AP Photo

Despite some battlefield accomplishments in Marjah, Afghanistan and the capture of multiple key Taliban leaders in Pakistan, serious backsteps on Afghanistan's political front over recent months may have far greater implications for the sustainability of American efforts and Afghanistan's long-term stability.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has further consolidated control over the country's electoral processes through a presidential decree passed during Afghanistan's parliamentary recess, and he recently enacted into law a controversial 2007 measure providing blanket amnesty from prosecution for veteran military commanders and Taliban fighters that lay down their arms. What's more, key anticorruption initiatives that President Karzai promised to the international community at the...