Winning the War in Afghanistan

[Dayuhan]

The only true path to stability is for a new government to form that merges and balances the equities of the entire populace. GIRoA has no interest in such compromise, and has no necessity to act so long as we subsidize and protect their failure to do so.

Worth noting that the Taliban also have no interest in compromise. Even if we stop subsidizing and protecting the GIRoA, compromise is unlikely at best: neither side is interested and there's nothing even close to a level of trust that would support compromise.

At this point the interests of the various components of the populace are probably too divergent to merge. It's not a question of finding some magic formula of balance: the parties involved have to reach a point where they see some basis for compromise. That process will involve violence, probably a lot of it. It's true that a path to stability would involve either dissolution into more sustainable parts or the emergence of some more inclusive mechanism, but either would have to emerge through a fair bit of evolution. No way to impose a deus ex machina solution.

We have two choices.

1. Stay and force such compromise and drive a reconciliation process and the formation of a new constitution that creates the mechanisms of trust required for such a reconciliation to work. (This shifts the impossible task from the military back to the civil aspects of our intervention where it has always belonged);

That's a very hypothetical choice, since we have no way to force compromise or reconciliation, and even if we did any compromise or reconciliation that we forced would be artificial and unsustainable. The "impossible task" would remain impossible, and "the civil aspects of our intervention", which are in no position to "force" anything, are no better equipped to do the impossible than the military ones.

or

2. We simply recognize that we really have few interests in the region, and even fewer risks of any real threat from the region, and pack up and leave an let a self-determined naturally selected process take its course. (Yes, of course Iran and Pakistan would employ agents to shape events, why would they do otherwise?)

True enough, though we do have to recognize that the Taliban and their Pakistani backers have to a large extent adopted a global Islamist narrative: they aren't just good nationalists that are being worked. It is very likely that they will end up supporting and protecting people who want to kill Americans. That's not necessarily a reason to stay, just means there's a good chance we'll have to do it all again, hopefully smarter.

Either solution would have to be tempered to the will and culture of the collective populace

Wouldn't that automatically exclude any attempt to force compromise and reconciliation?

What's a "collective populace"?

This must be a government designed for this complex populace, not one designed for ours.

Again, the use of "this complex populace" imposes the construct of a singular populace, which is a distortion from the start.

I don't think anyone could possibly "design" a government for anyone else's populaces. I doubt that even the populaces involved could design one at this point. It has to evolve, not to be designed, and that evolutionary process isn't going to be pretty. Best we find ways to stay out of it.