August 2003: NATO deploys troops to Kabul for a peacekeeping mission. The force later expands to other areas and numbers 11,000. The U.S. has more than 10,000 troops in Afghanistan.
Oct. 9, 2004: Hamid Karzai wins Afghanistan's first-ever presidential election.
Nov. 17, 2008:
Taliban militants reject an offer of peace talks with Karzai.
Nov. 25, 2008: Karzai calls on the international community to set up a timeline for ending the war.
Oct. 2009: October becomes the deadliest month in the war for U.S. troops, with 58 killed.
Dec. 1, 2009: Declaring "our security is at stake," President Barack Obama orders an additional 30,000 U.S. troops into the 8-year-long war in Afghanistan. The 30,000 new troops brings the total in Afghanistan to more than 100,000 U.S. forces.
December 2010: U.S. diplomatic cables posted online by WikiLeaks anger Afghan officials.
May 2, 2011:
Osama bin Laden is killed in Pakistan by U.S. Navy SEALs and CIA operatives in a covert operation.
January 2012: Video surfaces online showing uniformed U.S. Marine snipers urinating on the corpses of Taliban fighters. U.S. Officials deplore the action. Karzai calls the act " inhuman."
February 2012: Riots break out after workers at a U.S.-run prison reveal that American soldiers put Korans and other religious materials in a pit and set them on fire. The Pentagon says the Muslim holy books were burned by mistake. Protests and retaliatory attacks killed more than 30 people, including six U.S. soldiers. Several Afghan lawmakers call for an immediate U.S. withdrawal.
March 2012: A U.S. Soldier is accused of killing 16 Afghan villagers, including women and children, while they slept.