Imran Khan is in prison, and we are fighting the Afghan Taliban. These are facts. A third reality may also be taking shape in the wake of Pakistan’s decision to defend Saudi Arabia against Iran, a choice that could finally free us from the last of our imagined messiahs and manufactured monsters.

This myth-making was always state-driven and destined to unravel under the pressures of time. Khan was projected as an ideal leader, but is now an unwanted man. The Taliban, once celebrated as Islam’s true warriors, are today condemned as sponsors of terrorism. The Ayatollah’s messianic aura may also be approaching its moment of reckoning, as his regime’s confrontational course risks dragging our Gulf allies and possibly us into a war not of our choosing.

Each of these myths has its own historical context, without which the narratives that sustained them cannot be understood. Let us begin with the Taliban.

I reported on their rise from Kandahar in the mid-1990s. I briefly encountered Mullah Umar and met some of his commanders and foot soldiers. From what I could see then, this was a ruthless militia with a dangerous agenda for Afghanistan and beyond. That is precisely what I reported at the time: peace would remain a distant dream in that war-torn country.

Back home, however, the Taliban were projected as a liberating force that would disarm rival factions and restore order. They were supported with men and material. After they captured Kabul and much of Afghanistan, we continued to defend their repressive regime. During the War on Terror, we played the familiar “good Taliban–bad Taliban” game with the Americans. And when the Taliban returned to power, some even hailed them for having “broken the shackles of slavery”.

Fast forward to today: Pakistan now finds itself fighting the Taliban, who in turn support terrorism against us. Our earlier justifications—the Pashtun-majority argument and the doctrine of so-called strategic depth against India—have both backfired. Our own Pashtun population now feels politically marginalised, while Afghan safe havens provide strategic depth to TTP terrorism. And, to add insult to injury, the Taliban are now flirting with India.

The chickens were bound to come home to roost. Public perceptions of the Taliban began shifting long ago as their violence spilt into civilian life, but the change in our official stance is relatively recent. One can only hope that the current rhetoric around this conflict endures.

Saudi Arabia enjoys considerable goodwill in Pakistan because of its critical economic support and its religious standing in the Muslim world

Saudi Arabia enjoys considerable goodwill in Pakistan because of its critical economic support and its religious standing in the Muslim world

The Khan project also coincided with the Taliban’s rise. Here was a former cricket icon, married into the English elite, a newly minted Islamist with a niche in philanthropy—idealised by the youth and admired by women—stepping into politics to end corruption. For our state elites and their middle-class collaborators, both deeply suspicious of democracy, this was a perfect leadership résumé.

But the project had to wait a decade, as Musharraf’s rule rested on a compromise with the turncoats of dynastic politics. It was launched once power returned to mainstream parties. We all know how that democratic revival was then undermined—through manufactured crises for elected governments and the careful grooming of the “saviour of the nation” to lead “Naya Pakistan” to glory. Yet once in power, Khan’s leadership quickly defied his sponsors’ expectations: governance consumed by vendetta, no grasp of the economy, and a foreign policy that managed to annoy even close allies.

So stark was the gap between Khan’s projected image and his actual performance that a hurried exit had to be negotiated with the very despised dynasties. Yet four years into this hybrid era, his incarcerated ghost continues to cast a long shadow over national politics. Khan’s cult following has survived every counter-narrative bid by the very institution that once sold us a different story.

Our “socially progressive but politically conservative” middle classes (to use Prof Waseem’s phrase) were part of this social engineering. They now face a reality check. Creators rarely forgive the creations that turn on them. The Taliban, too, are learning this harsh lesson. It remains unclear how the current political conflict will end, but one lesson should already be clear to the wielders of the state: experiments with political messiahs carry unbearable costs.

Let me finally turn to the Ayatollah of Iran, the last messiah in our popular imagination. The 1979 Islamic Revolution elevated Imam Khomeini as a near-divine figure of Islamic revival—an image that resonated strongly in Pakistan and reinforced General Zia’s Islamisation project. Yet from the very beginning, the Ayatollahs placed Iran on a path of perpetual conflict with the United States and Israel. Over time, the clerical regime also fuelled sectarian tensions and sponsored militant proxies across the Middle East.

The present war is, in many ways, a consequence of these choices—conflicts in which Pakistan and our Gulf partners have played no role. We must condemn the American-Israeli aggression against Iran and stand with the Iranian people in their hour of suffering. But solidarity with the Iranian people does not require endorsing a regime that has helped sustain the very conflicts whose costs are ultimately borne by its own citizens.

This distinction matters because Pakistan may soon face a difficult choice if the Iranian regime continues to bombard our Gulf allies—Saudi Arabia in particular—with drones and missiles. The Strategic Mutual Defence Agreement obligates Pakistan to defend the Kingdom in the event of war, and we have already decided to honour this commitment.

For now, the Gulf states have resisted the temptation to retaliate, preferring an urgent diplomatic resolution of the crisis. Let us hope the conflict does not escalate, dragging Pakistan’s military into the defence of Saudi Arabia. If it does, the domestic fallout could be serious, especially among sectarian groups sympathetic to the Ayatollah and his doctrine of Vilayat-e-Faqih.

Saudi Arabia enjoys considerable goodwill in Pakistan because of its critical economic support and its religious standing in the Muslim world. Public opinion may therefore be inclined to understand the logic of Pakistan standing with the Kingdom.

But such a stance must also be accompanied by a clear state narrative—one that distinguishes between solidarity with the people of Iran and endorsement of a regime whose confrontational course has destabilised the region. Only then can the messianic myth built around the Ayatollah finally begin to fade.

In the end, the monsters we create and later confront, and the messiahs we imagine and then disown, leave society confused: what to believe, whom to trust. Imran cannot be a hero one day and a villain the next. The Taliban cannot be friends today and enemies tomorrow. Perhaps this cycle of myth-making and its unravelling reflects a deeper identity crisis—rooted in the structural and ideological dynamics of our state and politics. But that is a different story.

© The Friday Times