Talking to the Taliban? Hold on a second…

President Obama is losing sight of our interests in Afghanistan. Again.

Despite clearly laying out U.S. interests in Afghanistan at West Point in 2009—disrupting, dismantling, and defeating Al Qaeda—the president faltered when he authorized a nation-building-cum-counterinsurgency strategy that far outstripped that goal. Mission leap, not mission creep. Now the White House is allowing its efforts to get the Taliban to the negotiating table to obstruct more important aims.

Read the rest at The National Interest.

Ryan Evans is the Editor-in-Chief of War on the Rocks.