A Post-American Afghanistan & Central Asia

Much more importantly, however, an answer to the question of what the U.S. endgame in Afghanistan will look like, and when it will happen, appears to have become more elusive than ever as a result of events in and around Afghanistan during the past six months. These developments have added significant new layers of tension and uncertainty to already troubled U.S. policy and operations. In particular, a new and deeper round of difficulties with Islamabad erupted following the allegedly accidental U.S. bombing of a Pakistani military camp inside Pakistan in November. And more recently, two incidents in Afghanistan—the burning of Qurans at Bagram Airbase in February and the murder spree by one or more U.S. soldiers in two villages near Kandahar on 11 March—have seriously undermined the already tattered trust between Kabul and Washington and drastically compromised the Afghan National Army (ANA), both in terms of its loyalty to its U.S.-NATO partners and trainers and its responsibility to protect the Afghan people.