AS the year came to a close, the battle for North Waziristan entered the final stages with the security forces trying to clear Shawal valley the last haven of the militants. It has been over a year and a half since the Zarb-i-Azab operation was launched in this treacherous territory known as the ‘witches brew’ where militants of all hues had taken sanctuary.

Many of the areas are now believed to have been cleared of insurgents. Yet, it is a long way to go before the territory can be fully secured. The terrorist network that threatened national as well as regional security has surely been disrupted, but not fully destroyed. There are still strong pockets of resistance and the militants are holding on to some of their bases and many are taking refuge along and across the Afghan border.

Surely the battle in Shawal is the most difficult one. The densely forested and high-altitude region makes it extremely difficult to track down militants taking sanctuary in the natural hideouts dotting the mountainous region. The valley runs through both South and North Waziristan make it much easier for the insurgents moving around both sides of the Pak-Afghan border.

While the air force jets have been constantly bombing suspected militant hideouts in the valley, the ground offensive has reportedly made significant advance securing a large part of the valley. With the advent of winter, however, it will not be easy for the troops to consolidate their position. One serious concern is the high troop casualties. It will certainly be a very critical, if not the most critical, phase of the operation.

Though the battle is far from over, the operation has blown away the myth about the invincibility of the territory which has not quite been the ‘graveyard of the forces’ as was feared by certain quarters. Surely, this battle in the tribal areas is the most critical in which our security forces have ever found themselves engaged. The Zarb-i-Azab has brought down the level of militant violence in the country, indicating a direct link between the various terrorist groups to the agency.

There is an urgent need for serious thinking on a host of issues as the nation lauds the gains made by Zarb-i-Azab. More war is hardly the answer.

Though sectarian and religious violence has continued unabated, the capacity of the militant groups to launch major terrorist attacks has certainly been curtailed. One major reason is said to be the intelligence-based crackdown by the security and intelligence agencies in the mainland.

The North Waziristan operation is, however, only one dimension of the protracted battle against militancy and extremism in the country. Zarb-i-Azb may have received wider public support than expected, but there is still no coherent strategy to deal with the problems of terrorism and militancy in the long run.

The danger is that the gains that have been made by the military in North Waziristan and in other tribal agencies could be wasted. We need to learn lessons from past operations. Militants returned to almost all the areas after official claims of the areas having been cleared out. It happened many a time.

Regrettably, the efforts by the federal and provincial governments are not fully commensurate with the military action, raising questions about their will as well as the capacity to fight violent extremism comprehensively. Their actions against militant and extremist outfits have so far remained patchy and lacking in conviction.

A major flaw in our approach is that we have placed the entire focus on military action. There has hardly been any thinking on improving the lot of the tribal people. At the moment there is hardly any proper system of administration even in areas that have been cleared of insurgents.

Unfortunately, the IDPs have been completely forgotten by the government. That has fuelled discontent and widened their alienation. It has been more than five years since the operation in South Waziristan, but a large number of the displaced population has still not been able to return home.

A major challenge for the civil and military leadership will be the rehabilitation of approximately 1.2 million IDPs. The government, like most of its policies, lacked long-term vision in tackling with the situation of IDPs. The displaced tribesmen face many difficulties, including health and hygiene, education, access to livelihood, food security, shelter, gender-based violence, crime, child protection, lack of infrastructure facilities, repatriation and reintegration, and security.

True, the process of rehabilitation could be incremental, but there is a need to begin from somewhere. The fighting has devastated the region, making it hard for people to start a new life. The intense bombing has reduced the agency headquarters Miramshah and Mir Ali into rubble and it will take years to rebuild them and restore economic life there.

Over the longer term, military action alone does not offer a solution to the complex problems of the tribal areas. It is not enough to drive out the Taliban; it is also important to bring the areas into the mainstream and give them economic and political rights just as any other region of the country.

Pakistan needs to take urgent measures to end alienation and backwardness of the tribal population and the ongoing military operation provides an opportunity to push for the long-delayed integration of the region into Pakistan and end its semi-autonomous status. An alienated population gives space to insurgents.

The oppressive, outdated administrative system must be scrapped, and the people of the region must be accorded full protection of the nation’s legal system. Massive investments in human and physical infrastructure are needed. A modern road network, for example, would help end the tribal areas’ economic isolation and link them with the rest of Pakistan, and Afghanistan too. In other words, in this crucial, strife-torn region, more war is not the answer.

There is an urgent need for serious thinking on these issues right now as we laud the gains made by the security forces in the North Waziristan operation. Surely these are critical steps needed to win the battle against extremism. One wonders why it has taken so long for the federal and provincial governments to realise the urgency of moving beyond the military operations. Then there is also the question of commitment to take tough measures.

In the aftermath of Army Public School massacre in Peshawar, the civil and military leadership agreed to extend the Zarb-i-Azab operation to the mainland. A 20-point National Action Plan (NAP) to counter terrorism and extremism was subsequently announced. Although NAP can hardly be described as a comprehensive counter-terrorism strategy, but even then only a few of its 20 points are being implemented and that too partially.

The major responsibility for the lacklustre approach lies with the federal government, though the provincial governments cannot be completely absolved of the blame. There is still no mechanism in place to implement the measures agreed upon in the NAP.

The non-implementation of NAP has endangered the gains made by the security forces in the tribal areas. Thousands of soldiers and officers have laid down their lives to defeat the TTP and restore state’s authority in the region. The blood of fallen soldiers would go to waste if the scope of the operation against militancy and extremism is not extended to other parts of the country.