IN THREE SHORT messages sent as Kabul slept, President Donald Trump has upended more than a year of painstaking American negotiation with the insurgents of the Taliban, who have been fighting to overthrow the American-backed government in Afghanistan for 18 years. Mr Trump revealed that senior Taliban leaders had been due to meet him on Sunday at Camp David, the president’s country estate. But that had been arranged before a Taliban suicide-bomb attack in Kabul on September 5th that killed an American soldier along with 11 others.
“I immediately cancelled the meeting and called off peace negotiations,” Mr Trump tweeted. “What kind of people would kill so many in order to seemingly strengthen their bargaining position?” He carried on: “If they cannot agree to a ceasefire during these very important peace talks, and would even kill 12 innocent people, then they probably don’t have the power to negotiate a meaningful agreement anyway.”