It’s always a great negotiation position when the other party knows you have no choice and want the deal badly.
This is like negotiating for a car when the salesman knows you are on foot and can’t get credit anywhere else.
If they aren’t coming to you with tears in their eyes begging to negotiate, they are gonna put the big britches on you... big time.
I agree with you. They smell blood in the water. They aren’t going to give an inch.
I attended a meeting of Pakhtun “elders” from areas so far distant that they had to introduce their kids to each other.
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Looking around the room it was amazing to see how much they looked alike. They could all pass for cousins or brothers. The incidence of first cousin marriage is about 40%.
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You fight with one you fight with them all.
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What military solution does anyone have in mind? Other than extermination?
That we have the political will for?
I wasn’t around at the time, but from what little I’ve read sounds a lot like the Vietnam conundrum. The VC knew we wanted to leave. It was Nixon’s stated policy more or less. But it left Nixon no choice but to increase attacks as they negotiated in Paris.