Pakistan, June 11 -- Pakistan's latest precision strikes inside Afghanistan have pushed an already volatile frontier into a more coercive phase. Islamabad is no longer treating Afghan-based TTP sanctuaries as a matter for demarches, mediated pauses and Taliban assurances; it is signalling a line of action in which militant infrastructure across the border will be targeted when Kabul refuses to act.

The immediate trigger was the June 9 attack on a Federal Constabulary post in Musa Dara, in the Hasan Khel area near Peshawar. The attack led to an intense gun battle in which six FC personnel were killed and several others wounded, according to the Ministry of Interior. Conflict journalist Iftikhar Firdous described it as a "major attack on a...