Editor's note: Azhar Azam works in a private organization as a market and business analyst and writes about geopolitical issues and regional conflicts. The article reflects the author's opinions, and not necessarily the views of CGTN.

The U.S. war in Afghanistan has entered its 19th year this year – the longest international military campaign in American history which unseated the over-17-year-long Vietnam War.

Nixon administration's "Vietnamization" policy, which sought to end the U.S. overseas armed engagement in Vietnam through "expanding, equipping and training" the South Vietnamese forces, is being replicated by Washington in Afghanistan by way of U.S. Operation Freedom's Sentinel (OFS) or NATO-led Resolute Support (RS) mission to "train, advise and assist" the Afghan security forces and institutions to shawl the offensive intent.

In December 2014, former U.S. President Barrack Obama and the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) announced the "completion" of Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) or Afghanistan war and leaned into the non-combat OFS/RS operations.

Though OEF was capped five years ago – in a humongous blow to the U.S. – the world's prevalent military power continues to ensnare in the grief-stricken country and suffer heavy fatalities. During OFS/RS, the U.S. troop casualties had reached 622 by December 16 including 82 deaths in the face of squandering about one trillion U.S. dollars in Afghanistan.

The virtual collapse of the U.S. to elude its military losses is pretty embarrassing for the globally dominant defense equipment exporter, notwithstanding it relocated its troops from a showdown with the Afghan Taliban to relatively a placating role to lift Afghan forces' warfare capabilities and focus on counter-terrorism operations against the remnants of al-Qaeda.

In the middle of Obama's tenure, the U.S. unequivocally realized that the Afghan war is invincible. The National Security Council (NSC) staffer's disclosure in 2014 that "Your job was not to win, it was not to lose" typified that Washington had long succumbed to the Afghan insurgent group that was consolidating its foothold and preparing to expand the operations and influence all over Afghanistan.

NSC operative revelation and Taliban's outstretched control in the battle-scarred country lobbed the U.S. claim "to help secure and build-upon the hard-fought gains of the last 13 years" and alluded that it was symbolically in search of a restorative transit to flee Afghanistan while circumventing international derision over its military gaucherie.

As the U.S. had covertly decided to leave Afghanistan in line with the "Vietnamization" plan to withdraw the American forces and foreign troops within 60 days of signing the agreement with North Vietnam – the Taliban divined the U.S. plan.

Armed faction moved aggressively in many parts of the country and redoubled its terminal suicide attacks including the deadliest stretch in Kabul. On the other hand, the U.S. was unlucky in the sense that it could not forsake Afghanistan, citing its national security concerns. The U.S., therefore, was enmeshed in the country.

U.S. President Donald Trump snapped off the peace talks with Taliban by his scorching tweets on September 8, alleging the militant group was trying "to build false leverage" and to "strength their bargaining position" through attacks – he turned his back on coalition's airstrikes to target the combatants across Afghanistan to tighten his grip on peace dialogue.

In July and August, the alliance's planes released 613 and 753 weapons respectively – higher than many months from the OFS launch in 2015 – to dial up military pressure on Taliban militias to "shape the political environment" and keep their interlocutors on the negotiating table. After the consultations stalled in early September, some 948 weapons were dropped on the Taliban – the largest monthly total since RS mission was launched.

So while Trump imputed the Taliban for tapping armed attacks on Afghan and U.S. forces as a bullying tactic to seek comparative influence on Afghan peace negotiations – in reality, both sides wrought the assault ploys to overawe each other in the crucial exchanges.

But in this abysmal fray to dominate the rival, Afghan civilian casualties hit the roof and swelled to 4,009 including 954 killings in the third quarter of 2019 – an increase of 130 percent from the previous quarter and 60 percent more compared with the same period last year.

Since peace continues to become extinct in Afghanistan, it could readily be plumbed that the U.S. widespread military, strategic, economic, social and political objectives in the God's Acre of global superpowers would never decipher into existentialism and eventually head toward a dead end.

Amid stark issues of rampant corruption, growing poppy fields, Afghan forces' incompetence to protect their own country and shriller differences among the political parties – the U.S. bilateral Afghanistan Compact and Geneva Mutual Accountability Framework (GMAF) to promote trade, stability, enhance capacity of the civilian institutions and improvement of justice system are blighted.

For years, several U.S. administrations have overstated their visibly invisible feats to cover up their defeat and massive defense spending in Afghanistan. Once the U.S. sensed that it won't be able to dupe its nation over ghost triumphs for too long, it picked the Vietnam-like troop retraction strategy through a peace dialogue with the Taliban.

The U.S. has lately relinquished nearly all its Afghan-centered initiatives. At present, the fundamental U.S. objective in Afghanistan is to "prevent any further attacks on the United States by terrorists enjoying terrorist haven or support in Afghanistan." So the resumption of proceedings in Doha had to commence as part of the U.S. "Vietnamization" policy in Afghanistan.

But it doesn't mean that the U.S. will completely vacate Afghanistan. Washington seeks an intelligence-based military presence in the country to monitor adversaries and regional developments, certainly at a much lower cost than it is paying now. Trump's last month surprise Thanksgiving visit to Afghanistan and the assurance to the U.S. soldiers that the Taliban "want to do a ceasefire" were again a commitment to them that they were coming home soon.

(If you want to contribute and have specific expertise, please contact us at opinions@cgtn.com.)