If Eleanor Roosevelt liked it, its probably a really, really bad idea. Ditto for JFK. Even Saint Ronnie can be wrong sometimes.
Afghanistan has never been stable by any definition we understand. Its a tribal society and their people lack both the ability and inclination to govern themselves outside of that frame work. If you want stability in Afghanistan, you’re going to need a sociopath to run it, because he’s going to have to crush a lot of people to make the central government work. Iraq works (sort of) because we had Saddam to prepare the way.
In a practical sense it seems humanitarianism can never be our basis for consistent international action, unless we had begun in 1945 by substituting the military for entitlements. Reagan certainly came the closest of anyone to achieving the goal when he picked a fight with the “Evil Empire”. The U.N. has moved far from that concept as demonstrated by placing Libya on the Human Rights Council.
I really appreciated Obama claiming human rights as criteria for Libyan action, when he considered preventing genocide inconsistent reasoning for maintaining troops in Iraq; pointing out our un-involvement in the Congo and Darfur. See http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19862711/ns/politics-decision_08/
I would agree that Afghanistan would not achieve a stable government as we would define it. Application of counterinsurgency tactics within Afghanistan would increase momentum among local religious, tribal and political leaders to reject Taliban jihadists and accept a national government. The objective would be to help them make pragmatic, consistent decisions recognizing utility of and alignment with Kabul.
Afghan and NATO combined units would clear jihadists from marginal regions, retain military forces, and allow reconstruction team entry. Locals would assume authority as behavior confirmed commitment to national goals. In rebellious regions attacks would disrupt Taliban units planning offensives, until regular presence expanded from adjacent pacific areas. Some areas would never be pacified.
The desired leadership would not be sociopaths according to their definitions, although we Westerners would probably always have doubts. The British managed to achieve a functioning India, but continually campaigned against the hill tribes, so some “political discussions” would always involve warfare.