Islamabad - After nurturing the Taliban for more than a decade and a half, the realization is growing in Pakistan that the Taliban are an existential threat to the country, its generally moderate Muslim values and the local version of Islamic democracy. Taliban forces stunned almost everyone, from the country's ruling elite to religious groups, from liberals to conservatives, last month when they came dangerously close to the capital Islamabad by capturing the nearby district of Buner.

The militants' push was a clear violation of a February peace deal they signed with the government in the neighbouring Swat valley.

After the initial shock, government troops moved in to reclaim vast swathes of mountain districts in Swat, Lower Dir and Buner, where ongoing fierce fighting so far has left more than 350 militants dead.

In a late-night televised address Thursday, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, scrapped the Swat peace deal and formally ordered the military to "eliminate" the extremists and terrorists in the north-western region.

Military chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani promised a "decisive ascendancy over the militants."

"Everyone in the ruling elite is now realizing that they have created a sort of Frankenstein's monster as portrayed in Mary Shelley's novel," said prominent political and military analyst Hassan Askari Rizvi.

"But no one knows how to get rid of it since the monster has become uncontrollably powerful because of our own mistakes," he added.

The country openly assisted the Taliban's emergence in the mid-1990s in its efforts to ensure a pro-Pakistan government in Afghanistan after the fall of the Soviet Union in the late 1980s and infighting between the various mujahidin groups in the subsequent years.

Pakistan also secretly allowed them to set up sanctuaries on its soil when they launched their resistance following their ouster from Kabul by the US-led invasion in 2001.

During this period, every ruler, whether a liberal like the slain former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, a conservative like current opposition leader Nawaz Sharif or military strongman Pervez Musharraf, thought the Taliban were a strategic asset to defend Pakistan's western border in case of any future war with its traditional rival India to the east.

They turned a blind eye to the Taliban's ideology based on a narrow interpretation of Islam and their brutalities towards locals, believing all this would remain confined to Afghanistan, or merely expand to Pakistan's remote tribal areas.

Religious political parties were even more vocal in their support, seeing the Taliban as their natural allies.

Under this self-defeating policy, the Taliban were allowed to increase their fighters numbers, training centres and weaponry. The military moved against them, but only half-heartedly when Western pressure increased on Islamabad.

According to a classified official document from late 2008, seen by the German Press Agency dpa, there are 17 main militant groups operating in Pakistan's tribal region and the neighbouring North-West Frontier Province (NWFP).

They have between 61,375 and 94,000 well-trained and well-equipped guerrilla fighters, including dozens of squads of suicide bombers. Hundreds of rebels from other jihadist groups are based in Punjab, Pakistan's most populous province.

However, policymakers failed to perceive the scale of this threat when the Taliban turned on Pakistan in late 2007, shaking the country with several dozen suicide bombings, attacks on security forces and assassinations of political leaders. The government continued its policy.

But all political and military forces were alarmed when the Taliban revealed their real intentions following the Swat peace deal.

Sufi Mohammad, the main truce broker and pro-Taliban cleric, termed Pakistan's constitution, democracy and judiciary un-Islamic and "a system of infidels." He also called those following it apostates and vowed to change the entire system.

Mainstream politico-religious parties that are interested in transforming Pakistan into an Islamic state, but through democratic process, reacted angrily to the statement.

The conservative Pakistan Muslim League, headed by former premier Sharif, which previously explained militancy and extremism as a reaction to the US-led invasion of Afghanistan, did neither openly support or oppose the military action in Swat and neighbouring areas.

Nevertheless, the country-wide political consensus might not remain strong enough if civilian casualties and displacement of residents from the conflict areas turns large-scale, which now seems to be the case.

According to recent reports, dozens of civilians have died in the anti-Taliban operation, 500,000 are feared to be displaced, and many more are stuck in the crossfire.

"Since we don't see any well-planned strategy on the government level to provide relief to the affected, the crisis might have repercussions for the military action," said Riffat Hussain, a professor for defence and strategic studies at the capital's prestigious Quaid-i-Azam University.

"The displaced don't care if Taliban started the conflict, but they know it was the military operation that displaced them," he said.(dpa)