 1989, after the death of Azzam, Osama bin Laden took the helm of AQ. He envisioned his global jihad as “striking the head of the snake” in which the head was America. He wanted to bring the US into a death trap and by compelling US troops to be deployed globally.

AQ carried out a number of attacks on US targets around the world to allure America into war. Laden struck the center of gravity in America on the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, which changed the landscape of global terrorism. After the attack on the Twin Towers, Laden expected US troops in Afghanistan, Somalia, Syria and Libya to achieve an asymmetric war of attrition.

Even the Bush and Obama administrations were unaware that the war on terror was nothing but a booby trap. America lost the war in Somalia, Libya, Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. That is how the theory “channelize, canalize and penalize” works.

American political scientist Samuel Huntington asserted in his book The Clash of Civilizations that the future holds a series of clashes between “the West and the rest” and envisioned religion as “perhaps the central force that motivates and mobilizes people.”

AQ wanted the US military to use unilateral military action against Muslim countries, which paved the way for recruiting Muslim youths against US atrocities. Successful examples are the invasion of Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia.

Globally, democracy is declining. The war on terror, patronized by the US, gave opportunities to authoritarian rulers in several democratic countries. Nations in South Asia, the Middle East and Africa have experienced terrorism as a tool of suppression and intimidation against opposition. Terrorism is solely responsible for the world refugee crisis, which has affected the European Union and Western nations the most.

Even US citizens have experienced draconian anti-terrorist laws embodied in the so-called “USA Patriot Act” that have immeasurably increased government power of surveillance, arrest and detention. The construction of military prison camps for suspected terrorists, the abrogation of basic civil liberties and the call for military trials have undermined decades of progress in developing democratic policies.

Islamic extremist movements linked to AQ have achieved their goals in Afghanistan, Somalia, Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger and are strongly emerging in Yemen, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Pakistan, Nigeria and the Caucasus region. AQ in the Indian subcontinent (AQIS) has started a hidden and secretive network in India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Kashmir. AQ in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) is going to capture the important port cities and very soon will take control of the Gulf of Aden.

In my opinion, within the next five years several African countries will announce Islamic rule within their country. AQ in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) has strong bastions in Algeria and the Sahel.

Ideological conflict must be countered by ideology. If this simple equation is miscalculated, then there will be a catastrophic debacle. Some democratic rulers are trying to politicize terrorism and for God’s sake, they are digging the grave for democracy with their own hands.

During my research, I found that AQ started its preparation on global savagery in 2002. AQ, from the beginning, targeted the dollar system as the enemy’s center of gravity. Just think, if America was not involved in the war in Afghanistan, Iraq and Africa, where would they be now? The war on terror was nothing but a waste of money and lives.

The world is shaping into a multipolar world in 2022. America has used and abused the dollar system as a punitive tool and democratic frontliners have failed to exhibit a stable, executive, beatified ideology in the 21st century. We have seen the eccentric Trump in the US, Hindu extremist Modi in India and a pillow passing show in the United Kingdom.

The world is now considering an alternative trade currency system instead of the US dollar. But it is extremely important to be critical of state terrorism when one discusses this complex and sensitive topic. For decades, the US and Israel have been accused of state terrorism.

It is, therefore, neither the time for terrorism nor reckless unilateral military intervention, but for an ideological campaign against ideological conflict. This campaign should not accept militarism, violation of human rights, the establishment of a police or military state nor the undermining of democracy in the name of fighting terrorism.

No doubt, democracy is in the ICU and misjudgment of this ideological conflict will put the last nail in the coffin of democracy.

This article published at :

1. The Jakarta Post, Indonesia :04Nov22

2. The New Nation, BD: 04Nov22

3. South Asia Journal, NJ,USA;04Nov22

4. Review Nepal, Kathmandu :06Nov22

5. The Seoul Times, S, Korea :07Nov22

6. Modern Ghana, Ghana :07Nov22