A week ago I watched the documentary on him on the History channel. here are a few quiet musings:

1. If you are an elected official BY the people, the people should know about what you are up to, and they should OK your candlestine activities. I know that is a catch 22 thingy, but that is the nature of the beast. What if that activity is something what your constituens don't approve of?

2. He was shows in the documentary as the guy who singlehandedly won/achieved American help for weapon shipments to the Mudjahedins. Brzezinski noted later that the policy was already in place when Wilson hadn't even heard about Afghanistan.

3. I don't care how important is your next day flight, if you cause a car accident while drunk, you don't flee the place,(isn't that a felony?) but wait for the police.

4. If you break the law for a good cause, it is still breaking the law.

5. They should have let him to ride against the Russians and fight... :)

6. He was basicly a boozing and drugusing rockstar!

A week ago I watched the documentary on him on the History channel. here are a few quiet musings:

1. If you are an elected official BY the people, the people should know about what you are up to, and they should OK your candlestine activities. I know that is a catch 22 thingy, but that is the nature of the beast. What if that activity is something what your constituens don't approve of?

2. He was shows in the documentary as the guy who singlehandedly won/achieved American help for weapon shipments to the Mudjahedins. Kissinger noted later that the policy was already in place when Wilson hadn't even heard about Afghanistan.

3. I don't care how important is your next day flight, if you cause a car accident while drunk, you don't flee the place,(isn't that a felony?) but wait for the police.

4. If you break the law for a good cause, it is still breaking the law.

5. They should have let him to ride against the Russians and fight... :)

6. He was basicly a boozing and drugusing rockstar!

I read the book a few years ago when it came out, and I came away from it thinking it probably gave Charlie more credit than he rightfully deserves, but that he also did what he thought he had to do to help the Afghans, and that he truly came to believe in what they were doing.

As to his personal character, he was pretty much a drunk playboy, but if that disqualifies a person from public service, well, then we really wouldn't have too many public servants, would we?

Bottom line: To get the Pakistanis to knowingly work with the Israelis was damned impressive.

Oh yes, the documentary forgot to mention Wilson's strong support of Somoza. I wonder why?


As to his personal character, he was pretty much a drunk playboy, but if that disqualifies a person from public service, well, then we really wouldn't have too many public servants, would we?

Bottom line: To get the Pakistanis to knowingly work with the Israelis was damned impressive.

Well, I don't know if I can agree with that deffense. Just because everyone is stupid/thief/etc, that doesn't mean you have to be the same.

I missed that part about the Pak-Israeli cooperation.

Another case of "The ends obviously justify the means" when it involves the best interest of the US.

Kind of like the current "Waterboarding" debates going on today. When it was done to our soldiers, it was clearly a despicable war crime. But...... when the US does it, it's a necessary interrogation method.

A boozing womanizer politician meddled in the affairs of another country which resulted in war. What a great guy.

The war was already happening. Try reading sometime. It will help you look less foolish.

The war was already happening. Try reading sometime. It will help you look less foolish.

By now you should have realized that very few posters on Sciforums actually read books. Despite this being labeled the "Intelligent Community", I'd venture to say some of the least well read members of the Ebays reside here.

The funniest part for me is how so many of them go out of their way to drop in on threads where they no absolutely nothing about the subject matter, but insist on showing their ignorance, as evidenced by desi's post.

The war was already happening.

He wasn't that far off, if he says: "that accelerated the war". Clearly, giving the Stringers to the Mujahedin escalated the war....
And who knows? Had the Russians subdued the country, the Taliban wouldn't have had a birthplace and no 9/11???
Just playing with history....

A boozing womanizer politician meddled in the affairs of another country which resulted in war. What a great guy.

You're joking? This is America's fault? We caused the Red Army to march into Afghanistan in the hopes of adding another republic to the USSR? Huh?

Or were you just totally oblivious of any pertinent historical facts on the issue and just wanted to throw in another of your non sequiturs to make sure everybody knew that no matter who's to blame, you hold American responsible.

Brilliant.

