The recent failed terror attack in New York City's Times Square has returned a focus to Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, a terrorist organization representing a collection of Taliban groups who oppose the Pakistani army and NATO forces, and whose leader Hakeemullah Mehsud, Pakistan's most feared militant, has re-emerged from months of silence after he was believed to be killed in a US drone missile attack on 14 January this year.
As US Attorney General Eric Holder charged in an American television appearance, the TTP is behind the New York bomb plot. "We have now developed evidence that shows that the TTP was behind the attack," he said, a charge the organization has not yet denied. "We know that they helped facilitate it." The charge comes a day before US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned Pakistan of "severe consequences" if a successful extremist attack in America were tracked back to Pakistan. Pakistan was adjusting to the troubling news from New York when another setback also knocked at Islamabad's door with the appearance of the latest video from Hakeemullah Mehsud who vowed "revenge attacks" on the United States presumably in reaction to the increasing drone attacks over Waziristan region where Washington believes al-Qaeda and the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban established strong centres to plot attacks on America.
If Eric Holder's statement regarding TTP involvement is to be believed, then it gives credence to earlier rumours that the TTP emerged stronger than before even after the death of its leader Baitullah Mehsud, also reportedly killed in a US drone attack in August last year in South Waziristan. But the statement from the US attorney general also raises questions as to why Pakistani and American intelligence failed to pick up such plots from the TTP before their execution, if the American establishment no longer sees the Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad acting independently as it had intimated earlier. Had Faisal Shahzad physically went to Waziristan last year for bomb-making training? Had the TTP channeled money to organize the attack in New York? Does this follow that TTP has taken over from al-Qaeda the Taliban's overseas operations? If this is the case, what brought about this change and what does this change signify?
These questions may not be answered so soon. However, Hakeemullah released a video on 3 May to disprove of earlier media reports that he was killed in the missile attack. The media "killed" Hakeemullah three times. First, it was after the missile attack. Then weeks later the media said he "succumbed to wounds" in Orakzai and the last and third time he was pronounced dead while on his way to Multan city in Punjab province.It appeared the federal government was also encouraging the reports of his death to spread despondency among his fighting force at a time when the military was pushing deeper into the territory held by the TTP in South Waziristan after dislodging militants from their strongholds in Swat Valley last year.