Reply #17: It's not a matter of them giving up. They can be marginalized and diminished,

[Occam Bandage]

through the simple process of giving Afghans legitimate economic opportunities and defending those opportunities from terror, and the American plan has had success where it has had the resources to succeed (most recently in the field test of Balkh province, where opium production and warlord strength have cratered.) Keep in mind that we nearly succeeded in driving the Taliban from Afghanistan; had we not redirected our attention, money, and people to Iraq we certainly would have.

Guerrilla wars are not won by making the other side give up, they are won by eliminating support for the other side among the general populace. The Afghan people have demonstrated that they are hungry for rule of law. We owe it to them, and to the world, to prove that we can defeat terrorism not through the bombs-from-the-sky Iraq approach, but through building and talking.