Douthat answers Millman's query:

The point of a counterinsurgency campaign… isn’t to crush the Taliban once and for all. It’s to create an environment in which they feel like they could be crushed, and to turn those security gains to political ends. Whereas so long as the Taliban’s leaders and fellow travelers are convinced that they’ve all but won the war, any “orderly entry” into government that they negotiate is likely to end in disaster — for our interests, and for Afghanistan.

(Cartoon via Joyner)