We caused the Red Army to march into Afghanistan in the hopes of adding another republic to the USSR? Huh

If you happen to know history, it was exactly like Vietnam. There had been Russian "advisers" in Afghanistan years before the invasion. There was a treaty between Russia and Afghanistan declaring that if the Afghan government asks for help, Russia would come and help out in a military fashion. Then the government asked....

"In 1972, up to 100 Soviet military consultants and technical specialists were sent on detached duty to Afghanistan to train the Afghan armed forces. In May 1978, the governments signed another international agreement, sending up to 400 Soviet military advisors to Afghanistan. In December 1978, Moscow and Kabul signed a bilateral treaty of friendship and cooperation that permitted Soviet deployment in case of an Afghan request. Soviet military assistance increased and the PDPA regime became increasingly dependent on Soviet military equipment and advisors."

To try and make a coherent decision about history and fact based on a Hollywood movie, is like trying to do brain surgery on your self, at home, dangerous, foolish, and show nothing but stupidity.

More on American involvement:

"Carter advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski stated "According to the official version of history, CIA aid to the Mujahadeen began during 1980, that is to say, after the Soviet army invaded Afghanistan, 24 Dec 1979. But the reality, secretly guarded until now, is completely otherwise." Brzezinski himself played a fundamental role in crafting U.S. policy, which, unbeknownst even to the Mujahideen, was part of a larger strategy "to induce a Soviet military intervention." In a 1998 interview with Le Nouvel Observateur, Brzezinski recalled:
We didn't push the Russians to intervene, but we knowingly increased the probability that they would...That secret operation was an excellent idea. It had the effect of drawing the Soviets into the Afghan trap...The day that the Soviets officially crossed the border, I wrote to President Carter. We now have the opportunity of giving to the Soviet Union its Vietnam War."

What's your source on the above? I'm reading Robert Gates' From the Shadows at the moment and it doesn't agree with this. Nor does anything else I have read.

A few other points...


1. If you are an elected official BY the people, the people should know about what you are up to, and they should OK your candlestine activities. I know that is a catch 22 thingy, but that is the nature of the beast. What if that activity is something what your constituens don't approve of?

This is impossible. Covert actions are covert precisely because they are not common knowledge.


2. He was shows in the documentary as the guy who singlehandedly won/achieved American help for weapon shipments to the Mudjahedins. Brzezinski noted later that the policy was already in place when Wilson hadn't even heard about Afghanistan.

The policy was in place, but it was meager and ineffective until Wilson and the Reaganites increased the budget and forced the CIA to take the gloves off. The Carter administration funded the efforts at around $5 million, per my recollection. By the end of the conflict, the US was sending more than $500 million. That's a big difference, and Wilson was a part of it.


3. I don't care how important is your next day flight, if you cause a car accident while drunk, you don't flee the place,(isn't that a felony?) but wait for the police.

It is. I haven't seen this documentary, but Crile's book is generally very favorable toward Wilson, and it chooses to look at incidents like the one above as evidence of "Good Time Charlie," in a no harm, no foul kind of way. That was my main problem with the book. Crile fell in love with his subject, and as a result, objectivity went out the window. He also gives Zia al-Haq a pass, and Zia was a brutal thug. He also is the man most responsible for turning Pakistan into a sort of theocracy. As has been noted elsewhere in this thread, Charlie's support of Samoza, another thug, is also intentionally made light of. My assessment is that Charlie, a terribly flawed person, just wasn't capable of truly sizing people up for who they really were...

What's your source on the above?

Wikipedia, Charles Wilson entry..


This is impossible. Covert actions are covert precisely because they are not common knowledge.

That's why I said Catch 22... It is an interesting moral question though. What if the people after the fact don't agree with the Senator's secret activity? After all Wilson was also supporting Somoza. My bet is that a poll would show most of his constituents disagreed with that...


By the end of the conflict, the US was sending more than $500 million. That's a big difference, and Wilson was a part of it.

True. We just don't know how much was his achievements. As another poster who actually read the book pointed out, he came away with the feeling that Wilson got more credit than what he deserved.

That's why I said Catch 22... It is an interesting moral question though. What if the people after the fact don't agree with the Senator's secret activity?

This is indeed the rub of the matter, but I see no easy way to resolve it. The entire country can't be privy to state secrets.


