Unfortunately for both Afghans and Americans, Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Barack Obama, his counterpart in Washington, missed a chance to reset the critical relationship between their two countries and move the dialogue in an honest direction.
Each month since U.S. President Barack Obama has taken office, Afghanistan has seen a growing number of civilian and military deaths - a spiral of violence which has served to destabilise a nation already struggling to recover from its previous three decades of war.
If the numerous foreign diplomats, envoys and super envoys assigned to Afghanistan really want to help the country, the best thing they can do during these vote counting and election-fraud investigation days and maybe weeks ahead is to go on vacation.
The people of Afghanistan are increasingly caught in the cross-fire between a violent insurgency and a violent counter insurgency but does this mean the entire country is unravelling?