Rizwan Asghar The nations that do not learn lesson from their past mistakes are never forgiven but are crushed under the fast pace of the moving wheels of history. These ideas are very relevant today for no other country than the USA. It is repeating the same mistakes in Afghanistan as committed by the earlier empires. The day is not far away when the US troops will meet a humiliating defeat and will order the complete withdrawal of forces from the remote and rugged land. General McCrystals recent assessment clearly conveys his disappointment about countrys role in the country. The report describes the situation in Afghanistan is getting from bad to worse; the Taliban insurgency is resilient and growing; Afghans are experiencing a crisis of confidence as they trust neither the Karzai regime nor the NATO forces; the next twelve months will be decisive and failure to gain the initiative and reverse insurgent momentum risks an outcome where defeating the insurgency is no longer possible. So much desperation has never been witnessed on the part of the US high command. The present year 2009 has proved to be the most deadly year for the coalition forces since the beginning of foreign occupation of the country. The key allies of the US are fighting a purposeless war; their public opinion has turned against their engagement in a futile protracted war. Some analysts opine that America has occupied Afghanistan in order to strengthen its geostrategic position and exploit the resources of Central Asia. But prolonged US presence in this region will bring more instability to this region and damage its interests more than anything else. Now President Obama has only two choices: one to commit fully in Afghanistan, order a huge increase in ground troops and earmark massive amount of money for development purposes, or to scale back the American presence and concentrate on drone strikes. The surge in troops will on the one hand provide the Taliban more targets for attacks and deepen the feelings of hatred against foreign occupation on the other. This is the point made to a New York Times columnist, Nicholas Kristof, by a group of former US intelligence officials: Our policymakers do not understand that the very presence of our forces in the Pashtun areas is the problem. The more troops we put in, the greater the opposition. We do not mitigate the opposition by increasing troop levels, but rather we increase the opposition and prove to the Pashtuns that the Taliban are correct. Similarly drone strikes will result in increased killings of innocent civilians as the militants easily melt into civilian population and alienate the local population, which is key to winning against the guerrilla warfare. Neither of these methods can brighten the prospects of US victory. Moreover in the last eight years the NATO forces have completely failed to persuade the Afghan population to side with their cause against the militants. No doubt, the Taliban have no popular support in Afghanistan but the presence of foreign troops there continues to provide them a best recruiting ground in their own country. The Taliban cannot be expected to surrender soon and their leadership remains out of the reach of NATO forces. The support of US citizens for the Afghan war has already dropped to a record low. So now it is left with no other option but to withdraw its forces from the country. According to the recent reports, the US has threatened airstrikes in Pakistan to destroy the alleged safe havens of militants in Balochistan. If this happens to be true, the US will be overlooking the lesson of Vietnam here. Richard Nixon also expanded the Vietnam War into Cambodia in 1970 believing that in this way the US troops will be able to crush North Vietnamese soldiers. But perhaps like Obama he was also unaware of a historical mistake that opening more battlefronts makes the regular fighting forces more vulnerable to resilient guerrillas. The expansion of Afghan war theatre into Pakistan will compound US difficulties. Therefore, the US administration must let sanity prevail and accept its forces inevitable defeat in Afghanistan. Email: rizwanasghar7@yahoo.com