Even Former Texas Rep. Charlie Wilson Thinks We Should Get Out of Afghanistan
By Susie Madrak Thursday Oct 08, 2009 7:00am
(h/t Heather)
Via Buzzflash. Yes, even the former Texas congressman who was single-handedly dragged us into our initial entanglement in Afghanistan thinks we should get out:
The U.S. military's ongoing conflict in Afghanistan is a movie Charlie Wilson has seen before, and he isn't thrilled with where the plot of this one is going.
"I think they're looking at us more and more like occupiers," he said.
[...] Out of Congress since 1997, Mr. Wilson is now 76 and two years removed from a heart transplant. Because of that, he has significantly reduced his public speaking schedule.
"I actually committed to this one a long time ago. I don't make so many anymore," he said during a recent phone interview from his home in Texas.
Most of his talk will center on Afghanistan, from his covert dealings there in the '80s to its present situation. No doubt he'll be comparing and contrasting the Soviets' experience to what the American military is going through now in its fight against the Taliban.
"I want to make them understand the dilemmas the (Obama) administration is under," Mr. Wilson said. "It's a very tough situation."
Mr. Wilson was better known for his hard partying ways - his nickname was Good Time Charlie - than for his policy credentials when he became deeply interested in Afghanistan a couple of years after the Soviets' 1979 invasion.
"I decided the Afghans were really going to put up a fight," he said. "Basically, I just wanted to embarrass the Soviets as much as possible. Then I got into it big time."
Using his seat on the House of Representatives Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense, he was able secure enough funds for the CIA to arm the mujahideen freedom fighters with automatic weapons and Stinger missiles.
"It was harder than it sounds," Mr. Wilson said. "We had to buy Russian-made weapons. We had to deal with Poland and Romania. That was all pretty intricate."
The weapons paid off for the Islamic fighters, and the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan in 1989. Mr. Wilson's efforts were documented by author George Crile in the book "Charlie Wilson's War," which was adapted into the 2007 movie starring Tom Hanks as Mr. Wilson.
Of course, the story didn't end with the withdrawal. Mr. Wilson believes that the United States' failure to invest in Afghanistan's recovery following the war led in large part to the ascension of the Taliban, who provided a refuge for Osama bin Ladin, who had fought with the mujahideen against the Soviets, and Al Qaeda in the years leading up to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
"We (screwed) up the end game," Mr. Wilson said. "It would have been very easy and done for a minuscule amount of money. We should have done the basic things for a backward country that's trying to come out of (a war) and have a reasonable hope of economic success."
As President Obama considers whether to send tens of thousands of more troops to Afghanistan, Mr. Wilson worries that the war could become "another Vietnam.""It's probably best to make a calculated withdrawal," he said. "If I were the president, I'm not sure what I'd do. I'd probably shut it down, rather than lose a lot of soldiers and treasure."
He says this as someone who knows as well as anyone just how fierce and tenacious the Afghan fighters are.
"I'd rather take on a chainsaw," Mr. Wilson said. "They're the world's best foot soldiers, best warriors. And they're fearless."They're fearless, and they've got nothing to lose. And they have a pretty serious hatred for those who try to occupy their country."
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And THAT is something no military action can change no matter how many troops we send there.
We already have NATO there and that isn't helping one bit.
Let Karzai have Kabul - declare victory and get us the eff out!
would exacerbate unemployment levels.
Perhaps they know?
By Ray McGovern:
http://therealnews.com/t/index.php?option=com...
This the Empire of the United States Buddy! #1 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
in the best of health. Hope he still has time to keep in touch with his other foreign policy friends, the Anastacio Somoza family, formerly of Nicaragua.
Fortunately, Samoza took an RPG suppository right up his ass. There is some justice in the world.
NOW they want to pay attention to Afghanistan.
Too late, folks. While we were busy
gang-raping female workers and holding them incommunicadoliberating Iraq, we completely handed away any initiative - strategic, moral, military - on the Afghanistan front. We let the Taliban regroup, rebuild its power base and expand its influence. We propped up a military dictator, tried to supplant him, and wound up with a PM who doesn't like America. (Oh, and several hundred billion dollars that went unaccounted for.)Afghanistan is the Hurricane Katrina of the war business. "Yup, um, looks like you're all prepared for ... um ... uh ... this ... um ... uh ... fight."
Heckuva job, guys.
Going to Iraq didn't change that simple fact.
Yes is did Terrible! At one point we WERE Ahead in Afghanistan. You just didn't know about it, cuz our media didn't think it was news worthy (aka dramatic) enough to report it.
then you do now. What I SAID was it didn't change the final outcome which IS failure. That we were "ahead" doesn't make a shits worth of difference at all. It's the end that matters.
... give the proper weight to the objective: get Osama bin Laden. We didn't follow through on that at all. Outsourcing the cordon around Tora Bora? Give me a frackin' break.
The moment you start broadening the goal with feel-goods like 'a democratic and free Afghanistan,' you dilute the purpose and effectiveness of a military force. It's like trying to build a house by focusing on the whole thing instead of starting with a sound foundation and proper anchoring, then adding one board at a time.
That is precisely why I knew the day they dropped the first bomb that they were not interested in capturing bin Laden. In fact the day before they dropped those first bombs a friend asked if I thought the US really would invade Afghanistan and I said "No because if they do that they'll never catch bin Laden. It's just all tough talk to try and get the Taliban to help capture him without having to provide them with the evidence." BOY was I wrong! I'd forgotten who bin Laden works for!
We needed to get the "Shock and Awe" launch into Iraq set up somewhere close by.....
On March 13, 2002, in a presser (on whitehouse.org) Bush admitted to a reporter who asked him if he wondered where binLaden could be..."..I am not at all that concerned about him.."
The MIC needs more wars to continue making money (Iran)...wars make money, peace does not
Maj. General Smedly Butler: "War is a racket."
jmho
Afganistan but to get into Iraq for fun and profit.
Although no profit for the American people just the few at the top! As usual.
republicanism is a mental illness!
I think that it being Wilson that's stating this should be a sure sign that getting out of Afghanistan is the right thing to do (as if there weren't more than enough signs already).
Afghanistan is where empires go to die.
I can already hear Beck saying Bush started the war and Obama lost it. Hell, I think I can hear a whole chorus of republicans saying that.
I don't know what we should do, but I feel like it's time to turn the car around and head for home, before we run out of gas and drivers.
..w's biggest blunder. He went there unilaterally versus with the help and support of all the nations surrounding Afghanistan. He allowed his Defense Secretary to do it on the cheap AND he did the one thing NO ONE SHOULD EVER DO: He forgot the past! Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. Since EVERY Power who has invaded Afghanistan has been defeated, how the eff did he think he was going to win with the methodology employed? Even consulting with the Russians might have been a positive step but I'm talking like he really was out to get obl and al-qaeda; he wasn't and it was all about the OIL!
Its time to leave!
on W's part to get peoples minds off his pal bin Laden. And Bush would do ANYTHING to protect bin Laden from being captured. Even if it did mean destroying the US military and the American economy.
..yes, we can be all cynical and say what a great plan it was so that obl would be free..that's just bs. The U.S.A. was attacked and our President said we were going to get the guy responsible. That was a lie! Right, he had no intention of getting obl and that may have been his plan all along but not his stated plan. And to suggest that it was a good plan really insults the honor of the American Service Men and Women involved in the conflict and the ones who gave their lives for the lies w told the American people.
Speaking of w, isn't it time he be tried with War Crimes? Isn't it time the current administration do what its honor-bound to do and investigate the allegations of torture that the Red Cross has announced we have committed?
for a silver lining in these little international imbroglios. The US economy will have an extra little economic stimulus accommodating the flood of Afghan refugees that will result from the seemingly inevitable US withdrawal. They'll all need food and clothing and housing and medical care and education etc. That'll mean lots of jobs.