After all Wilson was also supporting Somoza. My bet is that a poll would show most of his constituents disagreed with that...

My bet is that most of his constituents, then and now, would have no idea who Somoza is.


True. We just don't know how much was his achievements. As another poster who actually read the book pointed out, he came away with the feeling that Wilson got more credit than what he deserved.

I agree, and have said I think Crile's book goes a little overboard. As I said, Crile fell for Charlie hard. He almost idealizes him in the book. Tellingly, Wilson is barely mentioned much in Milton Bearden's or Steve Coll's books, which cover basically the same events during the same period. But then those books are largely about Central Asia, whereas Crile centers most of his tale in DC. Still, I think it safe to say Crile overestimates Charlie's importance. It makes for a better story that way. However, we do need to consider that even the CIA valued CW. The part about him getting the medal from them is true...

I think Charlie was a convenient vehicle to romanticize a story that needed to be told. He was a rebel, a drinker, a womanizer, etc., and for whatever reason people tend to identify more with those types. Honestly, will anybody really be that interested in Dick Cheney's memoirs when/if they come out? Probably not, because Cheney is a cold, cynical bastard, with no obvious human frailty.

I believe Charlie really believed in what he was doing, and as I've already said, he empathized with the noble afghan freedom fighter, even if the whole situation was completely over his head. Sure, he was a glory hound, but what politician isn't? I'm glad the story is being told, and while there may be certain liberties taken in the book, and I'm sure there will be more taken in the movie, it is important that people know how complex the situation was during that time.

I have to modify a statement I made above. I have just finished Milt Bearden's book, in which he touches on events in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where he was station chief at the end of the war against the Soviets.

Bearden praises Wilson, saying he was absolutely essential in winning funds for the covert action. So while I still think it's safe to say Crile overestimates Charlie's importance, I wanted to note, for accuracy's sake, that Bearden gives the Congressman high praise for his fundraising efforts. Whether Charlie was as involved in the covert plans as the book and film depict, Bearden does not say, an absence which I take to mean that these were handled by the CIA.

This is impossible. Covert actions are covert precisely because they are not common knowledge.


“ Originally Posted by Defiant
2. He was shows in the documentary as the guy who singlehandedly won/achieved American help for weapon shipments to the Mudjahedins. Brzezinski noted later that the policy was already in place when Wilson hadn't even heard about Afghanistan. ”

The policy was in place, but it was meager and ineffective until Wilson and the Reaganites increased the budget and forced the CIA to take the gloves off. The Carter administration funded the efforts at around $5 million, per my recollection. By the end of the conflict, the US was sending more than $500 million. That's a big difference, and Wilson was a part of it. If there is a better argument against allowing covert action by your intelligence agencies than the blowback from Charlie Wilson's War, I can't think of it.

Given that you love to make giant leaps of logic and connect things often seperated by years and a lack of correlation to confirm your anti-American template, I'm not surprised you would say as much.

But a more in-depth examination of the rise of militant Islam, the Taliban and Al Qaeda renders your "blowback" argument slightly more problematic. You'll need to understand more about the above before rationale people who know a thing or two about this will take you seriously.

Lessee: fall of Soviets in '89, period of infighting among Islamic warlords too well armed and experienced to be managed by indifferent US, rise of Taliban and turning of newly armed and experienced and trained jihadists to next Western evil empire mid nineties, first direct major blowback '96 in Saudi Arabia.

Seven years.

Arming and funding of Baluchistan Islamic tribalists against Iran a couple years ago, declaration of loyalty by them to OBL and Islamic jihad agaisnt the West (and Iran, if they get around to it): about as much time as it took the funds to clear and the guns to show up.

Seven months ? More or less.

Delivery of funds to groups taking up arms against the Iranian supported Hezbollah after the Israeli invasion and troubled withdrawal from the smoking mess, discovery that said groups were still more motivated by their long alliance with AQ and other Sunni jihadists against the US/Israel combine: immediate.

Seven weeks ? News travels slowly.

The blowback interval seems to be getting shorter.

Is there anything the CIA has done by way of major covert operations (not intelligence gathering, small and specific influences, their original mission) that we would not gladly take back, if we got a do-over ?

