In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), particularly in its former tribal districts, the word “operation” has become synonymous with fear and disruption. For many residents, it evokes memories of displacement and turmoil rather than security and peace.
“We’re tired of hearing about operations. They bring no peace, only displacement. They scare us now,” said Jaffer Mehsud, a trader from South Waziristan whose family was displaced in 2009 during Operation Rah-e-Nijat, a military offensive against the militant Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in the former tribal district.
“The new one, ‘Azm-i-Istehkam,’ is just another name for the same nightmare.”
Last month, the federal government, in a meeting comprising top civilian and military leaders, announced it was launching a comprehensive, nationwide anti-militant operation codenamed ‘Azm-i-Istehkam’ to mitigate a rise in attacks on security forces by militant groups. Ever since the announcement, however, the operation has been plagued by controversy.
Opposition from political parties, peace campaigns, and civil society groups has cast doubt on its efficacy, leaving the public and observers questioning the fate of the operation. Meanwhile, the government has sought to clarify that Azm-i-Istehkam would not be a kinetic large-scale military operation, nor would it entail the mass displacement of the local population.
For its part, Pakistan’s military has declared Operation Azm-i-Istehkam as an essential counter-terrorism campaign for national survival. Addressing a press conference in Rawalpindi last week, the military’s spokesperson Lieutenant General Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry said that a “massive, illegal political mafia” was trying to sabotage the drive through “organised propaganda”, while negating any notion of mass-scale displacement to be caused by it.
Analysts and officials monitoring the security situation warn that the government and military face significant challenges with this new operation compared to , which was launched a decade ago.
While previous operations have struggled to eradicate terrorism from Pakistan, questions loom over the new operation’s potential effectiveness and the broader implications for national security. How will Azm-i-Istehkam navigate the complexities of a resurgent TTP and the shifting geopolitical dynamics following the Taliban’s rise in Afghanistan? Can it succeed without the unified political consensus and public support that were instrumental in past operations like Zarb-
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