Plots and Armies

Today we publish Plots and Armies: How Territory Decides What Terrorism Becomes, the fourth paper in our series of Strategic Assessment Papers, after Counting the May 2025 Conflict, The Cost of Watching Everyone and The Kabul Assurances.

The paper starts from two facts recorded in the same year. In 2025 deaths from terrorism worldwide fell to 5,582, the lowest since 2007 and about half the 2015 peak, according to the Global Terrorism Index 2026. The same Index ranked Pakistan the country most affected by terrorism in the world for the first time. We set out to explain both, and found one variable running through them: territory.

Three Tests

The first test was the Islamic State's caliphate. From 2014 the group held cities, oilfields and a border in Syria and Iraq, and the man who coordinated the Paris attacks of November 2015 had fought for it there. Europol recorded 150 deaths from jihadist attacks in the European Union that year. The caliphate fell at Baghuz in March 2019. By 2025 jihadist attacks in the Union were killing five people a year, even though Europol still counted 24 attacks and foiled plots, more than in 2015, according to its TE-SAT reports.

The second test was North Waziristan. Pakistan's army cleared the TTP's base in Operation Zarb-e-Azb from June 2014, and attacks in Pakistan fell every year for five years, from 625 in 2015 to 146 in 2020.

The third test ran the other way. In August 2021 the Taliban took Kabul, and the TTP regained a sanctuary across the border. The United Nations Monitoring Team now reports some 6,000 TTP fighters operating from Afghanistan with "substantial logistical and operational support from the de facto authorities". Attacks in Pakistan rose every year after 2021, reaching 699 in 2025, when they killed 1,034 people, according to the Pakistan Institute for Peace Studies.

Two Kinds of Threat

Territory also explains why the threats facing Europe and Pakistan now look so different. In 2025, 108 of the 347 people arrested for jihadist terrorism in the European Union were 18 or younger. Plots involving minors were thwarted 96.8 percent of the time. Britain's Security Service disrupted 43 late-stage plots between 2017 and 2024. Europe's attackers are teenagers radicalised online, with no trainer, safe house or supply line. Pakistan faces an armed force of 6,000 with a government behind it.

The paper draws on our recent Playbook Live interview with Maajid Nawaz, the former Hizb ut-Tahrir recruiter who co-founded Quilliam. He described the change from the inside: "In the internet age it is no longer the case. You don't really need a hierarchical organisation to function anymore."

Why It Matters Beyond Pakistan

The ground held on the Afghan frontier reaches far. The US intelligence community rates the Islamic State's Khorasan Province as the group's branch most capable of external attacks. In 2025 Pakistan arrested the ISKP commander wanted for the Abbey Gate bombing in Kabul, and President Trump thanked Pakistan before Congress. The Pentagon has confirmed that US-supplied rifles were among weapons seized from militants in Pakistan.

The recommendations follow from the argument. Disruption works on individuals, and Europe's record since 2019 shows it. A movement that trains on protected ground requires measures aimed at that ground: sanctuary made a condition of engagement with the Taliban, UN sanctions extended to TTP commanders, and a joint US-Pakistan programme to trace the weapons.

How We Built It

The paper rests on 96 numbered sources, ranked by tier. Intergovernmental records come first: four reports of the United Nations Monitoring Team cited from the original Security Council documents, eleven years of Europol data, MI5 threat assessments and the US Director of National Intelligence's annual assessment. Pakistani research institutes supply the national series, military figures are attributed to the military, and Baloch separatist violence is counted separately from the Islamist campaign. A closing section sets out what the evidence cannot yet settle.

Bottom Line

Over the decade, the scale of Islamist killing tracked the ground militant groups held. Europe's threat fell with the caliphate. Pakistan's rose with the TTP's sanctuary in Afghanistan, behind a border closed since October 2025.

The full paper is available at The Pakistan Playbook Strategic Assessment Papers, free to read, quote and cite with attribution. ■