As usual, you've thrown a lot of chum in the water to bolster your lack of a cogent argument.


Lessee: fall of Soviets in '89, period of infighting among Islamic warlords too well armed and experienced to be managed by indifferent US, rise of Taliban and turning of newly armed and experienced and trained jihadists to next Western evil empire mid nineties, first direct major blowback '96 in Saudi Arabia.

I'm not sure it's worth debating you on these points, as you think an argument is little more than an endless string of chronology, your subjective take on said chronology and your subjective correlation between events in the chronology.

Again, a more in-depth examination of the rise of militant Islam, the Taliban and Al Qaeda renders your "blowback" argument slightly more problematic. The US did not somehow create militant Islam all by its lonesome, nor are its actions abroad the sole reason groups like Al Qaeda and the Taliban burst into existence, as some would have you believe. A discussion about the multitude of factors that contributed to the rise of these three would be interesting, but I don't think you're either equiped or objective enough to really engage in such a conversation. You can't even answer direct questions, can you?


Is there anything the CIA has done by way of major covert operations (not intelligence gathering, small and specific influences, their original mission) that we would not gladly take back, if we got a do-over ?

That's a complicated question, covering more than 60 years of operations. As far as what we're talking about here, even Wilson says he thinks the Afghan operation was worth it, and the fact that the US "dropped the ball" afterwards shouldn't be held against it. Personally, I think blaming the rise of the Taliban, which indirectly helped enable 9/11, on the US/Afghan operation is more than a tad simplistic.

That's a complicated question, covering more than 60 years of operations. As far as what we're talking about here, even Wilson says he thinks the Afghan operation was worth it, and the fact that the US "dropped the ball" afterwards shouldn't be held against it. Even Wilson thinks it was "worth it" ? Too bad about the actual events, though ?

Worth what to whom ?

And why shouldn't I hold consequent - even just subsequent - events agaisnt it, if I am evaluating the worth of such endeavors in the future ?

We have, as observed, 60 years of operations to search for examples of postiive consequences from covert violence as guided by the the kinds of people who make careers of covert violence. So far, we seemingly would have been better off, or at least not obviously worse off, not doing any of it. It's 60 years of fuckup and blowback, evil and failure and unexpected bad news.

Let's stop doing it. No more covert violence - if you can't justify it in public, you don't get to do it. Then if things blow up in our face, we can at least live without the blame of lighting the fuse.

Too bad about the actual events, though?

Wilson, and he's not alone in this, believes that the action hastened the demise of the Soviet Union, a position I'm prone to agree with after finishing Bearden's book. I'm sure you'll offer some typical riposte about the US's overblown fear of the Soviets or that the Soviet Union was prone to topple anyway, but such remarks are little more than the intellectual equivilent of Monday-morning quarterbacking.


And why shouldn't I hold consequent - even just subsequent - events agaisnt it, if I am evaluating the worth of such endeavors in the future?

I'm not saying you shouldn't. I'm saying your bias and lack of understanding about this region compels you to make claims and connect events that don't quite match up the way you think they do. Again, a more in-depth examination of the rise of militant Islam, the Taliban and Al Qaeda renders your "blowback" argument slightly more problematic. The US did not somehow create militant Islam all by its lonesome, nor are its actions abroad the sole reason groups like Al Qaeda and the Taliban burst into existence, as some would have you believe.


We have, as observed, 60 years of operations to search for examples of postiive consequences from covert violence as guided by the the kinds of people who make careers of covert violence. So far, we seemingly would have been better off, or at least not obviously worse off, not doing any of it. It's 60 years of fuckup and blowback, evil and failure and unexpected bad news.

This is a simplistic and naive view. You need to learn to not be such an absolutist and to quit trying to fit every round peg in your square holes of anti-Americanism.

Are there failures in 60 years of covert operations? Certainly there are. Should none of it have even been undertaken? That depends on whether you think places like Japan, Germany, Italy and Greece would have been better off under Soviet domination for the latter part of the 20th century. I happen to think the Soviet Union was a very nasty political structure that exported nastiness to whatever corner of the globe it could. Your argument seems to suggest that the US should have shrugged its shoulders at the Cold War, taken its ball and gone home.