Yet the evidence is that the US government wanted the Soviets to invade and did what it could to provoke it. According to Secretary of State Robert Gates 1997 book “From the Shadows” the CIA started giving aid to Islamic rebels in Afghanistan six months before the Soviets invaded. This was confirmed and detailed in an interview with Zbignew Brzezinski, Jimmy Carter’s National Security Advisor in 1998 in the French journal Le Nouvel Observateur. In the interview Brzezinski explained that Jimmy Carter signed an order on July 3 of 1979 to give aid to the mujahadeen and that he (Brzezinski) wrote Carter a note that same day saying “this aid was going to induce a Soviet military intervention”.
Not that Brzezinski objected. To the contrary this is how he answered his interviewer’s question on whether he had any regrets. “Regret what? That secret operation was an excellent idea. It had the effect of drawing the Russians into the Afghan trap and you want me to regret it? The day that the Soviets officially crossed the border, I wrote to President Carter. We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam War.”
The sad fact is Brzezinski is one of the main guys whispering in Obama's ear on foreign policy today. How can we expect a man who has no regrets over deliberately drawing the Soviets into a war, to have any compassion or common sense to advise Obama to stop this senseless war?
and he is keeping the lid on Israeli complicity in the JFK assassination. Better for us to worry about Afghans and carpets.
Really, off the freakin' charts. And, people think I say provocative things. You take the cake. I've never heard that the Israelis were complicit in JFK. Wow, and I bet you think Mel Gibson was wrong to blame the jews for everything, huh?
The Soviets and the Chinese didn't hesitate to draw the US into the Vietnam morass. Ah Realpolitik! Is there no country it can't destroy?
Does Charlie's opinion REALLY count??? Or matter??? This conflict is considerably different than the one he started in the 80's. And let us not forget what happened when the Soviet Union finally did pull out in '89! That is what will happen again if WE pull out. Afghanistan will collapse from tribal conflicts brought on by the Taliban or other factions. From the point of view of a military member who has been there twice in the past 3 years, I can honestly say that the war there is still win-able and a noble cause. The Taliban should have NEVER been in power! And should NEVER return to power! Civilian casualties will occur...that is inevitable in a war, but civilian casualties will also occur under the rule of the Taliban.
...Pffft is right: Georgie-Porgy and friends did "F" this war up by switching focus on Iraq rather than where the threat really lies. But the fact remains, that if we leave Afghanistan to secure itself, Al Qeida and the Taliban or some other terrorist organization will just take up shop and start international operations under the cover of some Fundamentalist "Dick-tatorship".
Never lose sight that the Taliban is genuinely evil!! (In my opinion all religions are)...They should be exterminated!
... in light of our failure to hold the initiative, then it is EXACTLY the same as Charlie Wilson's War. We're letting the enemy and the battlefield dictate the victory conditions.
I don't mind a continued presence/mission, but we have to have something other in our hands than our naughty bits. An objective other than a long-term committment to a police presence, which military troops are ill-suited for, especially in urban insurgency situations.
What I'm REALLY dreading is finding out how much of those missing billions went to the Taliban by way of Musharraf buying himself political survivial for a few months.
of exterminating religious fanatics it makes a lot of since to begin at home and then spread out. You also seem to have a misconception about the Taliban bring a "terrorist" organization. Watch FOX much?
I am not defending how the Taliban has ruled over Afghnistan and killed many of our military. I have some questions for you:
1) Which countries did the Taliban attack when it was in power in Afghanistan?
2) How is it that the poppy plantations thus the sale of Opium was decimated under the Taliban because they banned it; yet, the production and sale of opium has tripled sense the invasion of Afghanistan?
3) Did the Taliban become the enemy of the U.S. before or after it traveled to Texas and refused to allow the Neocons and Unocal (Karzai's former employer) the right to build a pipeline through Afghanistan?
4) Did the Taliban not offer to hand over Bin Laden upon the request that the U.S. provide evidence of the crimes Bin Laden and Al Quieda committed?
There is no defending the atrocities committed by the Taliban and Al Qeida. The fact of the matter is that the U.S. has not been an honest broker in Afghanistan and until it decides to do so, there will be no end to this conflict. This is still win-able? What the hell are we winning exactly?
because of what happened in 1989? Wow, I wish I could get through to you, so I will say this: first, the Taliban were America's allies until they weren't. Second, it was Pakistan that was upset when America left in 1989, not Afghanistan. Pakistan is the ones who wanted America back, not Afghanistan. Third, Pakistan wanted America's money again. Fourth, what a coincidence that 9/11 brought America back. Fifth, there is no such thing as a coincidence.
Or is that still Dick Nixon's little secret?
That was just Dick's word for "Pulling out". If we pull out now, it will be the same, but repackaged as "Afghanistanization".
was originally Ho's idea. Call it what you will, his version worked.
During Vietnamization there were just as many troops there as ever. It was only a strategy change to using more South Vietnamese troops in combat situations. It was a lame attempt to cut the US casualties. A strategy who's consequences wasn't lost on the South Vietnamese troops!
What was it. Vietnam for the Vietnamese?
I understand what you're saying and I agree that Ho was working towards a form of Vietnamization. But we were talking about Nixon's "Vietnamization" I thought. And that was what I described.
Vietnam for the Vietnamese would be a much more accurate term of Ho's policy.
Responding to JollyFE. Sorry for any confusion.
with renal problems, and his tiny Egyptian sidekick with a massive inferiority complex. And what do we have to show for the billions we spent in the meanwhile?
plan to catch Osama that he touted in the debates?
duh!
I find Charlie's toupee abolutely convincing.
Pipeline-Istan: Everything You Need to Know About Oil, Gas, Russia, China, Iran, Afghanistan and Obama
By Pepe Escobar, Tomdispatch.com. Posted May 13, 2009.
http://www.alternet.org/world/139983/pipeline...
Probably wasn't why Charlie was there, or at least he wasn't sober enough to figure that out.
It is such a tremendous lie to claim that the US did not invest heavily in the so-called rebuilding of Afghanistan after the 2001 invasion.
The US has pumped billions and billions into redevelopment, building infrastructure, schools, wells and many other aid to Afghanistan in the past 8 years. It is sort of like the lie they keep telling us how it's all about a new strategy. There hasn't been a strategy or a new one for 8 years. The same strategy that started this fiasco is in place: get control of the pipeline routes (and resources including cheap labor) in the Near, Far East.
Rather, if Mr. Wilson were honest he would admit that what has really happened these past 8 years is that some Afghanis (i.e. those currently in government jobs) and many Americans siphoned most, if not all, of the aid for themselves.
And, let's not forget the Afghan War is a lie in the first place because the Taliban never attacked America, and even if it were legitimate to invade Afghanistan to go after al-Qaeda, America routed al-Qaeda (except for the ones they let escape into Pakistan) by the end of 2001. Al-Qaeda isn't even in Afghanistan any more!
Enough people have died. And the criminals who started this mess may never be brought to justice. It's costing the Americans lives and money.
End it now.
However, getting out doesn't mean that we leave the country wrecked. We have bombed and killed lots of innocent people, we have economically looted the country and handed it over to foreign control. Getting out doesn't mean not paying for what we have done, wiping our hands clean and saying, "well, that was a mistake". It means we have to give Afghans control over their country and to repair what we destroyed. The National Solidarity Program (the US decreased funding for it while Europe increased funding for it), seems like a good thing to fund development. It is community based, participatory and democratic (shocking that it was created by the world bank). My guess is that we'll keep private contractors in Afghanistan for years, our corporations will continue to hold extremely important resources and we will have the US army formally walk away. We'll talk about how we meant good, how we were responding to 9/11 and like all other similar wars in our past (large amount, seems to be endless) we'll claim our goals were noble, regardless to the policies that the elites choose and profited from at Afghanistan's expense.
All the POTUS need do is make a deal with the Taliban: Help us get bin Laden and you can have Afghanistan. They have already expressed a desire to negotiate.
...Sorry, but abandoning the Afghans to the Taliban is unacceptable.
Unlike the Soviets, we don't face a Superpower. We own whatever part of that country we choose to.
I hate that we're losing soldiers there, but they are doing something needed. Period.
Argue on.
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