A truly unique all-embracing narrative of the American war in Afghanistan from the own words of its architects. Choosing Defeat takes an unparalleled inside look at America's longest war, pulling back the curtain on the inner deliberations behind the scenes. The author combines his own extensive experience in the Army, the CIA, and the White House, with interviews from policymakers within the Bush, Obama, and Trump administrations, to produce a groundbreaking study of how American leaders make wartime decisions. Transporting you inside the White House Situation Room, every key strategic debate over twenty years – from the immediate aftermath of 9/11, to Obama's surge and withdrawal, to Trump's negotiations with the Taliban, and Biden's final pullout is carefully reconstructed. Paul D. Miller identifies issues in US leadership, governance, military strategy, and policymaking that extend beyond the war in Afghanistan and highlight the existence of deeper problems in American foreign policy.

‘This is a remarkable and important book - erudite and detailed, yet pithy and provocative. As a soldier, intelligence analyst, policymaker, professor, and scholar, Paul D. Miller has certainly earned his right to write this book and offer his take on the history of America’s Afghanistan experience. More, he has helped us understand what went so badly wrong there, even though Americans like him who served can take some solace that the war helped prevent another 9/11 despite its ultimate failure to achieve larger objectives.’

Michael O'Hanlon - Phil Knight Chair in Defense and Strategy, the Brookings Institution, and author of To Dare Mighty Things: U.S. Defense Strategy Since the Revolution

‘Paul D. Miller’s detailed accounting of how the US lost the war in Afghanistan is an important, sobering analysis that every new policymaker should read.’

Kori Schake - Director for Foreign and Defense Policy, American Enterprise Institute

‘Paul D. Miller argues that the problem in Afghanistan was not too much reliance on counterinsurgency and nation-building, but too little - and flawed, inconsistent, rushed implementation where they were undertaken at all. His perceptive, penetrating analysis is essential reading for anyone interested not just in Afghanistan but in civil warfare and stabilization generally.’

Stephen Biddle - Professor of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University

‘It is rare to find this level of honest critique of events in which one participated, and we should be grateful for Miller’s fortitude in confronting these truths. … As the War in Afghanistan is dissected by historians, Miller’s book will be recognized as an essential part of the understanding of the conflict and a roadmap of errors to avoid in future wars.'

Mike Nelson Source: Providence

‘Miller draws on his background as an Army veteran, NSC staffer, and academic to produce this analysis of the American failure in Afghanistan. … Recommended.’

A. J. Falk Source: Choice

‘‘Choosing Defeat’ is a rare achievement: a book that confronts strategic failure without cynicism, blends scholarship with firsthand insight, and restores moral vocabulary to the analysis of war and peace. Its argument is bold, its evidence rich, and its critique of American strategic culture both urgent and constructive. While its US-centric perspective limits its treatment of regional dynamics, especially Pakistan, that focus is part of the book’s purpose: to force US policymakers to examine not what others did to them, but what they did to themselves. This is a book that will be read, debated, and cited for years, not only by historians of the Afghanistan war but, one hopes, by those who are responsible for shaping America’s future engagements abroad. Its lessons are sobering, but its underlying hope is clear: that wisdom, prudence, courage, and justice remain possible in American statecraft if leaders are willing to pursue them.’

Hassan Abbas - H-Diplo

‘As the historiography of the War on Terror develops, ‘Choosing Defeat’ is a book that scholars should consult. It documents the twists and turns of policymaking in this complex war and makes many sound critiques. It also displays an admirable commitment to historical contingency in pushing against the fallacy that this was a doomed war from the start.’

‘This book offers a meticulous reconstruction of American decision-making during the war. Drawing on extensive interviews with senior policymakers and Miller’s own experience in government, the book reconstructs every key strategic debate over the two-decade intervention. The narrative is richly detailed and often revealing. It will doubtless become an essential reference for scholars who seek to understand how US officials perceived the conflict.’

‘An outstanding book.'

‘Miller offers a thoughtful, detailed, and well-written analysis of US strategic thinking under four very different presidents: George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, and Biden. … As Miller energetically lays out his case, he benefits from his firsthand experience in the US Army and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), as well as his familiarity with many of the key players in Afghanistan and Washington, some of whom sat for interviews. Analyses of Afghanistan can be a graveyard of nuance, and a bundle of simplistic myths and stories. Miller rightly pushes back on the ‘false sense of inevitability’ … and argues that in reality, a range of outcomes were possible in Afghanistan.’

‘A truly great book on the war … Miller lays out clearly that it was in America’s power to build and maintain an Afghanistan that did not harbor terror but served as a bulwark against it in a dangerous part of the world, and that four presidents threw that chance away.’

'Paul D. Miller’s Choosing Defeat: The Twenty-Year Saga of How America Lost Afghanistan is one of the most ambitious and morally serious reflections yet written on America’s twenty-year war in Afghanistan. Part insider account, part analytic autopsy, and part philosophical meditation on the nature of statecraft, the book shifts the center of gravity in Afghanistan War literature away from battlefield narratives and toward the inner workings of American decision-making. Few works embody such candor about US strategic behavior, intellectual blind spots, and moral contradictions.'

Hassan Abbas - National Defence University Source: Jervis Forum, H-Diplo

'Paul Miller’s Choosing Defeat: The Twenty-Year Saga of How America Lost Afghanistan offers a meticulous reconstruction of American decision-making during the war. Drawing on extensive interviews with senior policymakers and Miller’s own experience in government, the book reconstructs every key strategic debate over the two-decade intervention. The narrative is richly detailed and often revealing. It will doubtless become an essential reference for scholars who seek to understand how US officials perceived the conflict.'

Jennifer Brick Murtazashvili - University of Pittsburgh Source: Jervis Forum, H-Diplo