Balochistan is 42% of the nation's total landmass. Let that sink in. When the TTP controlled territories in FATA, which is a sliver of the total landmass of Balochistan, it was able to unleash a wave of terror in the entire country. Even with Afghanistan totally pacified, the miscreants could operate freely with such an incompetent (technologically and tactically) archaic, dysfunctional security apparatus as ours. Even if external factors stir unrest in Balochistan, Quetta does not sit at the border as Lahore does with India. From the border to the Balochistan hinterland, the terrorists operate freely. They have weapons, human intelligence networks, do recce/surveillance of their targets, communicate with various elements in their chain of command—numerous opportunities to bust their modules at either of these steps if the proper tactics and 21st-century technologies are employed. But we can't due to structural bottlenecks marring our security institutions. Moreover, a regime losing provincial capital after provincial capital (could not keep its own territory) does have the juice to orchestrate terrorism in Pakistan? Highly unlikely. If there is any external power capable enough of doing so, that is the one General Bajwa asks to bury the past and move on. It's moving on and burying alright.