what's to be done about Afghanistan?

[PSOL]

Let someone that isn’t the Pakistanis take care of it.

Let’s look at the list of potential candidates, shall we? India could be a possible contender, being antagonistic to Pakistani interference. Ensuring the safety of a non-Taliban dominated Afghanistan ensures that Pakistan is diverting attention to two flanks, Indian operations through Afghanistan and Indian operations through its borders. That fits with what India wants. However, India doesn’t border Afghanistan, so India can’t do much to protect the web of cities and northern lands in Afghan control.

Iran could have been used as a replacement, bordering Afghanistan while being more inclined to combat the nearby Islamists that act as cannon fodder for other areas around Iran, I.e. Uzbek mujihadeen in Syria. However, the general economic issues, along with no present speaking terms with the U.S. kills the plan for the near future.

Honestly, even a full retreat could be done so to protect the government. Both Russia and China are dead set in stopping Afghanistan from becoming another Islamist pipeline. Yet their presence ensures that there can be no United States presence in Central Asia. So honestly it is all up to what you feel the goal of our foreign policy should look like.

In short, Afghanistan is a confusing pile of mess that should have been handled by regional actors immediately after Osama Bin Laden’s demise. Both India and Iran could have put the spoils away from Pakistan, while simultaneously robbing a solidification of Central Asia by China/Russia. Doing so, we could have been focusing more attention to other fronts such as the South China Seas by now.

[PSOL]

We leave and say "good luck!"

You are an idiot.

Do you have a plan to stay and succeed then?

[PSOL]

Troop surge just like in Iraq, where it worked exactly as hoped.  Of course being half in/half out like we are now was never going to work. 

And then what, stay till things get fixed? Afghanistan differs from Iraq in that it was always very decentralized in power structures, with politicians only caring about getting as much land for their tribe. I doubt they’ll move on to agreeing that sharing the Afghan nation is beneficial.

There is an issue of also how those troops would be supplied through and resupplied, as the current troop movements go through Pakistan alone. I highly doubt Russia or Iran would not mind American troops moving through their countries or their backyard.