I'm John Bachelors, my good colleague Bill Rangel of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracy, Senior Fellow.

He keeps the Long War Journal for more than two decades, and Bill and I have been talking about Afghanistan for that same time.

And we now have a revelatory piece, terrific reporting in the New York Times by Aizam Ahmed and

Matthew Alkins about a man named Abdul Rizek who according to these reports

Rizek is dead was responsible for disappearances, leaving families broken and creating a landscape of mystery and

threat across Kandahar province. However, we come to 2024. Bill, I'm not going to say we lost the war, I'm not

going to say we won the war, but the mission was to degrade Al Qaeda. The reporting that you do at the Long War Journal is that

al Qaeda is more potent and confident in Afghanistan today than it was when

Razik was operating operating is that correct.

Yeah John I will say that we lost the war. We did not achieve any of our objectives

to establish a stable government in Afghanistan to objectives to

keep the stable government in Afghanistan to keep the Taliban out of power and to

to keep Afghanistan out of

of, um, break the alliance with the Taliban and you know destroy their

leadership and keep them from establishing a foothold in Afghanistan so

today the Taliban is running training can I'm sorry al-Qaeda with the support of the Taliban is running training camp, I'm sorry al-Qaeda with the support of the

Taliban is running training camps in 10 of Afghanistan's 34 provinces. It's

operating Madrasa, religious schools, and five provinces. It operates a weapons storage depot in Panzier province

which used to be the heart of the resistance that has been broken and that's

more than symbolic of media operation center and also safe

houses to get its people to and from Iran some of al-Qaeda's top leaders including

it's the man who's believed to lead al-Qaeda, say Faladol, is sheltering in Iran.

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