The Taliban were and are not the same sort of problem for the West as al Qaeda was and still potentially is. I suggest that what happened to the Taliban was co-lateral damage in the US led, attack on al Qaeda. Had it not shielded al Qaeda in Afghanistan it could well still be in power there.
The Northern Alliance opportunistically used the American military presence to defeat the Taliban.
I suggest the US attack on al Qaeda was motivated by revenge for 9/11 and the removal of the al Qaeda camps. Nation building was not really an American focus. The Europeans through the Bonn Agreement (Afghanistan), followed by conferences in Tokyo, Berlin and London 31Jan to 1Feb 2006 "The Afghanistan Compact" http://tinyurl.com/349wto.
This later document sets out the then state of play in what is essentially a European blueprint for Afghanistan's democratic future. Thus the present NATO efforts need to be seen in that context.ie. providing enough security to allow the "nation building" to continue.
Though al Qaeda may not have been in Iraq at the time of the US invasion it became, according to bin Laden, the central front for al Qaeda's struggle against the US.
Unexpectedly Iraq has become the battlefield where al Qaeda has suffered an enormous degrading of its forces and its morale.
In Sept 2006 al Qaeda announced 4000 of its fighters were killed since engaging with the US/Iraq forces in Iraq as the following shows:
"A release from CBS News and the Associated Press in Cairo.
9/28/2006
The new leader of al Qaeda in Iraq said in an audiotape posted on the Internet Thursday that more than 4,000 foreign insurgent fighters have been killed in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.
“The blood has been spilled in Iraq of more than 4,000 foreigners who came to fight,” said the man, who identified himself as Abu Hamza al-Muhajir - also known as Abu Ayyub al-Masri - the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq, though the voice could not be independently identified.
The Arabic word he used indicated he was speaking about foreigners who joined the insurgency in Iraq, not coalition troops. "
However The Multi National Forces (Coalition) in 28 Nov 2006 released the following.
"The MNF announced that despite Al Qaeda’s claims to have lost 4000+ Jihadi fighters in Iraq, the reality is that over 7000 have been killed/captured since October 2004."
"Thus 7000 Al Qaeda have been killed or captured in Iraq in 26 months."
"This 7000 does not include the number of suicide bombers in Iraq who are almost 100% foreign fighters (typically Al Qaeda and/or their affiliates). Data on the number of suicide bombings has become sketchy and is no longer being publicly tracked because there are so many. At last count there has been an average of 80 suicide bombings and/or attempts every month, and that number has been on the rise since mid 2003."
"According to the latest Brookings Institute Iraq Index Report, at least another 2500 Jihadis have killed themselves in Iraq-most Al Queda or Al Qaeda affiliates since October 2004."
Increasingly now there are claims coming out of Iraq that AQI is virtually finished as an operating force.
All that indicates that however it was in Iraq as of March 2003, Iraq has proved to be the best and most efficient place in the world to degrade al Qaeda. It is early days yet but we may have witnessed the end of this movement as a significant terrorist organisation. If that proves to be so then involvmemt in Iraq was its biggest mistake.
