But no one underestimated the bitter-end determination of some in the Taliban, notably the Pakistanis, Arabs and other foreigners among them who have fought hard.
Two men with a similar steely outlook bonded with a shared experience of bitter defeats and determination to fulfil their ambitions.
But the rest of the concert was about individual relationships, from tentative beginnings to bitter separations to the determination to start again.
And then turning up at the last, a bitter silhouette of thin-lipped determination in the rain, outside Catherine's home.
Still seeking rap credentials even though his audience is packed with squealing teenage girls, Eminem is headlining a package with Papa Roach, whose melodic rap-rock moves from bitter complaints to vows of determination and the lusty, fast-talking, multimillion-selling rapper Ludacris, along with the rapper Xzibit and the rap-metal band Bionic Jive.
It signals the opening of a potentially bitter battle between press and parliament, underlining the determination of most publishers and editors to reject the royal charter agreed by politicians and peers.
"It was a very bitter pill to swallow but there's a steely determination that it won't happen again".
We may also have to steel ourselves, as victory appears in sight, for some more bitter setbacks in the long Egyptian battle for self-determination.
In the most bitter of ironies, this spectacle of black athletic excellence, self-determination, and entrepreneurial-savvy was sponsored by one of the world's most murderous dictators at the behest of one of its most cunning and untrustworthy figures.
Friends always hastened to praise Clinton for her determination to "keep going," but they uniformly described her now as angry, confused, bitter, and sad.
