I swear, sometimes I could just cry. A U.S. military official has come out with a statement concerning the Taliban’s prospects in Afghanistan, and… just read them for yourself.

“If the Taliban do not make it through this offensive, we feel that by next year they’ll have limited access to Afghanistan,” said Army Col. David B. Enyeart, deputy commander of Task Force Phoenix V, according the American Forces Press Bureau.

Okay, I’m starting to sound like a record on this point, but it’s 2007. The beginning of the end for the Taliban should have been somewhere in late 2002 or early 2003. Not only shouldn’t we be seeing the beginning of the end, we should already be past the end of the end. We’re in a mess in Iraq and people are gazing toward Iran, Afghanistan should have been over and done with by now.

“The Afghan National Army itself is growing not only in size, but it seems that they’re growing smarter in the way they do things,” he said. Enyeart added that Afghan troops are less dependent on support from the U.S. and coalition forces. Enyeart said that this shift in the nature of war makes him optimistic about the eventual outcome.

“Now it’s more of the Afghans want the war to be over with, and they want a secure state themselves,” he said. “This is a winnable war over here.”

Times like these it makes me wonder more and more about Iraq. In a nuclear analogy, Afghanistan is the Little Boy to Iraq’s Fat Man. If over five years after the invasion we’re just now getting to the point where the Afghans are starting to help, think about how long it might be before the three-way separated Iraq will do the same.