Reconciliation and COIN in Afghanistan

[Dayuhan]

I believe that GIRoA has pretty firmly established that they have no intent to expand governance beyond the control of the former Northern Alliance, or to share in any way with those who we helped them to displace.

Surely nobody expected that sharing was ever going to be part of this picture.

Perhaps if we left they would get serious about talks to avoid open civil war; but that is impossible to predict.

Since neither side would see "talks" as anything but a device to advance their own plans for victory and control, it hardly matters. As Omar has pointed out (correctly IMO) the Taliban aren't after reconciliation, they're after victory. There's little reason to think an American departure would change that.

The key thing for the West to stay focused on is that we went there to punish AQ, and that the key to evicting AQ from AF/PAK lies with the Taliban, not with GIRoA or Pakistan.

The Taliban could probably evict AQ, but they aren't going to do it because we want them to. They may be a key, but it's not a key that has any incentive to cooperate with us.