Taliban

Operation Marjah

Coalition forces are hunting Taliban insurgents in the largest military operation in Afghanistan since the initial U.S. invasion in 2001.

FEBRUARY 17, 2010

Dead Terrorists Tell No Tales

Is Barack Obama killing too many bad guys before the U.S. can interrogate them?

BY MARC A. THIESSEN | FEBRUARY 8, 2010

Saving Pakistan's Heartland

While media attention has focused on the battle for control in its restive tribal areas, Pakistan needs to develop a strategy for thwarting the creeping Talibanization of its urban centers.

BY AHMED HUMAYUN | FEBRUARY 8, 2010

Invite the Taliban to the Afghanistan Conference

Why excluding the insurgency won't work.

BY FABRICE POTHIER | JANUARY 27, 2010

Divide and Conquer

At an upcoming conference in London, the Afghan government will unveil its plan to bring the Taliban rank and file back into the political fold -- and plead for international assistance for its new initiative. 

BY ALIM REMTULLA | JANUARY 26, 2010

Groundhog Day in Afghanistan

Day after day, political crisis after political crisis, Afghanistan persists in going nowhere.

BY WHITNEY HARING-SMITH | JANUARY 26, 2010

Kabuki in Kabul

Wait, did Hamid Karzai actually want the Afghan parliament to reject his cabinet?

BY JEAN MACKENZIE | JANUARY 22, 2010

'Langley Won't Tell Us'

How I fought the intelligence turf wars -- and lost.

BY RON CAPPS | JANUARY 11, 2010

How to Whip the Afghan Army Into Shape

Much of President Barack Obama's strategy rests on the creation of a new, more competent Afghan military. Here's what he'll need to know to get the job done.

BY MARK MOYAR | DECEMBER 22, 2009

Lessons from America's Other Counterinsurgency

The United States and Colombia have been testing out COIN strategies for years. But the major lesson for Afghanistan is a tough one: there are no clean answers in messy wars.

BY ADAM ISACSON | DECEMBER 16, 2009

No More Representatives, Please

The last thing we need is a new big shot envoy in Kabul.

BY NICK HORNE | DECEMBER 11, 2009

Will There Always Be a Pakistan?

Fissures within the military could tear not just the army but the entire country apart. It's coming sooner than you think.

BY SETH CROPSEY | DECEMBER 11, 2009

Obama's Indecent Interval

Despite the U.S. president's pleas to the contrary, the war in Afghanistan looks more like Vietnam than ever.

BY THOMAS H. JOHNSON, M. CHRIS MASON | DECEMBER 10, 2009

The Al Qaeda Diaries

As the Pakistani soldiers moved into South Waziristan, they found something almost as valuable as al Qaeda itself: the diaries and books that explain how militant ideology binds the diffuse world of terrorism together.

BY IMTIAZ GUL | NOVEMBER 20, 2009

My Nights With Hamid

The world is hounding the Afghan president to crack down on corruption and kick out entrenched warlords. I don't think he's going to do it, and I should know: I’m the man who wrote his autobiography.

BY NICK B. MILLS | NOVEMBER 19, 2009

Losing the War of Exhaustion

It's not low troop levels that stand to defeat the United States in Afghanistan. It's plain old public fatigue.

BY MARK T. KIMMITT | SEPTEMBER 21, 2009

Russia's Brutal Guerrilla War

How the crisis in the North Caucasus could go global.

BY PAUL QUINN-JUDGE | AUGUST 31, 2009

Third Time's Not the Charm

Is Nawaz Sharif, Pakistan's once and likely future leader, really a born-again liberal?

BY HAIDER ALI HUSSEIN MULLICK | MAY 6, 2009

How Pakistan Can Fix Itself

When will Pakistan's leaders wake up and do what's needed to save their country from ruin?

BY AYESHA KHANNA, PARAG KHANNA | MAY 5, 2009

Seven Questions: Dexter Filkins on the Taliban's Long War

With the Taliban growing fiercer by the day, Dexter Filkins, a grizzled war correspondent for the New York Times and author of The Forever War, shares his tales from tribal Pakistan and explains why it may be too late to apply the lessons of Iraq.

OCTOBER 8, 2008