Ahmad Hassan Al Arbi
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PUBLISHED
January 25, 2026
The year 2025 has been intense. A year like this came back to us after a relatively manageable quiet of a few years across Pakistan’s western border regions. To make matters murky, news reporting of terrorist incidents, frequent spectacle of their dead bodies and many funerals of our own martyrs were all mixed up explosively with an unfortunately parochial and dim-witted political discourse.
Mostly unhinged, invariably politically motivated and largely subjective year-end reviews have created a sense of alarm over the trajectory of our nation’s counterterrorism effort. References to and comparisons with our hardest years in Counter Terrorism fight (i.e., 2011-15) are being irresponsibly bandied about. What’s needed is an objective, evidence-based, scientific framework to measure progress on this critical front.
Terrorism aims to kill for visual impact, manifested mainly in the cognitive domain. It seeks to prey on a nation’s psychology. Its visible wounds are aimed to create deep emotional scars. Horrific images of ripped up buildings and charred bodies shake a society’s confidence. The state, therefore, needs to anchor its assessments in dispassionate analysis. And the nation needs to be protected from scaremongering and deserves to know the ‘real’ state of things. Equally importantly, policymakers and operational planners involved in the work of counter terrorism need to use an analysis tool which is both original in its understanding of our peculiar counter terrorism conditions as well as comprehensive enough to straddle full breadth of the enterprise, from strategic down to tactical.
It is imperative that we use the ‘seven markers’ to not only assess how Pakistan fared in its struggle against terrorism during 2025 but to also identify the core areas that must be focused upon in the fight of the future. Importantly, the assessment under each marker is, and must always remain, independently verifiable:
Marker One: Has the State held its ground? The answer is a resounding yes, in both ideational as well as operational realms. Conceptually, after a few years of misplaced euphoria and misguided engagement with terrorists, the State recovered its gravitas. Once again, the menace was called what it really is; a foreign sponsored scourge. This ideational correction started to get reflected in a refreshed state narrative and confusion over the nature of the menace started to dissipate. In the operational domain, despite an unprecedented influx of Afghani mercenaries, the threat was kept bottled up inside the border districts in KP and away from main urban centers in Balochistan. Despite massive inputs from our enemies, state forces managed to firewall mainland Pakistan from a sustained campaign of terror.
Marker Two: Has the society held its ground? Desperate efforts by terrorists notwithstanding, terrorist and separatist ‘ideology’ remained a distasteful joke. Voluntary recruitment for terrorist cause diminished. Resultantly, KP-related terrorist entities were forced to rely on hired Afghani cohorts to wage their ‘war.’ Even in the legendary Mehsud belt, which happens to be home to the head of TTP (Coined as Fitna Al Khawarij) serpent, as many as eight hired Afghanis formed part of every group of ten terrorists. These facts are openly verifiable. Across the border districts or hinterland of both KP and Balochistan, not one instance was reported of a small family or a clan, let alone a tribe, openly aligning itself with terrorists. Several places – for example the brave Lakki Marwat, Bannu and Wana – recorded inspiring examples of entire tribes taking up arms against the terrorists. Disappointed with the premature death of their ‘moral stand,’ terrorists have resorted to unashamed kidnap for ransom, extortion, and barefaced criminality against public goods and infrastructure. Very importantly, despite sporadic setbacks, non-military Law Enforcement Agencies and civil administration sturdily held the line and fought back shoulder to shoulder with Pakistan Army and the Frontier Corps.
Marker Three: Did terror find a permanent or near permanent geographic sanctuary or stronghold? Terrorists’ presence in border districts remained sprinkled mostly across the wilderness and inaccessible, inhospitable places deep inside forested zones, away from main population centers. Sparse populations of small mountain hamlets mostly suffered the administrative burden of sustaining their so-called tashkeels. Despite influx of an unprecedented number of Afghani mercenaries, terrorists have found no permanent place to hide. Across both provinces, there are no ‘no-go’ areas. Misguided comparisons with past notwithstanding, throughout this period of one and half year of intense counterterrorism, there is no North Waziristan of 2010s or South Waziristan of 2000s.
Marker Four: Did any significant population center(s) slid into terrorist control? Throughout this year, terrorists have not been able to establish sustained control over a single significant population cluster. As and where terrorists’ cartels made such attempt, they were hit hard and eventually smoked out. In KP, Bajaur and Malakand in the north and Azam Warsak and Tank in the south are sterling examples of state forces’ surgical actions to swiftly decimate terrorist attempts to create lasting foothold amongst our communities. Balochistan also recorded many instances of terrorists running for their lives not long after they penetrated a town with an intention to dig in and hold out.
Marker Five: Was any main highway or communication artery(s) severed? Across the length and breadth of Pakistan’s border regions as well as inner KPK and Balochistan, all major public roads remained open for travel. Scattered instances of highway banditry notwithstanding, terrorists have not had the capacity or courage to block any main communication artery and keep it in that state. Criminal activity such as looting of unsuspecting, unarmed travelers or targeting of isolated state officials is not unprecedented in these outlying regions and has only exposed the true nature of the twin-evils of terrorists operating in KP and Balochistan.
Marker Six: Scale and severity of punishment dispensed by the State? Terrorist losses during 2025 were unprecedented, transparent, and traumatic in both numbers as well as frequency. Never before in the history of our national fight against this evil so many dead bodies of terrorists lay in the wilderness. In just one instance in Shawal, more than seventy of them perished in one night. Another fifty beelined to their death on international border in Bajaur. Dozens were eliminated in the wilds just south of Gomal River in Balochistan. An overwhelming majority of terrorist attempts to physically raid a military camp or position, including many suicide attacks, were successfully and transparently thwarted. All five Afghani terrorists involved in attack on Cadet College Wana, all nine coming for Jandola Fort in Tank and all six attacking FC Headquarters in Quetta perished well short of their objectives. Never before have the forces physically disposed of or the nation seen so many dead bodies of terrorists. In 75,175 Intelligence Based Operations (IBOs) in 2025 – 14,658 in KP, 58,778 in Balochistan and 1,739 in other areas – more than 2,597 terrorists were sent to hell, including 1,803 in KP, 784 in Balochistan and 10 in rest of the areas of the country.
Marker Seven: How did the terrorists kill? Contrary to countless bold and daring offensive operations conducted by state forces, more than 90% of all terrorist attacks took place in the form of cowardly swipes from a safe distance in the form of IEDs on roads planted in the dark of the night, using rudimentary Quadcopters to drop explosives on top of forces’ positions, sniping from a safe distance and occasional ambushes through hired guns. Throughout the year, terrorists rarely picked up the courage or capacity to close in with forces and engage in physical combat. There were 5,397 such cowardly attack carried out by the terrorist in 2025, 3,811 in KP, 1,557 in Balochistan and 29 in rest of Pakistan. These figures include 16 suicide bombings in KP, 10 in Balochistan and 1 in other areas of the country – a marked decrease from previous years.
Despite an endless supply of Afghani reinforcements of war, logistical support from the misguided elements of Kandahar, and desperate spurring by Pakistan’s other enemies, 2025 remained a year of desperation and disappointment for terrorists and their masters. As the nation’s forces prepare, Lord willing, to eliminate this threat in 2026, the year just gone by qualifies as one during which Pakistan held its line against its enemies. Together with our victory in national anti-terror drive, we have more reasons than before to be confident about our operational trajectory and to be optimistic about the years ahead.
All facts and the information are the sole responsibility of the writer
Ahmad Hassan Al-Arbi is an International Relations scholar and author specializing in modern warfare and contemporary security studies. His work examines hybrid conflict, strategic competition, and the changing nature of war.
