America and the Taliban inch towards a peace deal in Afghanistan

AS HE LEFT the Qatari capital of Doha on August 5th, Zalmay Khalilzad, America’s envoy for Afghan peace talks, did not quite say that a deal with the Taliban was a matter of crossing the “i”s and dotting the “t”s, but he came close. He declared that the two sides had made “excellent progress” towards an agreement that would allow America to bring its troops home. What was left, he said, were “technical details” and “steps and mechanisms” for implementing it. But the devil may be in those details.

The essence of the deal, which Mr Khalilzad has said he wishes to strike by September 1st, before Afghanistan’s election on September 28th, is simple enough. America will pull troops out of Afghanistan, satisfying the Taliban’s principal war aim, and in return the Taliban will sever their ties to transnational terrorist groups like al-Qaeda and promise that Afghan soil will not be used for attacks, dealing with the problem that led America to invade 18 years ago.