Ex-Army colonel from Omaha who helped set up talks with Taliban still bullish on peace in...

Last month, President Donald Trump pulled the plug on peace talks with Afghanistan’s Taliban, the hard-line Islamist faction that controlled the country when al-Qaida orchestrated the 9/11 terror attacks from Afghan soil in 2001.

You might think that would disturb Christopher Kolenda, a retired Army colonel from Omaha whose under-the-radar meetings with Taliban leaders two years ago kick-started the latest round of talks. He also represented the Pentagon in discussions with the Taliban between 2010 and 2013, which ended in failure.

Kolenda has fought the Taliban, too, commanding a cavalry squadron that won over rebel fighters in a pioneering “armed diplomacy” strategy more than a decade ago.

Today, the 1983 Creighton Prep graduate, now 54, lives in Milwaukee with his wife, Nicole. He works as a leadership consultant and serves as an adjunct senior fellow with the Center for a New American Security, a defense-oriented think tank.

He said he is disappointed but not surprised by last month’s setback, when Trump declared negotiations with the Taliban to be “dead” after the Taliban launched an attack that killed a U.S. soldier.

Though Kolenda was not involved at that point, he saw the breakdown coming.

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