On a recent trip to Lahore, organised by a Pakistani think tank for a group of journalists and South Asia pundits, the security was provided by an elite police group who dressed in black T shirts with the slogan 'No Fear' on the back. These same policemen were the victims of today's attacks in Pakistan's city of culture.
This was the opposite of a soft target. Like the stunning attack on army headquarters in Rawalpindi earlier this week, the target has been chosen precisely because it was difficult. The message is clear: there is nothing invulnerable to us, nothing we cannot reach.
The assumption is that these attacks are the work of Hakimullah Mehsud, the political heir to Baitullah Mehsud, who was killed in a US drone strike in August. He is not thought to be a close relation to Baitullah, but a clansman and protege. He acted as spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban leader from 2007.
Senior US officers were claiming at the time of Baitullah's death, that Hakimullah had also been killed in a shoot-out over the succession, but Hakimullah, or at least a man who looked very like Hakimullah appeared on a video after another attack, last week on the World Food Programme Headquarters in Islamabad. He appeared surrounded by other Taliban commanders, including the man who was alleged to have shot him.
The message was that the Taliban remained unbowed and united. The complexity of this week's attacks, involving synchronised assaults and disguises, is a demonstration that the group's command-and-control systems are working well, and they have plenty of volunteers, including suicide bombers, across the country. Coming ahead of a threatened army offensive against Taliban bases in Waziristan, the attacks are aimed at demoralising the security forces, hitting them hardest where they thought they were safest.
