Malkasian's Afghan War

 I commented earlier on Carter Malkasian's "The American War in Afghanistan". 

I've now finished the book and have some more comments:

• overall he judges our war to have been a failure.
• he notes that GWB had the most freedom to manage the war. Bush focused on Iraq and let Afghanistan slide, particularly on building up the armed forces. Rumsfeld is credited for being prescient as to the problems, but debited for resisting the mission.
• Obama felt he was rolled by the Pentagon at the beginning of his term. Malkasian agrees, suggesting with the benefit of hindsight he should have endorsed a change of goal and a smaller investment of forces. 
• Trump is credited for being able to say "enough".  He's dinged for "the Sword of Twitter (not Damocles)", being erratic in his decision making, and endorsing a one-sided peace agreement.

As for causes of our failure he touches on corruption and poor government, the existence of Pakistan as a safe haven and supporter of the Taliban, multiple missed decisions by all the presidents. etc.  His emphasis though is on the idea that the Taliban most closely represented the "real Afghanistan": Islam, and defiance of foreign influence, meaning that Taliban fighters were more inspired by jihad than the government fighters were by their paychecks.

It seems like a good analysis, though I also take from the book the idea that the government and society were never united, never resolving tribal rivalries, often with problems working with the US. Karzai was able to unite the factions early on, but he and the American forces gradually lost their unity.

I also note support for a pet idea of mine: the problems created by rotating troops and commanders through the country.  These problems diminished over time, as more troops and especially the special forces served multiple tours, and as commanders returned in higher positions.

[update--so far Malkasian's earlier book, "War Comes to Garmser", which is focused on the area in Helmand province where he worked for 2 years, seems better written.]