Recently, the skies of South Asia have been anything but peaceful. A few days ago, at night, residents in Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, and several border cities were awakened by loud explosion sounds. At first, people might have thought it was internal conflict or an accident, but the plot quickly turned around: the source of this "justice from the sky" turned out to be neighboring Pakistan!

Yes, the Pakistani Air Force has gone wild this time, directly crossing the border into Afghan airspace and launching a comprehensive bombing campaign targeting locations related to the Pakistani Taliban (referred to as "TTP") within Afghanistan.

According to reports, the scope of this air strike was extensive, involving four major cities in Afghanistan, with at least seven targets being struck. It is said that these targets included TTP training camps, their strongholds, and safe houses where senior commanders were hiding. Several key commanders of TTP, such as Sher Zaman and Abu Hamza, are reportedly killed in this air strike, and even a high-ranking individual was killed in a precise strike in the center of Kabul.

This operation, this style, does it feel strangely familiar? Yes, it's similar to that "tyrant" in the Middle East, Israel — whenever senior members of Hamas appear in Qatar, Lebanon, or other places, Israeli fighter jets are likely to fly thousands of miles to "target" them. Now, Pakistan's cross-border strikes, ignoring Afghanistan's sovereignty, directly attacking near the capital, have a flavor of a "Pakistan version of Israel." Netizens jokingly refer to "Batie" as showing a "steel" firm hand this time.

So why did Pakistan suddenly become so "strong," risking serious diplomatic risks to cross the border for bombing? The core reason is one: national security. In recent years, TTP has carried out countless terrorist attacks in Pakistan, with blood on their hands, and many of their strongholds and senior leadership have moved to Afghanistan, where they are protected openly or secretly by the Afghan Taliban (referred to as "ATA").

Pakistan could no longer tolerate it, and once they obtained concrete intelligence, the JF-17 fighter jets and F-16 fighter jets immediately took off loaded with bombs to carry out the strike action across the border.

More interestingly, there seems to be the shadow of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) or the U.S. Central Command behind this operation. Pakistani media hinted that Pakistan received U.S. intelligence assistance. That's interesting, because the United States and the ATA are bitter enemies, and Pakistan cooperates with the United States to fight against TTP, while the ATA and TTP are "twins" in ideology... This relationship is chaotic, comparable to a large-scale serial drama. However, it also leaves a huge space for imagination for future anti-terrorism operations in Afghanistan — will "U.S.-Pakistan intelligence cooperation, cross-border targeted elimination" become the new norm?

Facing the intrusion of its own airspace and the bombing of targets within its territory, the response of the Afghan Taliban authorities has been quite "restrained." Besides verbally condemning Pakistan for "violating territorial integrity," and putting its air defense system (which is basically a showpiece, unable to deal with the JF-17 and F-16) on alert, there has been no substantial military retaliation. Why is it so "cowardly"? Actually, the ATA is also suffering: if it openly admits that the targets bombed were important TTP targets, it would mean admitting that it has been protecting the TTP all along, giving the international community a knife. This loss seems to be unavoidable for now.

Therefore, this incident may just be the beginning. If the Afghan Taliban continues to be unable or unwilling to effectively restrain the TTP forces within its territory, then such cross-border bombings by Pakistan, "if you don't clean up, I'll help you clean up," may become routine in the future. This means that the already poor relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan will further plunge into the abyss.

In summary, Pakistan's transformation into a "small Israel in South Asia," using JF-17 fighter jets to cross the border for bombing, is not only a significant upgrade in its counter-terrorism strategy, but also a concentrated outbreak of complex regional conflicts. On one hand, it shows a firm determination to safeguard its own security; on the other hand, it faces challenges to the sovereignty of neighboring countries and the already fragile regional balance. This drama has just begun. Whether it will be more "JF-17 launches" or whether all parties sit down for negotiations, we will wait and see. But the local civilians will suffer again, caught in the struggle between great powers and regional conflicts.

Original article: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7559816095050318336/

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