RAZMAK, Pakistan  On an operating table at a makeshift trauma center at this military base in North Waziristan, a Pakistani soldier lay anesthetized, blood-soaked bandages applied in the field just an hour earlier a testament to a near-fatal wound.

The bullet through his neck from a Taliban militant had narrowly missed an artery, and after some minor surgery, the army medics declared the patient, Sepoy Aziz, out of danger.

In an offensive nearly two years old, the Pakistani Army has been fighting Taliban militants in the nation’s tribal areas and beyond, and like the United States across the border in Afghanistan, it is finding counterinsurgency warfare tougher, and more costly, than anticipated.

Months after declaring victory on several important fronts, including in South Waziristan and the Swat Valley, the army has been forced to reopen campaigns after militants seeped back in. True victory remains elusive. Soldiers like Sepoy Aziz  a sepoy is the rough equivalent of a private  are killed and wounded almost daily.