And Charlie's Angels Office Staff... 
was GREAT! Jailbait stole my heart--
Posted on 01/28/2008 12:23:47 PM PST by Victory111
If there exists one visional depiction of the Cold War’s end, it is still a Eurocentric one, November 9, 1989, the day East Berliners joined with those of the city’s West in celebration of the Berlin Wall’s demise. Three weeks earlier, on October 19, 1989, Stalinist East German dictator Erich Honecker, facing mass internal opposition, was forced from power when the Kremlin, overwhelmed with comparable resistance on many fronts, for the first time refused to provide the East German dictatorship with the political or military cover it had come to expect in its Cold War defense of the regime’s totalitarian reign over the East German people.
(Excerpt) Read more at crossactionnews.com ...
I saw ‘Charlie Wilson’s War’ and liked it, but it’s no more history than ‘300’ was.
The Reagan Administration was responsible for arming resistance to the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, which then lead to the rise of Osama Bin Laden and, by extension, to 9/11. This policy was a colossal failure not because of some short term successes, but because it did not foresee the long term disasters that it was responsible for.
or:
The Reagan administration failed to do anything to relieve the plight of the poor in Afghanistan who were being murdered, without resistance, by the Soviet Union. If it had not been for the heroic escapades of one alcoholic, drug using, strip club aficionado who wanted to have sex with Julia Roberts, nothing would have been done to save millions of people.
As usual the truth is to be found elsewhere.
Nice summary.
It’s like Michael Moore and Bush. Based on a wee memo, Bush should have bombed Afghanistan and gotten Bin Laden, but based on refusals for inspections and mounds of international intelligence, Bush didnt have enough to invade Iraq.
The movie also eliminates the fact that Wilson got drunk, had an accident on the 14th ST bridge and ran from the scene the night before he was supposed to leave for Afghanistan.
I was disappointed in that. Fascinating story, with him on the phone to his staff who got the D.C. police to bail him out.
Would've at least been a nice excuse to give the staffers more camera time :)
And Charlie's Angels Office Staff... was GREAT! Jailbait stole my heart--
LOL. The real story is almost always more interesting.
The book was much better.
That would have been an amusing anecdote in the movie, which did portray Wilson as an unapologetic consumer of alcohol, at both in appropriate times and places.
The real sad part about this war was that after we pulled out it was not the US would got to declare victory but instead ended up being by the muzzie fanatics as proof that they could defeat a superpower like the Soviet Union (since they didn’t know that the US was the one doing all the heavy lifting and conveniently overlook it when it is put in their face).
The victory against the Soviets in Afghanistan essentially started Al Qaeda (not because we trained Bin Laden which is a liberal fallacy. nor did we train anybody in Al Qaeda) years later. Muslim youth showed up years after the US pulled out and created the myth that Allah defeated the Soviet helicopters and tanks using a few thousand true believers. (And if you can’t read and have no access to news anywhere outside your village, this sounds like a great story on par with King Leonidis or Alexander).
And lets not forget that a huge part of our lack of interest in doing anything in Afghanistan after the Soviets pulled out was due to the State Department and the lifers in the Pentagon and CIA who didn’t appreciate the fact that we kicked Soviet @ss in the first place. The same kind of people who are trying so hard to keep us from winning in Iraq over the past five years.
The US didn't do "all the heavy lifting." The war in Afghanistan was fought with our gold and their blood. The Mujaheddin could not have won without US material support, but let's be honest -- they did the fighting. And when Osama bin Laden came along to tell them they could do it with his money rather than ours, with weapons bought on the open market rather than provided by us, the Taliban came to power.
Just a footnote: it took the Taliban a few years after the Soviets left to complete the conquest of Kabul. Even then, the Northern Alliance clung to a strip of territory adjacent to the Soviet Border. I think in the Democrat cliff-notes version of history they encourage the idea that the Taliban immediately installed itself into power after the Soviet defeat.
300 was the modern equivalent of a mythical retelling of a real event.
Approach it that way and it’s much more enjoyable.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.