With a peace deal all but finalized, and an announcement potentially days away, President Trump backed out not just of the deal, but the entire process. The Taliban, unsurprisingly, reacted with anger after eight months of effort went down the tubes.



The Taliban warned primarily that the lack of a deal at this point would hurt the US more, both tarnishing America’s putation as a negotiator and exposing Trump’s “anti-peace approach.”



The Taliban further warned that in extending the war, more lives would be lost, including on America’s side. With Trump centering his justification for scrapping the talks on a single soldier killed in a bombing, the reality is that untold additional Americans may be killed as the war continues to drag on.



Moreover, the war continues to be lost. The Taliban has been winning battles for months in Afghanistan, and is threatening multiple provincial capitals this weekend, With no apparent US military plans to turn the tide of battle, the strategy seems to be to just keep losing until they decide on something else to do, which will almost certainly closely resemble the peace deal they could have right now.





Author: Jason Ditz Jason Ditz is news editor of Antiwar.com. View all posts by Jason Ditz