The funny thing is that this was briefly attempted in the 1970s, when the US was notoriously wobbly after Watergate and Vietnam, by Ford and Carter, both of whom were reluctant to replicate the CIA's previous doings. The result was massive Soviet acension in the Third World wherever we chose not to face them down. And it's interesting that the blowback from this lack of committment isn't typically addressed by people such as yourself. Yemen, the Congo, Ethiopia — the list of spots the Soviets meddled with that are still suffering with is as impressive as the US record you never fail to attack. In the end, Carter went back to the CIA and started the Afghan program. Even he realized what had to be done...


Let's stop doing it. No more covert violence - if you can't justify it in public, you don't get to do it. Then if things blow up in our face, we can at least live without the blame of lighting the fuse.

That's a noble sentiment, but it's hopelessly naive. All nations have covert capabilities and they all use them extensively.

I'm sure you'll offer some typical riposte about the US's overblown fear of the Soviets or that the Soviet Union was prone to topple anyway, but such remarks are little more than the intellectual equivilent of Monday-morning quarterbacking. But a little Monday Morning quarterbacking is exactly what is called for.

What we should and shouldn't have done, in 20/20 hindsight. Clues to what we should and shouldn't do now.

In hindsight, the Afghans might very well have benefitted from a Soviet breaking of the warlord system and Islamic misogyny, followed by a spinning off from a collapsing Soviet empire into a state better than their current one. (It coiuld hardly get much worse than their current one).

And the US would probably have been better off without the huge boost it gave to Islamic jihad worldwide, and the reinforcement of tribal and fundie political systems in the Caspian Sea resource basin.

And that from what is presented as the example of success - the operation that worked. If it's downhill from there, it's a pit we're describing.

Are there failures in 60 years of covert operations? Certainly there are. Should none of it have even been undertaken? That depends on whether you think places like Japan, Germany, Italy and Greece would have been better off under Soviet domination for the latter part of the 20th century. Covert violence gets the credit for keeping Italy,et al, out of Soviet domination ?

And it's interesting that the blowback from this lack of committment isn't typically addressed by people such as yourself. Yemen, the Congo, Ethiopia — the list of spots the Soviets meddled with that are still suffering with is as impressive as the US record you never fail to attack. If I were Russian, I would attack them - and on similar grounds: look at how we shot ourselves in the feet. Why continue in such self-destructive evil ?

I would quote the Russian soldiers who talked about how strange it was to be going to Afghanistan with the best of motives - to help, to improve lives, to bring the beneifts of modern civilization - and be greeted with hatred and bullets. I would say that good motives are not enough excuse for doing wrong with so much killing, and that the motives of the State were not good anyway (oil, gas, pipelines). I would say that freeing the Afghans from the Isalmic fundies and warlords, bringing education and health care, allegedly helping the Afghans, does not explain the chosen strategy and tactics.

But since I am American, I point to Chile, rather than Yemen. Nicaragua, not Ethiopia. And with more force - due to the greater impact of US meddling.

But a little Monday Morning quarterbacking is exactly what is called for.

That's fine, but at some point, it gets to be ridiculous. When you're arguing about what might have been, based on what wasn't and never was, forgive me if I don't take the conclusions seriously.

And again, your arguments about blowback require we look at a country or region for an extended period of time and lay the praise or the blame for every political development there on American involvement. All I am doing is questioning the soundness of this approach, largely because I think it's far too simplistic. The US did not create factionalism in Afghanistan, for example, nor did it create and fund the madrassas that gave rise to the Taliban and militant Islam in the region. But you would have all of it America's fault, America's responsibility, etc. The world isn't as neat as all that, and sometimes, our policy-makers have to make difficult decisions in parts of the world where there are no good choices.


In hindsight, the Afghans might very well have benefitted from a Soviet breaking of the warlord system and Islamic misogyny, followed by a spinning off from a collapsing Soviet empire into a state better than their current one. (It coiuld hardly get much worse than their current one).

Oh, it could, and what's more, it has been worse. Much worse.

