So, Pakistan has decided to take a page from the American playbook and launch airstrikes into Afghanistan. The result? At least 28 dead civilians, a flagrant violation of another nation’s sovereignty, and a masterclass in how to win friends and influence nobody. One might call it a ‘surgical strike,’ but the only thing precise here is the predictability of the outcome: more instability, more radicalisation, and a smug sense of moral superiority from Islamabad, as if they’ve discovered some forgotten law of international relations that allows them to bomb their neighbours with impunity.
What is it about the modern state that makes it so eager to replicate the very colonial behaviours it once decried? Pakistan, a nation born from the blood of partition and the promise of self-determination, now acts as if it has the right to decide the fate of Afghan villages. It is a curious form of amnesia, a selective memory that allows the powerful to forget the ironies of their own history. The British bombed the frontier tribes; now Pakistan bombs the same region. The more things change, the more they remain the same.
But let us not pretend this is some unilateral madness. The air strikes are likely a response to the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) using Afghan soil as a sanctuary. A legitimate concern, yes. But the method? Bombing villages where women and children live is not counter-terrorism; it is collective punishment. It is the sort of blunt instrument that generates more terrorists than it kills. If Islamabad’s goal was to reduce the TTP threat, they have just handed the TTP a recruitment drive dressed in body bags.
And where is the international community? The usual suspects will tut-tut, issue statements of concern, and then move on to the next crisis. Because Afghanistan is old news, a perpetual wound that no one has the stomach to heal. We have seen this script before: a regional power with a nuclear arsenal and a chip on its shoulder decides that the only language its neighbours understand is violence. The result is a cycle of retaliation that makes the region look like a 19th-century colonial frontier, complete with bombing raids, refugee camps, and a hearty dose of hypocrisy.
This is not about Islamic solidarity or sovereignty. It is about power. It is about the belief that might makes right, dressed up in the language of self-defence. Pakistan’s leaders would do well to recall the words of Edmund Burke: ‘Those who don’t know history are destined to repeat it.’ And history tells us that cross-border incursions rarely end well. Ask the Soviets. Ask the Americans. Now, ask the Afghan villagers whose bodies lie beneath the rubble.
The tragedy is that there were alternatives. Diplomacy, pressure on the Taliban to curb the TTP, economic incentives. But those require patience and nuance. Bombing is faster. Bombing makes you feel strong. And in the age of the 24-hour news cycle, feeling strong matters more than being effective.
Pakistan has crossed a line. It has opened a Pandora’s box of retaliatory violence. Afghanistan will not forget this. The TTP will not forget this. And the ghosts of those 28 civilians will haunt the corridors of Islamabad for years to come. But I doubt anyone there will pause to listen. After all, the sound of bombs drowns out everything else.
