I try not to talk about Afghanistan much anymore because I'm burned out, cynical and unobjective at this point. However, the two alternatives provided here sound to me like being given a choice to contract either syphilis or gonorrhea - in other words neither is good even if one might be marginally "better" than the other.

We should explore anything that is even remotely likely to result in a stable Afghanistan and/or provide the US with an opportunity to honorably disengage from Afghanistan, but let's not kid ourselves that our chances for success are very good with either of these two options.