Afghanistan now is not nearly as bad off as it was in the early to mid 1990s, when the militias were sparring with the Taliban; it's not as bad as it was in the 1980s, when the Soviets were rampaging across the countryside in their Hind gunships and indiscriminately slaughtering civilians. Again, your grasp of what actually has happened in the country seems limited. (The misogyny you speak of, for example, was largely a creation of the Taliban; it was not endemic to the country prior to their takeover). It's important to remember just how bad the Soviet invasion was (the film does a good job capturing this) and to remember that the Afghans asked for our assistance. Are you saying we should have denied them? That we should have let them die, in the hope that some greater good would come of it?


And the US would probably have been better off without the huge boost it gave to Islamic jihad worldwide, and the reinforcement of tribal and fundie political systems in the Caspian Sea resource basin.

Militant Islam was definitely given a boost by the US involvement in Afghanistan, but how much of a boost? Here again, you need to look more closely at the issue and see the nuances. Most of the US aid to Afghanistan went to Afghans. And while it's true that the Afghans the US armed, through the ISI, were largely fundamentalists in nature (they fought harder), these people did not leave Afghanistan after the war and spread terrorism around the region. The Arabs, like bin Laden's group, who fought in the conflict had little impact on it and were never directly armed. Essentially, they spent most of their time networking and building up their jihadist message. So yes, while this certainly happened in Afghanistan, while the conflict there drew them together, they groups already existed and already had a purpose. Thus, the US "role" is one part in a multifaceted equation, and not a simple matter of this-led-to-that.


Covert violence gets the credit for keeping Italy,et al, out of Soviet domination?

The CIA's role in Italy in the post-WW2 is well known. Not only did the agency back the Christian Democrats in the 1948 election with at least $10 million of money, through the Mafia, it helped provide muscle to break the Soviet's hold on the unions and "the streets."

Similar situations were repeated in the other countries I mentioned. Essentially, it was the KGB versus the CIA in election free-for-alls. Tim Weiner's flawed, but impressive book, Legacy of Ashes talks extensively about the operations in these countries after the war.


But since I am American, I point to Chile, rather than Yemen. Nicaragua, not Ethiopia. And with more force - due to the greater impact of US meddling.

And in doing so, you often conveniently overlook the role the Soviets played in each of these places.

The US did not create factionalism in Afghanistan, for example, nor did it create and fund the madrassas that gave rise to the Taliban and militant Islam in the region. But you would have all of it America's fault, America's responsibility, etc. I think that when evaluating the use of covert violence in a place, the results are worth looking at. If you don't want to blame the US for the Taliban, because the US did not fund the Taliban (directly), then don't. Myself, I blame fundie Islam for a lot of stuff like that, but fundie religion is one of my focusses. Others might blame Pakistan's domestic political needs. Blame is not at issue here.

The rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan is one of the results of the covert violence the US sponsored, the weapons imported and so forth. Without that covert operation, no warlord wars, no Taliban.

Afghanistan now is not nearly as bad off as it was in the early to mid 1990s, when the militias were sparring with the Taliban; it's not as bad as it was in the 1980s, when the Soviets were rampaging across the countryside in their Hind gunships and indiscriminately slaughtering civilians. Again, your grasp of what actually has happened in the country seems limited. (The misogyny you speak of, for example, was largely a creation of the Taliban; it was not endemic to the country prior to their takeover). The misogyny I speak of was hardly created by the Taliban. The Soviets proudly altruistic mission in Afghanistan included the freeing of the oppressed women there, back in the 80s, for example. Oppression of women was a well known feature of Afghan culture.

But the comparison I made was to the status of Afghans after all that Soviet rampaging (greatly intensified by US covert operations) and warlord infighting afterwards (likewise). You would be hard put to realistically come up with an Afghan nation in worse shape after much less (if any) of that, now, eh?

Are you saying we should have denied them? That we should have let them die, in the hope that some greater good would come of it? I am saying that arming the most violent of them to fight, insitigating and inciting and enabling more violence than was otherwise even possible, should have been evaluated in the recognition that greater evil might come of it. As it did, apparently.

Had the US not set up the Soviet Vietnam in Afghanistan, through covert violence, it seems (the aftermath, reasonably evaluated, implies) that both Afghnaistan and the US would now be better off. That is uncertain, of course - but the fact that it is even reasonably possible is a severe indictment of that use of covert violence - because the covert violence itself is a bad thing. It corrupts.

