By Greg Jaffe and Missy Ryan, The Washington Post:
For President Obama, the war in Afghanistan has been a matter of profound ambivalence — a strategic necessity and an unmistakable burden.
He has talked about the United States’ interest in preventing the country from ever becoming a sanctuary for global terrorists. Just as often, he has spoken of ending the war and about the limits of American military power, money, patience and time.
Nearly eight years after Obama began his presidency with a long and contentious Afghanistan strategy review, he is leaving behind for President-elect Donald Trump a war that reflects his divided outlook.
By most measures, the conflict is a stalemate. Afghan troops are fighting hard, but “the casualty rate is much higher than we would have hoped,” a senior defense official recently told reporters. Taliban forces are taking territory from the U.S.-backed government, but they have not been able to seize and hold any major cities or towns.
“Clearly the situation is getting worse, but not to the extent that you see the Taliban winning or the Afghan government is clearly failing,” said Andrew Wilder, a vice president and Afghanistan expert at the United States Institute of Peace.
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