We're all thinking ahead. The only viable road to peace will be Taliban participation in a new regime, which they may attain majority control over since they largely represent the Pashto ethnic group, which holds a very narrow ethnic plurality in Afghanistan.

While the Taliban are a bad group of people, America does not necessarily find their existence intolerable, merely their tendency to give safe harbor to terrorists. If they were obliged to follow the current constitution, a restoration of some form of Taliban control would be an acceptable outcome.

So basically, you want them to accept a democratic constitution, and accept the possibility that they might win power democratically?

A tweak to the constitution could fix it. If Afghanistan became a parliamentary system, they would need a coalition government to survive, because even if they went strictly down to tribal associations, democratically no one tribe constitutes a majority or a near-majority. Pashto is the largest, but not by much

But at the end of the day America's commitment in Afghanistan can't be limitless, and so long as guarantees are in place that Afghanistan won't become a giant Islamic terrorist training ground and hideout again, i think we would accept the Taliban otherwise, even if we didn't like the fact that they're in control. Similar to how the West "tolerated' Qaddafi after Libya ditched its WMD program (until it became clear that it would be easy to get rid of him altogether in 2011).

The outcome will be slightly different. NATO will begin to abandon the Afghan Army. The Afghan Government will continue cutting rights and freedoms by the time NATO fully leaves the Afghan Government will be the Taliban. A civil war will continue for years and the Government will be toppled if their is a democratically elected leader in place he will be stoned and dragged through the streets. The Taliban will then have control over the entire country and the United States will seek political relations with the new Taliban regime. Over the next ten years small pro democracy militia will fight the Taliban until the Taliban finally exterminates all resistance.

Likely another power will have to intervene for one reason.or another. The process will repeated itself. The Soviets would have won Afghanistan if America hadn't intervened. Today NATO would win if we stayed for twenty years and were willing to take the Taliban out in Pakistan.

The whole region needs to support a super power in liberating Afghanistan. However their will never be a Government entirely control of Afghanistan. Afghan will remain in a state of war at least some form of insurgency for the near future likely 50+ years!

Would they agree to terms that though?   I mean, basically their view is, that once the US leaves, they take back power quickly.  Even if they made a deal I'd think they'd betray it shortly after a US pullout.

It really feels to me like the only options in afghanistan are catastrophic failure, and a catastrophic failure that was negotiated and allows for the saving of face of the US.

The Taliban have a healthy fear of the US, i would say. They know they can't go back to their old ways entirely, or we'll just keep predator-drone-attacking them at our leisure after we leave. If they were negotiated into a settlement that was not overtly hostile to their interests, i believe some sort of peaceful solution can be achieved, so long as the other factions in Afghanistan are sufficiently strong that the Taliban would either face endless civil war or some sort of peaceful power-sharing agreement, they'll go for the latter if they have a secure role in said agreement.

we've been trying to empower them since the beggining with little results howeer.  Predator Drones are a good point however... though I question whether it's enough.

I'd argue there's a difference between sufficient strength to beat the Taliban and effectively occupy the country and strength enough to present the possibility to the Taliban that they cannot completely conquer the country. The latter the Afghan security forces likely possess, even if nowhere near the former.

Some people concentrate to much on political descision of dealing with Taliban, which indeed could be a political suicide for a politician. There're other ways how Taliban could come into power, somewhat legally akin to Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt if allowed (and that's was no-brainer after removal of Mubarak) or forcefully, since ISAF withdrawal at this point leaves little chance of Afghan Army to resist.

Security map of Afghanistan as of 2007-2008, not much has changed since then. Taliban is strong in Southern and Eastern regions.

Reminds me of Philip Carl Salzman's analysis of the political cycle in tribal countries.

1. Dissatisfied tribes rebel against westernized leader, put one of their own in charge
2. Tribal leader becomes rich and powerful
3. Gets out of touch with population, westernizes
4. Dissatisfied tribes rebel against westernized leader, put one of their own in charge

Example: Khadaffi.