Pahalgam and the exporter of terror

Express Tribune

15-05-2025

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Reportedly, 1,600 civilians and security personnel were killed across Pakistan in 2024, and the trend is fiercely continuing in 2025. Balochistan and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa dominate the terror landscape.
We cannot forget the February 2024, ISIS-claimed twin bombings in Pishin District and Killa Saifullah, killing 30 people. Or the August 2024 BLA attacks across Balochistan in a single day resulting in 73 killed. Or, the killing of 21 Jaffar Express hostages at the hands of the BLA militants in March this year.
Four days after the Pahalgam tragedy, a BLA attack led to the martyrdom of 10 Pakistan Army personnel in Quetta. Seven more soldiers laid down their lives this month in Kachhi, Balochistan.
During the 20 years of the Afghan war, Pakistan saw the worst wave of terrorism ever seen in the world. Fatalities peaked to 11,000 in 2009 alone, and only with a series of stalwart operation by the Pakistan Army was the state able to control and fence this scourge of terror and protect the people and the land.
Sadly, as soon as the Afghans allowed the Indians to return to their soil to complete some leftover projects, we see groups like TTP, BLA and ISKP suddenly getting reorganised, restarting a vicious cycle of violence in Balochistan and KP.
It's not that Pakistan has not been trying to tell the world that India and its malicious agency RAW are behind all this. The MoFA and the ISPR have continuously been providing evidence regarding Indian hand behind the BLA and TTP terrorism. For instance, the ISPR aired the conversation between a serving Indian major and the terrorist Majeed planning the Jaffar Express hijacking. Pakistan's capture of Kulbhushan Jadhav in 2016 is another irrefutable evidence of their malicious presence on our soil.
In November 2023, The Intercept leaked a report claiming that RAW is running assassination plots against Sikh and Kashmiri separatists, both inside Pakistan and abroad. This was a month after Hardeep Nijjar was assassinated in Canada, following which the US and Canada disclosed plots for assassination of more Sikh leaders on their soils. In the same month, eight Indian former naval officers, accused of spying for Israel, were given death penalty in Qatar.
It seems that India not only buys weapons from Israel, but also shares ideologies, like the ideology of genocide and apartheid; of death-squads and espionage; of breaking international laws and breaching the sovereignty of other states with impunity; of making all sorts of temporary laws and breaking the constitution every now and then just to kill, abuse, rape and dehumanise their internal or adjacent Muslim populations at will.
There is another common trait to be identified, the trait of yelling out the lie, crying full throttle, in national and international media and forms, with so much repetition of false rhetoric — that lies start sounding like truths and truths become the unknown-knowns. Hence wise India has propagated an unceasing campaign of calling Pakistan the hub and exporter of terrorism.
In January, The Washington Post published a report detailing an assassination programme executed by RAW to kill about half a dozen individuals in Pakistan from 2021 onwards.
Just like Israel goes right inside Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Iran to kill its enemies, not feeling the slightest remorse, like a criminal or a coward, rather being proud of their ignobility. Just like that, Modi, in false pride, in 2016, uttered in his Independence Day speech that "people of Balochistan, Gilgit and PoK (Pakistan-occupied Kashmir) have thanked me a lot in past few days, I am grateful to them."
Clearly, it is not the people of Balochistan, Gilgit and Azad Kashmir who are thanking the biggest-threat-to-Pakistan; rather it is Indian assets, spies, criminal gangs that India/RAW approaches and engages for terrorist acts, and separatist militant groups that India funds and arms so that they can commit crimes against humanity inside Pakistan, at India's behest, who are thanking Modi.
RAW is more than just a Research and Analysis Wing, it has become a wing of assassinations and terrorism. RAW has enabled India to export terror to the four corners of the world. And more, it has made India an expert of false-flag operations.
From Mumbai 26/11 to Pulwama to Pahalgam, India makes it happen and before an hour passes, before any evidence-collection or inquiry, it blames Pakistan and starts its aggression. The mere fact that no inquiry is made is a proof of the fact the India knows in advance how it happened and what its next steps will be.
It's amazing to imagine what lurks in the top echelons of Indian political and defence framework. No professionalism, no humanism, no rule of law, only barbaric brute sense of hate and vengeance - is that the mere force that drives India — the 1.46 billion people?
Perhaps this is the reason why, Indian armed forces have disappointed their people, because India invests more on espionage and covert interventions, and less on professional training and discipline. True that we are in an age of hybrid warfare, but not true that it can replace professional competency and proficiency.
News that Israeli experts were assisting the Indian Army in their attacks on Pakistan is a question mark on Indian handicap in fighting a war. You can buy weapons from others but you have to fight it yourself. Israel cannot lend you bravery, they lack it themselves.
War is not a viable option between the two nuclear-armed states. Nevertheless, it has given a much-needed case study in 5th Generation Warfare. The advance from 4th to 5th generation warfare was in essence an advance to technological superiority and networking warfare that lead to stealth.
Non-kinetic means are employed along with pre-attack pinpointing, jamming and sabotage of enemy's networking nodes, followed by precision targeting. Once the enemy is disoriented by disruption of its communication and compromise of its attack-centres, precision firepower becomes overwhelming.
Perhaps that was the critical intelligence JD Vance and Marco Rubio were pointing to; India's networking nodes had been compromised, and it was on the verge of humiliating defeat — ceasefire was the best option.
Hats off to Pakistan Army's war-room and to the brave hearts of the PAF, who always put the soil above their souls!