CYCLE OF RETALIATION

The rapid escalation between Pakistan and Afghanistan has pushed an already volatile frontier into one of its most dangerous phases in decades.

- 

What began as cross-border attacks and retaliatory strikes has quickly hardened into the language of “open war?’ a phrase that signals not merely military confrontation but a collapse of trust between two neighbours bound by geography, history, and deeply intertwined societies.‘The Durand Line, a 2,611-kilometre border drawn during colonial rule and never formally recognised by Kabul, has long functioned less as a boundary and more as a zone of contested sovereignty. Today’s violence reveals how unresolved historical grievances, militant sanctuaries, and competing security doctrines can converge into a conflict that neither side can afford, yet both appear unable to avoid. At the heart of Pakistan's security calculus lies the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), which Islamabad accuses of operating from Afghan soil with the tacit tolerance of the Taliban regime.

‘The resurgence of attacks in Pakistan’s border provinces has intensified domestic pressure on its military establishment to act decisively. Airstrikes and cross-border operations are presented as necessary preemptive measures to neutralise threats before they metastasise. Yet such actions carry profound strategic risks. They inflame Afghan nationalism, validate the Taliban's narrative of external aggression, and risk pushing Kabul closer to hardline postures. The logic of preemption, while compelling in the short term, often produces long-term instability by blurring the line between defence and provocation.