Chamblee54

There is an old saying: what goes around comes around. When you sow the wind, you reap the whirlwind. The toes you step on today are connected to the ass you kiss tomorrow. My karma ran over your dogma. OK, so there is more than one saying. The bottom line is, when your government messes with another country, there is going to be an invoice from the bank of retribution. The balance due is usually much larger than the principal.
In the region of the planet designated Afghanistan, there is no good place to get started. This country had the misfortune to be across the border from the Soviet Union. Thirty one years ago, the commies were the evil empire, that must be destroyed at all costs. These accounts are just now coming due, with interest attached. This is a repost.
The passage below was originally posted in tomdispatch. This is a fine facility , that deserves your readership and $upport.
It should by now be generally accepted that the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan on Christmas Eve 1979 was deliberately provoked by the United States. In his memoir published in 1996, the former CIA director Robert Gates made it clear that the American intelligence services began to aid the mujahidin guerrillas not after the Soviet invasion, but six months before it. In an interview two years later with Le Nouvel Observateur, President Carter’s national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski proudly confirmed Gates’ assertion.
Brzezinski: “According to the official version of history, CIA aid to the mujahidin began during 1980, that’s to say, after the Soviet army invaded Afghanistan. But the reality, kept secret until now, is completely different: on 3 July 1979 President Carter signed the first directive for secret aid to the opponents of the pro-Soviet regime in Kabul. And on the same day, I wrote a note to the president in which I explained that in my opinion this aid would lead to a Soviet military intervention.”
Nouvel Observateur asked whether he in any way regretted these actions. Brzezinski: “Regret what? The secret operation was an excellent idea. It drew the Russians into the Afghan trap and you want me to regret it? On the day that the Soviets officially crossed the border, I wrote to President Carter, saying, in essence: ‘We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam War.'”
Nouvel Observateur: “And neither do you regret having supported Islamic fundamentalism, which has given arms and advice to future terrorists?” Brzezinski: “What is more important in world history? The Taliban or the collapse of the Soviet empire? Some agitated Muslims or the liberation of Central Europe and the end of the Cold War?”
On September 11, 2001, the United States was lured into the Afghan trap. Osama Bin Ladin does not regret it. The women and children dying in Pakistan might have a different opinion. Pictures today are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”.