February 21, 2011 | National Review Online

What on Earth are We Doing in Afghanistan?

 In my weekend column, I argued that the democracy project has failed in Afghanistan, and that — far from taking the battle to the Taliban and America’s other enemies — our military’s main job there has become building a sharia state while the Obama State Department pleads with the Taliban to negotiate and join the sharia state regime.

 I also noted Steve Coll’s reporting, and State Department confirmation, that negotiations with the Taliban are, in fact, underway.

Now, at the Weekly Standard, Tom Joscelyn is reporting that, with apparent State Department cooperation, Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s “peace council,” in furtherance of its outreach to the Taliban, is sending a delegation to Gitmo to request the release of some 20 Taliban commanders and leaders who are still being held there because it is a ripe dead certainty that, if released, they would go straight back to the anti-American jihad, as we well know 40 percent or more of the released detainees do — some, as Tom points out, going right back to the Taliban.

You can’t make this up.