Division among militants
Monday, June 15, 2009
Waqar Ahmed
The military operation has succeeded in defeating the insurgents by ejecting them from Buner, Dir and other adjoining areas within nine weeks. A majority of the Taliban have either been killed or have retreated form the battlefields. Lieutenant-General Nadeem Ahmed, chairman of the Special Support Group, said on June 6 that the Swat Taliban leadership’s contacts with low-ranking commanders had been disrupted and the recruitment and training centres were no more operational, that their logistic dumps and ammunition had been destroyed and the flow of finances halted. Before him, Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani had said on June 4 that the military had “decisively turned the tide” against the Taliban in Swat and adjoining district.
Some media reports have revealed intercepted conversation among the commanders of the militants, which shows that they have been completely demoralised in resisting the army. High-ranking commanders of the insurgents are threatening their own fighters in desperation. For example, some Taliban suicide bombers were dispatched to a local commander “Hamzala” from “Haji Gul” who said that the suicide bombers were not allowed to leave their position. He further said that anybody falling back from his position would face serious consequences. Haji Gul said that he would kill the person himself if he runs away from his position. Setting aside the threats of their high-ranking commanders, demoralised militants have been extremely pressurised, and after losing control over their concerned areas, they are running from their last bastions.
Latest reports indicate that a majority of the Taliban leaders and commanders belonging to the banned TNSM and the Swat TTP has been killed, captured or fled. A major failure of the militants of Swat has been the absence of motivated suicide bombers in the battlefield. In the recent past, a network for motivating and training suicide bombers existed in certain Taliban strongholds in Swat, but it seems that a majority of the young bombers sent to the valley and other districts of Malakand was not locals. They were either foreign fighters or Afghan refugees who have escaped to Afghanistan.
However, there are a number of reasons which have brought about a division among the militants. The local people became fed up with the criminal activities of the Taliban like beheadings, kidnappings and especially their tactics of torturing innocent people. They realised that Sharia was a pretext that the Taliban were using to impose a brutal system on the local population. The brutality of the Taliban was such that close to three million people fled their homes, choosing to stay in camps rather than under the Taliban. As things stand now, the Taliban are no longer in a position to misuse and exploit jihad in organising the insurgents.
Unlike the militants, Pakistan’s armed forces have been fully supported by the people of Pakistan. In wake of public backing to the military operations coupled with high morale in Pakistan’s security forces has created disunity and demoralisation among the militants. During house-to-house fighting in Mingora, soldiers fought boldly and did not care for their life. Meanwhile, commandos were air-dropped at various strongholds of the insurgents. With morale high, the armed forces succeeded in disrupting the supply lines of the militants and destroying their command and control system. This compelled militants to fight in the scattered forms and caused greater division among them.
Although backbone of the Malakand militants has been broken by the army, it is imperative that public support for the military operation be maintained. Ordinary people need to cooperate with security forces and agencies in detecting and capturing the top militant leaders who are working on the payroll of RAW and CIA with the sole aim to destabilise a ‘nuclearised’ Pakistan for their common strategic agenda.
