Good post, an issue that we have haggled over for years, while our kids keep dying there.
There are a number of critical facts about Afghanistan:
The Pakhtuns are the problem.
They are all raised to hate foreigners. They still sing about and name the British officers they fought against hundreds of years ago.
They inherently hate any government greater than their own tribe. Anarchy, next to Islam is their common belief.
All of the Taliban, ISIS, whatever, Pakhtun fighters can attack at will and scurry back to safety in Pakistan to reload and resupply.
We have minimal interdiction in Pakistan, that is a permanent problem.
Given the preceding facts, there is no hope of winning, or peace, or even a stalemate........
EVER.
In case you’re wondering how their tribal anarchy has dominated Afghanistan throughout history, keeping them absolutely primitive:
They are the last country on Earth, where overland travel is possible, to not have a road between its two largest cities.
We built it. Now that road is a “toll” road, controlled by every ragtag “militia”, robbers, Taliban, whomever has weapons, that extort money from every user.
Our tax dollars, instead of increasing the living standards and wealth of Afghani’s, has allowed warlords to more easily corrupt and and steal from them.
We are doing more harm than good by being there, supporting the warlords and protecting the poppy and heroin trade.