"There was no established government and so the conflict was a clearly a civil war. "

I'm not sure how accurate your assessment is, or how universal this definition of Civil War vice Insurgency is.

What makes a government "established"? A vote? Foreign recognition?

Afghanistan is unique in that there always tends to be about half of society excluded from full participation in governance and opportunity at any given time; thus making this what I assess as the easiest country in the world to conduct UW in. There is alway a ready, orgainized team in the wings waiting for ANYONE to come along and help them turn the tables one more time.

The dynamics at work though, are those of insurgency rather than warfare, so I find the insurgency construct to be far more helpful than adopting a civil war construct. If the Northern alliance vs the Taliban was Civil War (and a miltary victory forced the change, so there is some merit to that assessment) it quickly morphed into an insurgency led by the Taliban vs the Karzai government that continues today.

Its complicated. That's why Karzai's reconciliation efforts are so key, in that he has to bring the excluded half in from the cold to turn the corner on stability.