Afghanistan's situation is obviously as complex as it can get but at the level of day to day experience of majority of locals (not only elite city-dwellers) Taliban are hated/feared but consistent, and they generally practice what they preach. In my brief personal encounters, and observations of what locals face: the corrupt government, its police and its army is like the "Zahhak the Snake Shoulder" (an evil figure in Persian mythology); an insatiable unstable monster better avoided at all cost. I suspect this is one of the main reasons nobody really put up a fight this time around.

Afghanistan's tragic contemporary conflicts has many winners and losers that switch places every so often but there's been one constant loser: its civilians.