A SPATE of killings across the country has ratcheted up alarmism about ‘terrorism’ in recent weeks, provoking a fresh bout of (indiscriminate) military actions, the latest round of polemic about ‘dialogue’ with the Taliban and a new wave of confusion amongst the general public.

It is due to this confusion that, some 13 years since the onset of the so-called war on terror, we’re still far from being able to adequately grapple with millenarian violence.

The easy option is to attribute the prevailing state of affairs to the dithering of elected government (present and past). Such an argument betrays a poor understanding of the military establishment’s foundational role and the inability and/or unwillingness of mainstream political parties to shape fundamental policies.

Similarly, the generally apologetic attitude of the media and ‘official’ intelligentsia towards the militant right reflects a deep commitment to the national security state and its jingoistic ideology.

How much has changed in the thinking and actions of the men in khaki, the original progenitors of the ‘strategic assets’ that appear to have developed minds of their own?

An argument currently doing the rounds posits that the military has definitively turned a corner, and not only recognises the perils of continuing to patronise the militant right but is actually undertaking obvious and not-so-obvious steps to slowly weed out jihadism.

On the other hand is the hypothesis that not much has changed and that GHQ still thinks of jihadis as allies serving a dual purpose: they are a spoiler in the domestic political sphere and also a bargaining tool in the wider regional calculus.

It would be just as inaccurate to suggest that the military establishment has undergone a paradigm shift as it would be to claim that it’s operating exactly along the same lines as it did before Washington & co. initiated the ‘war on terror’. In other words, the thinking of our holy guardians is neither entirely static nor overly dynamic.

Ultimately, a meaningful analysis of what has changed (or not) revolves around the question of whether GHQ clings on to the conviction that it alone possesses the prerogative to define the ‘greater national interest’ or if in fact it has acceded to the idea that it is ultimately answerable to the people of this country (and those that the latter choose to represent them).

Our generals may never have been very self-effacing but they have also always put a premium on maintaining a good image of themselves in the public eye. The military has historically been viewed with suspicion outside the Punjabi heartland, so now, as Balochistan slips out of grasp, the institution will be keen to retain goodwill within its traditional stronghold.

For this reason alone it can be argued that the men in khaki will accept that some things have to change. Their exclusive monopolies over policy matters will have to give way over time to a more negotiated structure of power in which mainstream parties and other state institutions are more substantial players than in the past.

Yet this will be a long process as GHQ’s instinct is to call the shots, especially on matters of ‘national security’, including the question of our erstwhile strategic assets.

Importantly, there are indications that opinions and attitudes towards ‘terrorism’ are not entirely uniform within the top brass of the military, even if there is consensus about the overall corporate interests of the institution. Still, the reality is that long-term linkages between the military and right-wing militant outfits — some even of a directly personalised nature — do not just dissipate, even if one argues that a certain degree of political will has been generated to effect such disentanglement.

In the final analysis, my sense is that the military establishment will continue to sanction selective patronage of the religious right, even while it faces up to the serious ‘blowback’ effects that both state and society have to endure. Democratic forces will continue to have to push hard, and in spite of censure, for what was always a disastrous policy to be abandoned altogether.

Regardless of how much the military is forced to retreat from its holier-than-thou mindset, the right-wing seeds sown in society over the past four decades will continue to give impetus to the politics of hate. In short, we have probably not quite hit rock bottom yet. It is the fear that things will continue to get worse that induces some of us to think in alarmist terms about the phenomenon known as ‘terrorism’.

Yet, more than ever before, we need to analyse what’s really going on, and particularly what the military establishment is or is not doing. This is the first step towards cutting down to size our self-proclaimed holy guardians, both uniformed and not.

The writer teaches at Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad.