By Uzma Ehtasham
There is a peculiar silence that falls over a city after an explosion. It is not the silence of peace, but the quiet of shock, of counting the living and mourning the dead. In Quetta, on Saryab Road, that silence was recently broken by the crack of gunfire and the percussive thud of a hand grenade. When the smoke cleared, a civilian lay dead. A dozen more, among them police officers tasked with protecting the very fabric of the state, were left wounded. In the Kharan district of Balochistan, the narrative was one of resolve rather than tragedy, as security forces, acting on intelligence, neutralized four militants from the extremist group Fitna-e-Hindustan and captured two more in a fierce exchange.
To read these two reports side by side—one of loss, one of victory—is to understand the dual reality of Pakistan today. We are a nation engaged in a war that is neither conventional nor fully acknowledged by a world that prefers its conflicts simple. This is a war of attrition against a hydra of militancy, where every head severed seems capable of growing back, nourished by foreign interests and internal treachery. Yet, to look only at the casualties is to miss the larger, more complex picture of a nation slowly, painstakingly, turning the tide.
For too long, the narrative of instability in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has been reduced to a simple binary of state versus insurgent. The truth is far more intricate, and far more sinister. The recent operations, particularly the successful raid in Kharan targeting Fitna-e-Hindustan, expose the ugly underbelly of the unrest we face. This is not a spontaneous uprising born of local grievance; it is a calculated, sustained campaign of terror orchestrated by external actors who view Pakistan’s destabilization as a strategic necessity. The hand of India, smarting from its geopolitical isolation following its defeat in 2025, has become increasingly visible in the shadows of these conflicts. No longer content with conventional brinkmanship, the Indian establishment has doubled down on its reliance on proxy groups, using them as expendable pawns to bleed Pakistan by a thousand cuts.
The most dangerous turn in this proxy war has been the transformation of the Afghan Taliban regime into one of India’s most active surrogates. It is a bitter irony that a neighbor once seen as a brother now hosts and facilitates groups like Fitna-e-Khawarij, an offshoot of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, allowing them to launch cross-border attacks with impunity. This collusion represents a fundamental betrayal of regional stability. But where some governments might have wavered, Pakistan has responded with a clarity of purpose that deserves recognition. The decision to cut official contacts with the Afghan regime and to seal the porous border was not taken lightly; it was a sovereign act of self-defence. The results, while not yet a complete victory, are demonstrable.
Consider the mathematics of survival. There was a time, not long ago, when the daily casualty reports read like a litany of hopelessness. Multiple attacks per day were the norm. Today, thanks to a unified military and intelligence effort, combined with a growing political consensus, those numbers have been dramatically reversed. According to Minister of State for Interior Talal Chaudhry, terrorism in the turbulent province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has dropped by sixty percent. This is not merely a statistic; it represents thousands of families spared the knock on the door at midnight. It is the sound of children playing in open streets that were once no-go areas.
But vigilance is the price of safety. The attack in Quetta and the operation in Kharan serve as stark reminders that the enemy has not disarmed; it has merely adapted. India, unwilling to accept its diminished regional standing, continues to seek out fault lines, attempting to reignite sectarian violence and separatist sentiment through the very groups our forces are working to dismantle. The ongoing success of operations like Ghazab-ul-Haq proves that when the state acts with strategic coordination and political resolve, it can reclaim ground. But this is a long game. Countering militancy is not about winning a single battle; it is about building the political, economic, and social infrastructure that makes the promises of violence irrelevant.
Pakistan stands at a critical juncture. We have proven our capacity to fight back. We have shown that political unity can be forged in the furnace of crisis. But we must also show the world what we have always known: that the terrorism we face is not a homegrown problem to be solved in isolation. It is a cross-border contagion, fuelled by state actors who cynically exploit the chaos of a volatile region. As we mourn the dead of Saryab Road and commend the bravery of the soldiers in Kharan, let us do so with a renewed commitment. The war against terror is, in its essence, a war for the soul of our nation. And it is a war we must, with clarity and unity, continue to win.
(The writer is a public health professional, journalist, and possesses expertise in health communication, having keen interest in national and international affairs, can be reached at uzma@metro-morning.com)