The CIA's role in Italy in the post-WW2 is well known. Not only did the agency back the Christian Democrats in the 1948 election with at least $10 million of money, through the Mafia, it helped provide muscle to break the Soviet's hold on the unions and "the streets." So that meddling, - not "covert violence" as we are discussing but near enough - gets the credit for keeping Italy out from behind the Iron Curtain, and the alliance with (and empowerment of) the Mafia and fascists and criminals of Italy is not evaluated for blowback ?

I think that when evaluating the use of covert violence in a place, the results are worth looking at.

I'm not saying don't evaluate them. I'm saying your initial conclusion, several posts back, is much too simplistic, largely because it's sullied by your rampant anti-Americanism. You cannot focus entirely on one piece of a 10 or 12 piece pie simply because you want to. Or rather, you can, but people won't take you too seriously.


If you don't want to blame the US for the Taliban, because the US did not fund the Taliban (directly), then don't. Myself, I blame fundie Islam for a lot of stuff like that, but fundie religion is one of my focusses. Others might blame Pakistan's domestic political needs. Blame is not at issue here.

I think blame is the issue, if you're talking about blowback.

The US had a hand in the rise of Taliban, make no mistake about it. But unlike you, I see the fault lying in America's refusal to engage with Afghanistan after the Soviets left as the root of the problem, not the initial American involvement with the mujahadeen or the so-called "support" of the Taliban you've chosen elsewhere to twist and make so much out of. But America was in tough spot. Afghanistan devolved into a Civil War after the Soviets left and we were understandably reluctant to support any one faction. It's easy to see why we walked away from the mess at that time, though in hindsight it looks absolutely astounding...

As for the Talibs, the simple fact is, the "fundie religion," as you call it, deserve much of the blame. It was Zia al Haq who fashioned Pakistan into a quasi-theocracy, and in doing so, created and funded the madrassas that would give birth the Taliban and provide them most of their soldiers. And yes, the US supported Zia, but that hardly seems relevant. Zia would have done the above with or without US support in other arenas because Zia was himself a zealot with little or no appreciation for secularism.


Without that covert operation, no warlord wars, no Taliban.

This is a sweeping statement, and it's very wrongheaded. There were warlords prior to the Soviet invasion, so blaming their existence and their internecine wars after the Soviets left on the US seems a bit of a stretch to me. Again, the Taliban was a religious effect from causes I already identified above. They would have happened regardless, I think. The only difference being that without a chaotic Afghanistan, they never would have had an opportunity to seize power.


The misogyny I speak of was hardly created by the Taliban.

Again, from Rashid: "The subjugation of women became the mission of the true believer and a fundamental marker that differentiated the Taliban from the former Mujahadeen." He goes on to speak of closing girls' schools, confining women to their homes and dismissing tens of thousands of them from government service jobs. All of this was an anathema to the Afghans, who had no problem associating with women in public.


The Soviets proudly altruistic mission in Afghanistan

The Soviets were butchers, and anyone who knows anything about their invasion knows this. It the butchery, in addition to the strategics involved, that compelled Carter to come to the assistance of the Afghans.


You would be hard put to realistically come up with an Afghan nation in worse shape after much less (if any) of that, now, eh?

Again, I think this is grossly ignorant. You need to read what living conditions in the country were like in the 80s and early 90s. You cannot begin to even compare those times to now...


I am saying that arming the most violent of them to fight, insitigating and inciting and enabling more violence than was otherwise even possible, should have been evaluated in the recognition that greater evil might come of it. As it did, apparently.

So we should have let them die? We should have let the Soviets pacify the country and turn it into another satellite state? OK. But I disagree... and so did the overwhelming majority of the Afghans...


So that meddling, - not "covert violence" as we are discussing but near enough - gets the credit for keeping Italy out from behind the Iron Curtain, and the alliance with (and empowerment of) the Mafia and fascists and criminals of Italy is not evaluated for blowback ?

It can be evaluated, but I think any reasonable evaluation will conclude that a Democratic Italy, Japan, Germany and Greece is better than what happened in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and East Germany, all of which were dreadful places people tried to flee from.