I don't think people really understand or think about what happened in Afghanistan. Like maybe we were just holding back or something. The final drone strike we carried out in Afghanistan is both deeply symbolic and enlightening. We killed a guy, his family, and bystanders including 7 children. The reason is that somebody thought the water bottles the guy was loading into his truck looked suspicious, so that was a good enough reason to kill him and everybody around him - even knowing full well this strike was likely to receive far more attention than average.
The army initially claimed they took out a terrorist with a vehicle full of explosives. They blamed any 'collateral damage' on secondary explosive discharges. The excessive scrutiny on this, the final symbolic drone strike, revealed those water bottles were full of water. And not only were the target and his family not terrorists, they were aid workers literally working for a US NGO in the process of trying to get a visa to the US. Nobody was held accountable or punished in any way. [1]
The point of this is that we certainly weren't "holding back" or anything of the sort. We were absolutely brutal in Afghanistan, and this went on for 20 years. But ultimately winning an occupation against a civilian population that is both hostile and armed, is basically impossible. Afghanistan now has the honor of being the only country to have defeated both the USSR and the USA. And they did it, for the most part, with "obsolete" weapons and improvised explosives, all while kitted out in robes and sandals.
[1] - https://www.newsweek.com/afghan-targeted-us-drone-strike-wor...