The question of continued US assistance to Afghanistan will keep going past 2014. Regardless of the number of US troops stationed to fill the roles of "train the trainer" type missions, the Afghan government, law enforcement, and military will be hard press to up-hold and maintain security after 2014. What we may see is portions of Afghanistan be surrendered to Taliban and pro-Taliban forces with the main cities under Afghan government control. The Taliban and several other insurgent organizations have long noted and spoke in public that they are waiting until the amount of US forces will be unable to stop any real coordinated effort among the various tribes and tribal communitites which openly support Taliban operations. Add to this that Afghanistan is still the world's largest heroin and opium producer and will continue even after the Taliban regain portions of the country. What was alarming is that the President placed a request for the military to begin troop draw down before November 2012? 68,000 troops to be pulled prior to the elections just to ensure that the headlines will read, "troops out as promised by the administration." So we are not basing strategic and tactical mission planning on the enemy's capabilities, we are judging what will work for potential votes. You are ensuring that Afghanistan will fall as soon as the last helicopter leaves the air-space. But I am sure VP Biden is waiting to make the claim that "they ended our piece in Afghanistan".