Imran Khan’s actions and army’s reputation, why did Pakistan respond to Iran attack so promptly?

Relations between Shia-majority Iran and Sunni-majority Pakistan have always been complex. Iran was the first country to recognize Pakistan in 1947. Pakistan President Iskander Mirza was given a state funeral by General Yahya Khan. During the Indo-Pak war of 1965, Iran provided safe bases to the Pakistan Air Force. During the Baloch insurgency of 1973–77, Shah’s government provided 30 helicopters and pilots to Pakistan to attack the Baloch. Despite this, relations between their ethnic Baloch population and the insurgency are complex. While there has been intermittent cooperation, both have also accused each other of harboring rebels. Away from the media glare, Iran-Pakistan border skirmishes have been troubled but these have been kept below the threshold of open hostilities.

Over the years, mechanisms and channels of communication have been established to deal with these situations. This is why the Iranian missile and drone attack on January 16 came as a surprise. The attacks targeted Sabz Koh village in Balochistan’s Panjgur district, about 60 kilometers inside Pakistan, killing two children and injuring three other civilians. According to Iran, they targeted the Pakistan-based Iranian Sunni militant group Jaish al-Adl (Army of Justice, formed in 2012), which has carried out several attacks in Iran. Jaish al-Adl or Jaish al-Dhulm, as it is called in Iran, is the successor to the Iranian Baloch extremist group, Jundallah (Soldiers of God). Since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Shia Iran’s harsh treatment of the Baloch has led to a rise in Sunni fundamentalism in Iran’s Sistan-Baluchistan province.

Interestingly, the Iranian attacks in Pakistan came a day after the series of attacks in Syria and Iraq. Iran blamed Israel’s Mossad for terrorist attacks in the Iranian city of Kerman on January 3, when two bombings killed 84 Iranians who gathered to mark the fourth anniversary of the killing of Revolutionary Guard General Qassem Soleimani. Pakistan viewed the Iranian attack as a serious violation of its sovereignty. Its initial response was diplomatic – withdrawing the ambassador and canceling all bilateral visits. This was followed on 18 January by attacks in Sarwan, Sistan-Baluchestan, in which nine people, including women and children, were killed. According to the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the mouthpiece of the Pakistan Army, targets used by the Balochistan Liberation Army and the Baloch Liberation Front were successfully attacked in the operation code-named Marg Bar Sarmachar. However, interestingly, trade between the two continued as usual and all border crossing points remained open despite mutual attacks.

It was risky for Iran to escalate Pakistani attacks or not respond. The former would divert attention from other conflicts in the Middle East in which it was involved. The latter risked inviting attacks from regional adversaries, to whom the message would be that Iran cannot sustain a direct conflict. Since both options were bad, the controversial question arises whether Iran intended the consequences of its actions against Pakistan to be a war and, if it did, perhaps it had other motives. There are many opinions on this. Given the multiple crises in Pakistan, economic, political, security, Iran has probably assessed that it will not be in a position to retaliate. Even if that were the case, it would avoid confronting Iran militarily. Additionally, Iran needs to signal domestically that it still has the capability and will to target Jaish al-Adl terrorists in Pakistan, despite facing multiple attacks in Sistan-Baluchestan.