As the surge petered out, the Obama administration had to decide what came next. On paper, Afghan security forces were supposed to take the lead for security throughout Afghanistan by 2014. But as the military surged and withdrew, a faction within the administration began to push for another option. Those who doubted that military progress could be sustained argued that the only plausible route to ending the war was through negotiations with the Taliban. Unfortunately, the Obama administration’s negotiations with the Taliban were undermined by battlefield realities, bureaucratic pathologies, and, above all, the withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan.