First of all....
I'm sorry, the thought has left me, but the other important thought is there and it will come back to me.
First of all, we're not talking about turning the country over to the Taliban, but opening up a new political and essentially non-military process, and a very quick one, whereby a new government can be established and a new balance of forces be established. I can't give you the perfect formula for how this is going to be conducted, but the alternative is equally important.
You say leave and give it up. I'm not persuaded that if we stay two, three, five, or even ten years we are going to achieve the goal we hope to achieve there. I think twenty years would be lucky, and there is no guarantee that you're not going to continue to inflame nationalist and religious and fundamentalist passions, in Afghanistan and in Pakistan and in the region, to come and fight against this present NATO project.
So it's not a crazy choice versus a sober choice. It's a sober choice at the present, which I argue is not working and is probably not going to work. And it's a new way of approaching the use of regional powers to stop the worst of the past elements. That is the participation of elements like al-Qaeda. Pakistan doesn't want it, Iran doesn't want it, Russia doesn't want it, and China doesn't want it. These countries have great power within those countries.
Another scenario is that Afghanistan will basically be divided into spheres of influence for some time to come, with those countries involved. It's quite thinkable, even though regrettable.