ALL aboard. The train to nowhere is pulling out. Goodbye, Pakistan. Hello, oblivion. Goodnight and good luck. Until next time.

We’ve been here before so many times that, even before it’s over, you know already there will be a next time. Brave boy did what brave boys shouldn’t have to do. Fierce cop did what fierce cops shouldn’t be allowed to do. Both are now dead.

No problem. We’ve got another 200 million to go.

Helpless? Sure. Senseless? Yeah. Recurring? Definitely. Anything new to say? No.

The basic mistake: we’re not at war with the Taliban; we’re at war with ourselves.

So whatcha gonna do? Not much. Twiddle a few thumbs, stamp a few feet, shed a few tears. Onwards.

The show must go on. Ghoulish or not. With or without you. Obviously, without a few — you just hope you won’t end up as the unlucky few. Alive is still better than dead. Even in Pakistan.

Why can’t they get it? Why can’t they — the pols, the uniforms — get what’s at stake? Why can’t they recognise the enemy for what it is? Why, why, why?

They do know. They do get it. Hell, they get it better than any of us — that Pakistan is at war with itself. That the enemy isn’t just within; the enemy is us.

That Musharraf chappie is in the news again. He once owned Pakistan. Strutting his stuff, world at his feet, Pakistanis paying obeisance — and then it all collapsed.

We know why it all collapsed, but there’s a little corner of that explanation that few venture towards.

Go back to his ’08 team, fighting in the trenches, trying to cling on to their seats, and ask them why they lost.

Sample answer: the local mullah said that if whoever voted for us, their nikkah would break.

Or: they claimed that it would desecrate the memory of the dead.

Or — the real kicker: it would be an insult to Islam.

Yep, Lal Masjid.

Of course, by Feb ’08, the Musharrafites knew the game was up, that it was truly over — and for a bunch of reasons. But Lal Masjid sticks out in their memory most — because the passions surrounding it were so raw.

And they were raw because the temporal is a distant second to the spiritual. Always has been; increasingly is so.

To translate: what the law is or says or demands or wants can go to hell when a higher, spiritual, religious law is invoked.

Or, to simplify: their version of Islam first; everything else can, well, go to hell.

The politicians got it then and they get it now: the battle for the people has already been lost.

Whatever the political settlement Pakistan finally achieves, it will happen somewhere along the spectrum between the centre-right and the extreme right.

The pols just kinda hope that events don’t nudge that settlement too far to the right — for beyond a point, politicians themselves become dispensable. Democracy is kuffar, remember?

Zardari got it too. When urged by the few — the very, very few — around him to push back against the tide of hate, he’d always ask the same question: how many have you got, how many can you bring out on the streets?

The conversation would usually end there.

The army gets it too. Listen carefully to the language it deploys: TTP bad because it attacks us.

Not jihad bad. Not we’re sorry for what we’ve done to this place and now we are going to help fix it. Not never, ever again will we dabble in darkness.

Just: TTP bad because it attacks us.

It makes sense. When your whole schtick is about honour and protection, keeping you and yours safe, you’ve got to call out the enemy for being the enemy.

But only a sliver of it: the guys with guns pointed at you.

The infrastructure of jihad? The mosque-madressah-social welfare network? The enabling environment? The in-house cleansing?

Shhh. The TTP is bad. Let’s go get ’em.

The reason for the army’s reticence is the same as the politicians’ squeamishness: they know which way society is orientated.

Who wants to fight a war that’s already been lost?

So we’re left with a brave boy doing what brave boys shouldn’t have to do. And a fierce cop doing things that fierce cops shouldn’t be allowed to do.

Tears have been shed. Monsters have been denounced. Apologists have been condemned.

We’ve seen it all before. And we’ll see it all again.

Because it really isn’t about the Taliban, the militants, the terrorists, whatever the hell you want to call them.

Say they’re one big group or maybe 50 splinter groups. Say they’re in 20 districts or perhaps 80. Say they’re five, ten, fifteen — fifty thousand.

Who knows, who cares?

We can’t get them. We can’t get them because society won’t let it happen.

Follow the wire back from the dynamite to the trigger. There’s your problem.

The stuff that goes boom we have the capacity to take care of. That’s the Taliban. But try digging out the trigger. The trigger that is embedded deep within this society.

Monsters will be monsters and monstrous things they will always do. But we’re not at war with the Taliban; we’re at war with ourselves.

We just haven’t admitted it yet.

The writer is a member of staff.

cyril.a@gmail.com

Twitter: @cyalm