When the United States attacked Afghanistan I had serious misgivings. My misgivings weren't about whether attacking Afghanistan was right or wrong. There was no doubt that it was the right and just thing to do. Afghanistan was the symbiotic host of al Qaeda. Of course, I wanted to see it done and I certainly hoped there was a way that we could get it right. If Afghanistan was internationalized in the right way; if the global community of nations took up the problem just right, well maybe it would be more than a military adventure and the start of something different.

Sure, I still had misgivings, but I pushed them aside and went on with life.

Did I know that we would topple the Taliban and then forget about the country, including its reconstruction? That the huge international effort we headed would come to nothing? That Tommy Franks and Donald Rumsfeld would let bin Laden get away? That Hamid Karzai would end up being the Mayor of Kabul and no more?

No, not in a thousand years were my misgivings anywhere near that bad. I'm just not that much of a pessimist. And then the lingering doubt returned, tugging at me deep inside, this certain knowledge, not firsthand but a hunch that Afghanistan wouldn't end well because, as I have said before, "it's easy to invade Afghanistan. But to keep Afghanistan? Well, that's an altogether different proposition."

And now? It's starting to look like we've both lost the political will to affect change there and watching the Taliban get more violent and brazen every day.

Will America have a Dr. Brydon, or will our reckoning be different?