Despite a protracted political process that delayed the seating of the new Afghan president and put a security agreement between the U.S. and Afghanistan in limbo for months, Campbell said the drawdown is on track so far. At the height of the war, ISAF had about 300 combat outposts and forward operating bases. There are now just 30.

“If I had one word to tell you what I've seen so far in the six weeks, it's transition, transition, transition. And that is transition from ISAF to the mission of resolute support. It's the political transition with a new president, the BSA signing, the SOFA [Status of Forces Agreement] signing, and this really complete political transition,” Campbell said.

(Read More: Gen. Campbell Will Recommend a Slower Drawdown in Afghanistan, If Needed)

Still, the Taliban aren’t exactly packing up and going home and many say they’re just waiting out the clock for the day when all foreign troops leave Afghanistan.

The problem we’ve had in the past is we’ve encouraged the Afghans to go ahead and report this to show the success that they have. And quite candidly, they’ve been afraid to do that. Gen. John Campbell, ISAF Commander

“For all of the political rhetoric that has followed, however, Afghanistan is still the forgotten war at a time when the Taliban is making steady gains, civilian casualties are rising, the Afghan economy is in crisis, and there still are no clear plans for any post-2014 aspect of transition,” Anthony Cordesman, a national security expert with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said in a recent report about U.S. strategy in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Central Asia.

Campbell said that in ”the last couple of weeks, there has been an uptick with the Taliban trying to make a statement as they close out the fighting season.” He said the Afghans have been fighting well, especially in Helmand province, but that the Taliban is unable to hold any territory they gain. He admits, though, that they’re not doing enough to counter the Taliban’s message.

“They have, quite frankly, won the information war,” he said.

Afghan security forces have been loathe to counter with their own public relations strategy, Campbell noted, in part because of the political problems in Kabul and a lack of confidence. But he said he expects Ghani, and the Afghan National Security Forces, will be more inclined to demonstrate their successes more publicly.

“The problem we've had in the past is we've encouraged the Afghans to go ahead and report this to show the success that they have. And quite candidly, they've been afraid to do that. And they've been inhibited in some places to—to tell some of the good news stories," Campbell said

As those forces step up on the battlefield and in that information war, Taliban morale will fall apart. “What you'll see in Helmand is that the Taliban do not own any of the ground that they've tried to get, and that they'll end the fighting season '14 here very discouraged, and that their leadership continues not even to be in Afghanistan and that the morale of the Taliban continues to be low," Campbell said.

Lessons Learned

Just days after the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, then-Secretary of State Gen. Colin Powell told Tim Russert on NBC’s Meet the Press that the United States would not get mired in Afghanistan’s so-called graveyard of empires. “I can assure you that our military will have plans that will go against their weaknesses, and not get trapped in ways that previous armies have gotten trapped in Afghanistan,” he said.