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Dawn Editorial
Monday, 11 Jan, 2010
Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud, left, sits with his comrade Waliur Rehman during his meeting with media in Sararogha of Pakistani tribal area of South Waziristan along the Afghanistan border on Oct. 4, 2009. – Photo by AP.
A video purporting to show a Jordanian suicide bomber, who killed several CIA agents in Khost, seated next to Hakeemullah Mehsud, the leader of the TTP, raises some very troubling questions. While the authenticity of the video has not yet been established, the initial consensus seems to be that it is genuine. Even if it is not, what is clear is that statements claiming responsibility for the attack have been attributed to the TTP and that the TTP has not contradicted those claims as yet.
Here, then, seems to be a spectacular example of collaboration between the TTP, Al Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban. (Al Qaeda has already released a video paying tribute to the Jordanian bomber, while the CIA’s forward operating base in Khost was almost certainly being used to direct operations against the Haqqani network on both sides of the Pak-Afghan border.) So does the attack signal a new phase of heightened cooperation between the various militant groups straddling the Pak-Afghan border? We must recall that Waliur Rehman, a South Waziristan TTP kingpin, recently boasted that the TTP has sent “thousands” of its men to fight the American-led forces in Afghanistan — a claim that has largely been dismissed as propaganda, but which indicates the keenness of the TTP to drum up its role in Afghanistan.
Moreover, do recent events make nonsense of the so-called good Taliban/bad Taliban distinction that the Pakistan Army allegedly makes? Certainly, many have pointed to the problem inherent in the army’s strategy of focusing its operations on those groups that are directly attacking the state here: cross-pollination between ‘discrete’ militant groups has made such a distinction hard to justify. In some cases, the army has had some limited, short-term tactical success with its approach, but the strategic and long-term costs are hard to justify. For example, before the operation in South Waziristan, an ‘understanding’ was reached with Hafiz Gul Bahadur in North Waziristan to stay out of the battle. He did, but then in many cases he has either given sanctuary to TTP militants from South Waziristan or allowed them safe passage.