Taliban

On the podcast: Former Pakistani Ambassador Husain Haqqani on America’s endgame in Afghanistan.

U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan would leave a power vacuum filled by terrorists.

Successive U.S. administrations failed to heed the lessons of a forgotten counterinsurgency success story from Vietnam.

Afghanistan’s jihadi insurgents are ready to give America what it wants: defeat without humiliation.

By holding its own peace talks, Moscow is laying the groundwork to play kingmaker.

The lifelong booster of American power is caught between Trump’s withdrawal plans and the Taliban threat.

Five Reads: The best Foreign Policy stories of 2018 on defense and security.

Reports of the withdrawal of U.S. troops took Afghans by surprise. And it gives the Taliban exactly what they want.

America’s top general admits the war is at an impasse.

Flawed and messy as it was, the vote was still good for democracy.

The killing of a strongman police chief creates a dangerous power vacuum.

On the podcast: American journalist Ashley Jackson wanted to learn more about Taliban leaders. So she donned a burqa and knocked on their doors.

The militants’ new strategy is to out-govern the U.S.-backed administration in Kabul—and it’s working.

The Pentagon says the United States is winning the war, but after 17 years, there’s still no end in sight.

As schools become targets, young Afghans are living and working on the streets — and the government isn’t doing much to protect them.

A temporary Taliban truce, despite the opportunity it presents, doesn’t mean peace is about to break out anytime soon.

"We've had weapons brought to this headquarters and given to us by Afghan leaders and [they] said, this was given by the Russians to the Taliban."

The White House is talking tough, but previous U.S. presidents never managed to persuade Islamabad to fight Afghan militants.

If we woke up tomorrow and found that none of our laptops, iPhones, iPads, or personal assistants worked, what would we do?

As U.S. troops draw down, the Afghan military struggles to provide care for its countless wounded soldiers — on the battlefield and at home.