Is Afgahnistan Going 'Off The Rails'?

U.S. Marines prepare to board a KC-130 Hercules aircraft to depart the Bastion-Leatherneck complex in Helmand province, Afghanistan, Oct. 27, 2014. U.S. Marine Corps photo by Chief Warrant Officer 3 Benn Bar

Afghanistan Going Off The Rails As U.S. Withdrawal Speeds Up -- Foreign Policy

Insurgent attacks rise as poppy cultivation reaches a post-Taliban high in Afghanistan.

While the world's eyes are trained on Iraq, Syria, and the fight against the Islamic State, a new report to Congress by the government's reconstruction watchdog warns that Afghanistan, where U.S. troops have been fighting the Taliban and other insurgent groups in the longest war in American history, remains dangerously unstable even as the American military withdrawal accelerates.

Insurgent attacks have reached the highest levels since 2011, the Afghan army has sustained heavy combat losses and is experiencing high attrition rates, and opium poppy cultivation has more than doubled from its pre-1999 levels when the Taliban ruled the country, potentially undermining the Afghan state's legitimacy even as the nation is experiencing budget shortfalls, the Office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, or SIGAR, said in a quarterly report sent to Congress Thursday.

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My Comment: What also does not help the situation is the U.S. continually doing this .... U.S. Refuses to Stop Giving Contracts to Backers of Afghan Insurgency (Washington Free Beacon).