Taliban Advances But Scores No Strategic Wins After US Pullout From Afghanistan by Yaroslav Trofimov, Wall Street Journal
This year’s fighting season is the first where Afghan security forces have had to battle the Taliban pretty much on their own. So far, they are standing their ground where it matters.
How long the Kabul government can keep up this resistance, especially if President Barack Obama goes ahead with his plan to withdraw almost all the remaining American troops next year, is another matter.
This year, the Taliban have advanced in some contested rural districts, including many of those reclaimed at a great cost in American and British lives during the 2009-2011 surge.
But the insurgency can’t boast of spectacular victories that changed the course of the war…