DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, Wolf, you know, we are heading into the tenth year, 1,300 Americans have lost their lives, soldiers, but this has been the deadliest year of all, we have already lost 400. And, Wolf, even though we have got the best commander, the best general in the United States military there on the ground in General David Petraeus, it does look increasingly likely that this is going to have a messy end.
It is not -- you know, General Petraeus finding, I think, it is harder than it looks. He is -- he's made progress, the U.S. military made a lot of progress, made a lot of contributions. He's now going into Kandahar, but the Taliban is just simply not fading away. It remains an important part of what's going on in Afghanistan. There are not only the public opinion here but a lot of top-flight former secretary of states in the U.S. are saying maybe we are on the wrong track.
And now, we've got these talks under way in Kabul between the Karzai government and some elements of the Taliban. They are peace talks, but there are indications that if we want -- if Karzai is going to cut a deal, it may be that we would have to give up some things that we in the United States, NATO have demanded, like having a chance to stay in there.
So this war could have a messy end that could be -- the end of it could be as unpopular as the war itself.
BLITZER: And now we're hearing that some elements, some elements in the Pakistani intelligence service, what is called the ISI, may, may actually be supporting the Taliban, maybe encouraging the Taliban to go after U.S. and NATO forces, even though we are hearing from U.S. officials the top leadership in Pakistan, the government there, the military and the intelligence leadership per se, not necessarily part of that group.
GERGEN: Well, this is another complication in the story and why it makes it less likely we will have any kind of clear-cut result that we will be happy with.
We have -- Pakistan, as you know, is central, it's critical to stability in this region. We have poured billions of dollars into Pakistan and yet it is quite clear that there are elements in Pakistan that are not friendly to us and do not share our goals in Afghanistan and perhaps even in Pakistan. It may not be that the top leadership of the spy agency, ISI, may not be supporting the Taliban and you recalling them to five. As "The Wall Street Journal" reported on in the lead story today, a sobering piece there are people within the spy agency in Pakistan who are telling the Taliban, this is -- this is -- we have given these people in Pakistan billions of dollars, their -- many of the people in their spy agency are telling the Taliban keep fighting the United States in Afghanistan, pour it on. And just in our relationship from Pakistan are now becoming quite strained, we have this incident, very unfortunate incident, which we have apologized when our helicopters hit some of their army people, but over 100 different trucks with fuel for American troops have been blown up in Pakistan in recent days.
BLITZER: David, it's a very worrisome situation, as I say.
GERGEN: Very worrisome. Start year ten now of this operation much the stakes are certainly enormous for so many Americans much appreciate it very much.
Transcript from CNN's The Situation Room Aired October 7,2010