Quite rightly, Eikenberry couldn’t continue to play the stupid diplomatic game of making excuses for Karzai’s gross ingratitude. The Obama administration’s standard way of responding to Karzai’s attacks is to simply say that he’s doing it for “his own domestic audience.” Now what on earth does that mean? First, it means he was talking to his own people, not to Americans. But it is nonsense to suggest that Americans aren’t listening also and aren’t getting the right message. Second, the message is that Karzai is trying to hoodwink his own people by suggesting that the corruption and inefficiency of his government results from America’s inept help and America’s presence. But the Afghan people know better, and they are not fooled, as any American or journalist has served there would attest.
The policy conclusion for the United States is truly inescapable: Karzai knows far better than Washington that his government cannot survive the departure of U.S. and NATO forces, whether that goodbye takes another five or 10 years. So, he wants to have it both ways. He wants to convince Afghans that their ills are caused by America, and to convince America that unless it keeps large numbers of troops there indefinitely, that the Taliban will return to power and pose a mortal threat to the United States. Well, if Washington had any brains, it would not continue to let Karzai get away with this double-dealing.

The United States has no vital interest in Karzai’s survival or, indeed, in whoever rules Afghanistan.