We Won! (Now Let’s Leave)

Matt Yglesias reviews Bush's original demands to the Taliban and finds that we have accomplished all of them:

[I]f this isn't victory, what would victory look like?

Sometimes, American policy in Afghanistan seems aimed at the odd idea that our troops can't leave the country until they've succeeded in killing everyone there who wants us to leave. It also doesn't make sense for us to be fighting to obtain a permanent military presence in a distant, impoverished, landlocked country. Nothing we can do can guarantee that no future regime in Afghanistan will play host to high-profile terrorist groups. But al-Qaeda has demonstrated an ability to get by without such a host, and we've demonstrated the ability to chase terrorists out of even the most remote areas. Our complacency in the face of al-Qaeda's presence in Afghanistan before 9/11 was a mistake, but with bin Laden dead, we can turn the page and say we've rectified that error. We've achieved what we went in to Afghanistan to achieve, and now it's time to start heading for the exit.

Amen.