If we are in agreement about broad principles going forward in Afghanistan, then the question becomes, and I perceive this to be the point of our disagreement--can America, largely by itself, effectively engage in non-offensive (in the military sense) peacekeeping duties that will bring a lasting security and stability to another population?

Why would America be singularly unable to do this? The plan was well explicated in the Bonn Agreement. The U.S. just needs to do what it was supposed to do, and not something else.

I would argue we cannot for a wide variety of reasons including our regional reputation and history, (mis)perceptions among "some" Afghanis about the true nature of our mission, our inability or unwillingness to fathom another peoples cultural uniqueness, time, money, the fallacy of being able to "create nations/institutions" from scratch, the fallacy that any COIN strategy can work in the first instance, . . .

I'm not sure what you are talking about for the COIN strategy. I was talking about peacekeeping forces. Those are forces that deploy to provide security during reconstruction, not win against enemies. I'm also not sure what the perceptions of the Afghans as to the true nature of our mission means. What is it you think they perceive it as? They perceive us as having failed so far, they are very clear on the mission. Some of them think that the failure should dictate that we leave, some of them not. Inability to fathom another peoples' cultural uniqueness is something I'm not understanding either. What do you mean by it? That sounds like a problem for the humanitarian end, not the military, so why wouldn't that be a problem in your plan? Creating nations/institutions from scratch is just a total misapprehension of the place. I know, I know, Alan Grayson said,.... He may have been to 151 countries, but apparently he doesn't read much history. And the Afghan ambassador was right about the idea that when (in this case) the U.S. doesn't want to deal with a problem and is thinking of quitting with the job undone, it starts characterizing people as tribal and naturally at war.

I presume you would disagree. Am I correct or incorrect in my presumption about your position(s)?

Yes, I disagree. The idea that the U.S. shouldn't do peacekeeping and it should always be allocated to Pakistanis (in any case inappropriate here) and Nigerians is pretty strange.

I do believe it might be possible for America to play a positive role, in any number of ways, if the actual regional players provided the peacekeeping forces and the West was perceived only to be providing humanitarian and infrastructure aid.

I'm very curious as to which regional players you think can provide peacekeeping forces, given the regional nature of the conflict and the fact that all players in the region perceive each other as attempting hegemonic advantage.

Short of that I believe your strategy is untenable and that history bears this out.

There's no "short of that" here. History hasn't been studied or it hasn't been referenced in your piece.

We can agree to disagree, but that doesn't change the dynamics that will ultimately prove me correct. IMHO.

You are entitled to such an opinion. Please take responsibility for what you advocate, though, because if the anti-war movement does succeed in getting a withdrawal, you are responsible for those humanitarian actions you said could take place without any security. From an EMT background, I regard abandonment as a form of negligence.

If you disagree, and although every situation is unique, please provide the closest historical analog you perceive to provide a "model of success" for what it is we are ostensibly claiming to be attempting to do in Afghanistan.

Angola is the most recent nation-building that has been completed. The ICRC closed its delegation there a couple of months ago (i.e. the conflict is completely over).

I had provided a quote of your statement from the other day only because I was explaining to The Narrative that people have taken to assuming they know what I think about things here, and because you put up something pre-emptively clarifying with a remark that I might misunderstand. I responded to this list of requests because I figured I owed you the response having used you as an example. I don't really want to get into another discussion on my war apologist views on Afghanistan today.