The Challenges and Opportunities of a Negotiated Settlement in Afghanistan

For the last 15 years, the war in Afghanistan has caused hundreds of thousands of deaths and the United States has sent thousands of troops and spent billions of dollars supporting strategies that have been unable to curtail the violence in the country. In addition to deploying over 130,000 troops from 51 North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) countries and its partner nations, the United States alone spent over $686 billion in the ‘Afghan war’.

Yet 2015 was reported to be the deadliest year for Afghanistan, and the insurgency (mainly referring to the Taliban in this essay) is as strong as ever.

The civilian casualties caused by insurgent attacks have been rising continuously since 2002.