Explaining the Taliban's lightning victory in Afghanistan

If anyone believed that the Taliban would halt at the gates of Kabul, they displayed a considerable ignorance of Afghan realpolitik

The Taliban’s lightning victory has seen its troops sweep through Afghanistan and capture Kabul in barely a fortnight after US intelligence forecast that the Afghan National Army (ANA) could hold them off for several months. Analysts are questioning the combat capability of the ANA and waxing lyrical about the combat capability of the hardy Taliban warriors. This analysis of the ANA’s rapid capitulation all across the country only illustrates the hazards of crystal gazing in an unfamiliar context.

Few have pointed out that audio and video coverage of the battlegrounds of Kandahar, Mazar-e-Sharif, Herat, Jalalabad and finally Kabul, show no