Ironically, America's idealism and unique, can-do attitude may be compounding the problems we face in Central Asia.

As the United States attempts to figure out how to proceed in Afghanistan and Pakistan, it has become blindingly clear that the realities in that region are a disorienting blend of contradictory, interwoven complexities. Thus, regardless of whether Afghan President Hamid Karzai wins re-election, adding more U.S. troops — and more warfare — to the area would be a mistake.

Afghanistan, the one-time training base of Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida, no longer serves that purpose, since that particular group of terrorists has relocated to the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan.

Should bin Laden return to Afghanistan, it would not take the 130,000 American soldiers the generals want — or even the 68,000 U.S. troops there now — to respond.

And if the rationale for sending yet more troops to that country is to remake it into an honest democracy, on our timetable, we are sadly deluded. While Afghans themselves may eventually make that transformation, our military presence currently provokes and feeds all sorts of undesirable effects involving the complex relationships and dynamics in the country — as well as in adjacent Pakistan.

Many longtime Asia observers, including our military planners, have stated that even with 200,000 total troops (including NATO's) or more, bringing democracy and stability to Afghanistan is not a sure bet, could easily take six or eight or more years, and consume $1 trillion or more.

That ancient nation today is in disarray. It is not clear what a majority of its people want. Its government is exceedingly corrupt and inept, its army is inadequate, and it has virtually no economy other than opium production. Its cities and its countryside are filled with the rubble of 30 years of war.

Its citizens, who are still feudal and primitive and spread out among countless villages, hold fierce loyalties to a multitude of ethnic groups, tribes, warlords, regions, languages, histories, and — importantly — competing interpretations of Islam.

Even the Taliban, whom we are apt to think of as one monolithic, guerrilla group, are really composed of many discrete resistance factions. They have — maybe temporarily — come together to take over as much of Afghanistan as they can. While they are galvanized to attack the American "occupation," they pose no threat to the United States itself. Instead, what they are after is Afghan sovereignty, personal income, and their own local power. Some are also fighting to create a rigid Islamic state.

While this diverse group of about 25,000 fighters that we call "the Taliban" contains some of the most sadistic individuals on the planet — men who will unhesitatingly cut a live victim's eyes out — it may be that circumstances today will not allow us to defeat them.

In a recent article titled "The Irresistible Illusion," in the July 9 London Review of Books, Rory Stewart, author of "The Places In Between," wrote that we cannot defeat a home-grown insurgency such as the Taliban without strong support from a majority of the indigenous population; a partnership with a legitimate, credible national government; and control of the country's borders. The U.S. currently has none of those factors working in its favor.

Stewart advocates reducing U.S. and NATO forces to 20,000 men or so. He wants us to provide development assistance primarily, and focus — if invited — on projects that yield services like electricity, water, irrigation, health, education and agriculture.

Similarly, Andrew Bacevich, author of "The Limits of Power," argues that remaking Afghanistan is both unnecessary for our security and impossible to achieve anyway. He believes our country has lost its senses of realism and proportion: We actually think that we can economically and militarily sustain — and that it is wise to conduct — a "hot" global war on terror.

William Polk, author of "Understanding Iran," also recommends reducing our troop levels in Afghanistan. He says we can't defeat the Taliban without turning the Afghan population against us, and our "victory" would simply create and displace new terrorists. He estimates the fight would cost us at least $3 trillion.

Ahmed Rashid, the notable Asian journalist and author of "Taliban" and "Jihad," cautions America that Pakistan may not be able to defeat the Taliban within its borders either. Pakistan, long struggling to balance the passions of its extremely divided people and manage the violence related to the Kashmir conflict, has now to deal with American demands that it regain control of terrorist sanctuaries along its border with Afghanistan.

This escalation may be impossible without Pakistan ripping itself apart.

It is time for America to reduce its military footprint in Central Asia. What began in Afghanistan in October 2001 as a tightly defined mission to destroy bin Laden and al-Qaeda has gradually expanded into an open-ended campaign to transform Afghanistan — and soon — Pakistan as well.

However worthy those goals may be, we're utterly overstepping ourselves here, in every way.

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Brian T. Watson of Swampscott is a regular Salem News columnist. Contact him at watson@nii.net.