In the wake of the four well-orchestrated commando-style attacks launched by different terrorist groups against security establishments on October 15,2009 -- three in Lahore and one in the North-West Frontier Province -- followed by a fifth attack in a residential area in Peshawar -- Rehman Mallick, Pakistan's interior minister, is reported to have aptly described the increasingly uncontrollable situation faced by Pakistan in the Pashtun tribal belt and in Punjab as a guerrilla warfare launched against the state of Pakistan.
149 fatalities--security forces personnel and civilians as well as terrorists-- have been reported in a relentless series of fidayeen attacks launched by different groups since October 5, 2009. Among the targets of the terrorists were the highly-guarded but easily penetrated General Headquarters (GHQ) of the Pakistan Army in Rawalpindi, a Lahore office of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), which is responsible for the investigation of terrorism-related cases, two training institutions in Lahore and a police station in the NWFP. Rehman Mallick used to be a senior officer of the FIA when Benazir Bhutto was the Prime Minister from 1993 to 96.
The attacks are more and more fidayeen (suicidal) than suicide and have involved a mix of modus operandi--use of hand-held weapons and explosives. Suicide attacks involving explosives-laden vehicles continue to take places against convoys of security forces, but commando-style attacks against well-fortified and supposedly well-guarded fixed establishments of the Army and the police are taking place with increasing frequency--to demonstrate the ability of the terrorists to attack with ferocity despite supposedly enhanced physical security.