Pakistan is witnessing political instability, grave economic situation, social unrest and an increasingly unstable internal security situation. This being the year of general elections in the country, political and social polarization is on the rise, aggravated by the precarious economy. Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) recently won a landslide victory in Punjab, winning 15 of 20 seats, leading to the collapse of Chief Minister Hamza Shahbaz's PML-N led coalition government.
Pakistan’s Centre for Research and Security Studies (CRSS) has called TTP as the biggest threat to the country in its annual report released on December 31, 2022.
Imran has been rooting against former Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa, accusing the Pakistani establishment of trying to assassinate him and calling for early elections while the government wants to arrest Imran and possibly debar him from contesting elections.
In January 2023, Pakistan’s external debt rose to about PKR 55 trillion according to the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP); a jump by PKR 4 trillion or around 7.7 per cent from the previous year which also witnessed heavy flooding.
China has been financially helping the all-weather friend Pakistan and the IMF released $500 million to Pakistan as the first installment of a $1.3 billion loan package. But economic recovery would take many years. Inflation, depreciating currency, falling investments and low growth together with unemployment, poverty and illiteracy is increasing social unrest.
The internal security situation of Pakistan is becoming increasingly unstable which is Pakistan’s own doing, ‘primarily. because of two factors: first, establishment of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and support to Afghan Taliban over the past several decades, with TTP coming home to roost now, and, second, China-aided continuing genocide in Balochistan which has witnessed rise of nationalism and integration of Baloch resistance forces for independence.
Resultantly, the TTP and the Baloch Liberation Front (BLF) / Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) have been consistently targeting Pakistan’s security forces. Genocide apart, the Baloch fury is also because of the Chinese presence in Balochistan, depriving locals of jobs and mining minerals, oil and gas. According to a report by the Pakistan Institute of Conflict and Security Studies (PICSS), January 2023 was one of the deadliest months, with 44 militant attacks across the country.
In its annual report for 2022, the Baloch Liberation Front (BLF) has said that it carried out 162 lethal attacks against Pakistani security forces during 2022 in which about 213 Pakistani soldiers were killed, 11 mobile towers were destroyed plus about 27 Pakistani military agents and ‘death squad’ members were killed.
Pakistan’s ISI appears to have miscalculated horribly in not discerning how inexorably linked the Afghan Taliban and the TTP are – call it a case of overconfidence killing the cat.
The report says that 10 Baloch rebels affiliated with BLF sacrificed their lives to defend their territories; motherland. The BLF has called on the Balochis to join the liberation war, saying, “In this war of independence it has become necessary for the Baloch nation to fight united so that a new bright dawn can be=gin due to the blood of martyrs and the sacrifices of the nation and Sarmachaars. BLF attacks on occupied Pakistani forces will continue with intensity until freedom of the motherland.”
On March 6, 2023, at least nine Pakistani police officials were killed after a suicide bomber (apparently BLA affiliated) rammed his motorcycle into a police truck in Sibi, 160 km east of Quetta, Balochistan’s capital. Naela Quadri Baloch, a senior leader of the Balochistan freedom movement in exile in Canada, says that the Government of Balochistan in Exile (GBE) has been established but China has emerged as a crucial player in Balochistan.
But Pakistani security forces are suffering much more at the hands of the TTP. In 2022, Pakistan witnessed a 51 per cent rise in terror attacks (maximum by the TTP), with 250 attacks that killed about 443 people and injured at least 719. Pakistan’s Centre for Research and Security Studies (CRSS) has called TTP as the biggest threat to the country in its annual report released on December 31, 2022. According to this report, at least 282 personnel were killed during 2022 in attacks by the TTP through suicide attacks, IED ambushes and raids with majority in the Pakistan-Afghan border regions.
Pakistan’s ISI appears to have miscalculated horribly in not discerning how inexorably linked the Afghan Taliban and the TTP are – call it a case of overconfidence killing the cat. Brokering a ceasefire with the TTP through the Afghan Talban was bound to fail. The plan to establish ‘strategic depth’ in Afghanistan has misfired with the Taliban wanting to subsume Pakistan into their fold under the rule of Sharia. Part of the TTP leadership is in Afghanistan and its military training camps are running full steam in Afghanistan while the US left behind enough weaponry and equipment for the Taliban to terrorize the Pakistani establishment.
In the past one year plus, the TTP along with its affiliates has increased its influence and presence in Pakistan, including in the southern districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) - South Waziristan, North Waziristan, Tank, Bannu and Lakki Marwat. Footage of heavily armed TTP cadres and its affiliate fighters in parts of KPK are seen periodically on social media sites. According to recent estimates, more than 40,000 TTP and affiliate fighters are present in KPK. There are also reports of the presence of over 100 TTP suicide bombers in Pakistan and more being trained in Afghanistan.
Whether the TTP can forge an alliance with the BLF/BLA and attract volunteers from Balochistan, others and Pakistani security forces remains to be seen...
The TTP has now released a video titled ‘Hum Log Taliban Hain’ which is the first part of a video series. The video claims that the Pakistani establishment and army are committing genocide, fraud, killing innocent people in fake encounters, and the media under threat of the army is portraying the TTP fighters as terrorists.
The video further says that the Pakistan army has been busy committing crimes and looting 80 percent of the public's hard earned money for the last 75 years but has not freed an inch of Kashmir from India. The video invites people from all sectors from youth to aged, labour to doctors, engineers as well as from Pakistani security forces and army to stand with the TTP whether Pashtun, Sindhi, Baloch, Punjabi, Kashmiri or Gilgiti and fight against the occupying bloodthirsty and corrupt army to establish the Sharia system in Pakistan.
With Pakistan’s population of 235,824,862 and an annual growth rate of 1.91 percent, 443 people killed and 719 injured in attacks during 2022 is not much. But the number of attacks was 250 – a rise of 51 percent. More significant is the presence of some 40,000 well armed TTP cadres in the KPK region.
Whether the TTP can forge an alliance with the BLF/BLA and attract volunteers from Balochistan, others and Pakistani security forces remains to be seen but it certainly is a recipe for increased instability in Pakistan. With the continuing Pakistani genocide in Balochistan, rebellion in units of Pakistan army’s Baloch Regiment should have been engineered by now although Pakistan has ensured these units are officered by Punjabis and non-Balochis.
With its sheer size and equipping, the Pakistani army arguably is no pushover. But organizations like the TTP are adept in sub-conventional warfare. Increase in the lethality of attacks by the TTP by way of numbers and modalities can cause major problems for the Pakistani establishment.
India certainly has an opportunity to pay back Pakistan’s 1000-cut policy in the same coin provided the Indian establishment has the will to do so.
The global geostrategic dynamics have changed because of the US war on Russia using Ukraine as proxy, NATO seeking an Indo-Pacific role and the US gearing up to fight China indirectly – possibly using India as a Ukraine-like proxy. Instability in Pakistan affects Chinese investments in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, which is also China’s strategic highway to the Arabian Sea.
Independent Balochistan (and Sindh?) would cut off Pakistan from the sea completely while tribal areas of Pakistan could merge with Afghanistan. The question remains if the US-led West wants to operationalize America’s erstwhile master plan to balkanize Pakistan drawn post 9/11 or will the CIA-ISI and MI6-ISI bonds block such a move. India certainly has an opportunity to pay back Pakistan’s 1000-cut policy in the same coin provided the Indian establishment has the will to do so.
Finally, the TTP’s clarion call to pan-Pakistan volunteers for fighting the Pakistani establishment and security forces could well be more than just an ideological ploy.