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Forward Operating Base Torkham, in Nangahar Province, Afghanistan (army.mil)

In the next week, the defense secretary, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the secretary of state, the director of national intelligence, and the acting national-security advisor will hand President Donald Trump a new military plan to defeat the Islamic State. For the sake of Americas military and political mission in Afghanistan, President Trump should direct the Defense Department, State Department, and intelligence community to conduct a similar assessment against the Taliban movement.

At the top of the list should be a fundamental question. Is the conventional concept of winning in Afghanistanpulverizing the Taliban into the ground; defeating al-Qaeda into oblivion; establishing an Afghan army that is corruption-free, independent, and strong enough to control the entire country; and constructing an Afghan government that respects democratic principlespossible to meet?

U.S. troop numbers in the country may be at their lowest point since 2002, but the American aircraft and special-operations forces are still all too frequently asked to bail out the Afghan army when they find themselves surrounded.

The security situation is going in the wrong direction at an increasingly alarming rate. According to the latest report from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) and data from the UN mission, territory under Afghan government control continues to contract. U.S. Forces-Afghanistan reports that 57.2 percent of the countrys districts as of November 2016 are solidly under the thumb of the Afghan security forcesa 15 percent decrease from the same period the year prior. More than 83 percent of Uruzgan province and 57 percent of Helmand province are under insurgent control or influence.

Armed clashes between insurgent groups and the Afghan security forces have reached their highest intensity since the UN began tracking the data. Meanwhile, the Afghan security forces are taking so many casualties that its becoming increasingly difficult for Kabul to address the attrition ratebetween November 2015 and November 2016, there were a total of 18,562 casualties (killed and injured).

Afghanistan was barely mentioned as a subject during the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

Now that hes their commander-in-chief, President Trump has a duty and responsibility to the American service-members who are continuing to fight the Talibanand the American taxpayers who backstopped 72.8 percent of the Afghan armys budget in 2016that U.S. policy is serving the security interests of the United States.

Trump should order the Pentagon to undertake a top-to-bottom review of the Afghanistan mission with these questions in mind:

None of these questions are easy. In fact, all of them are difficult to the point of being uncomfortable. After 15years of blood, sweat, tears, and treasure, any question that forces U.S. policymakers to confront whether Americas investment in the war has been worthy of the cost will generate a fair amount of anxiety.

As Stephen Walt explains persuasively when assessing our foreign-policy outcomes, There was never much doubt thatthe United States could topple relatively weak and/or unpopular governmentsas it has in Panama, Afghanistan, Iraq and, most recently, Libyabut the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan showed that unmatched power-projection capabilities were of little use in constructing effective political orders once the offending leadership was removed.

This should be evidence enough that difficult but elementary questions need to be discussed within the inter-agency process. To kick off this uncomfortable but necessary step, President Trump should sign another executive order tasking his commanders to do just that.

Daniel DePetris is a fellow at Defense Priorities.

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Why Trump Must Define the Mission in Afghanistan - The American Conservative