Although the aborted electoral run-off in Afghanistan has further weakened the country’s already troubled government, the Obama administration has little choice but to work with President Hamid Karzai. Indeed, the electoral mess paradoxically makes it easier for President Obama to decide on America’s next steps in the war. The turmoil in Kabul should convince the White House that General Stanley McChrystal’s plan to pursue counterinsurgency in the countryside is a bridge too far.

The US commander in Afghanistan would have coalition forces adopt a “population-centric” strategy in which they address “the needs and grievances of the people in their local environment”. In Iraq, a similar strategy did succeed in undercutting the Sunni insurgency. But Iraq’s central government was in the midst of stabilising and increasing its effectiveness, enabling it to rebuild the institutional infrastructure of a functioning state. With an Afghan government of questionable legitimacy and limited efficacy in control of only 30 per cent of the country – and much of the rest under the sway of local warlords – surging thousands of fresh troops into lawless rural areas is a recipe for chasing after unattainable ends with insufficient means.