| AMERICA'S "WAR ON TERRORISM" IN AFGHANISTAN |
| This page is anti-US, as well anti-Taliban. Here you will find out how the USA kept the Afghan people suffering for 20 years. |
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| Afghanistan is a nation with a history of no changes. For centuries Afghanistan has been an Islamic nation where the small upper-class had total control over the land, with almost no industry, and people living very primitive, and feudal lifestyles. It was in April 27, 1978 (Saur 7, 1357 by Afghan calender) when Afghanistan the first change was seen. The successful April Revolution took place, and the old Islamic regime which have kept the people of Afghanistan divided was overthrown by the Communist PDPA (People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan) led by Babrak Karmal, and the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan was declared. The PDPA's goals were to industialize Afghanistan, in other words to adopt 20th century technology. For the first time in Afghanistan everybody had access to decent shelter, free education, and free medical care. And women were able to hold any profession they wanted, and were not required to cover their faces. However, these changes were not acceptable by all. The former land owners, along with religious leaders, and loyalists to the old Afghan Islamist state decided that these revolutionary changes should not be in Afghanistan, hence Afghanistan was now under an Atheistic state. Afghanistan embracing Communism was also loathed by the United States, and their western cronies. By early 1979 there were already reports of counter-revolutionary Islamic guerillas being trained in Pakistan to oust the newly formed Afghan Communist state. The USA, and Saudi Arabia began to finance, and train these anti-communist Muslims for their jihad against communism. In December of 1979 the Afghan government was certain that a western imperialist invasion was underway, and requested Soviet military assistance to quell the pro-imperialist Mujahideen rebels. Soviet presence would keep the imperialist armies out of Afghanistan, hence Soviet intervention in Afghanistan angered the western imperialists, and the Cold War heated up. Former US president Jimmy Carter restricted American athletes to participate in the olympic games to be held in Moscow in 1980, and halted all trades possible with the Soviet Union. Jimmy Carter made it quite clear that he intended to start World War III with the Soviet Union over Afghanistan, by pulling away from the SALT II pact (Stratigic Arms Limitation Treaty) which was an anti-nuclear weapons pact signed by Jimmy Carter, and former Soviet chairman Leonid Brezhnev. By doing this Carter threatened the Soviet Union with nuclear war in the Persian Gulf, because Washington's paranoia was that the Soviets' intension was to take control of the oil fields in region. The Russians had an abundant amount of oil and many oil fields in the Caucasus, and Central Asian regions and republics. Therefore it was the Americans and British who wanted to plunder the Persian Gulf for oil. The Soviets' goal was only to help their comrades in Kabul, whom requested Soviet assistance. They had no interests in the Persian Gulf. In 1980 Carter's national security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski then wrote a memo to Jimmy Carter stating that the USA now had the opportunity to give the USSR it's Vietnam. From then on the United States was pouring money and weapons to the cause of the Mujahideen. Along with fighting the Soviet Union and the PDPA, the Mujahideen was also torturing, butchering, raping, and murdering men, women, and children who wanted to live in a better Afghanistan, and loyal to the PDPA. By late 1980 the Soviet Union found itself in an unexpected war with the Afghan Mujahideen. Now that the Mujahideen were fighting Soviet, and Afghan Communist forces they became known to the western world as "Freedom Fighters". US support continued with former US president Ronald Reagan and the former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, put billions of dollars to arm, and train these Afghan "Freedom Fighters". Osama Bin Laden was one of those "freedom fighters". By 1986 the United States had supplied the Afghan Mujahideen with the anti-aircraft weapon called the "Stinger" which was very effective in destroying Soviet aircraft. Before 1986 the CIA supplied the Mujahideen with Soviet made weapons obtained and paid for by arms dealers from Pakistan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. The stinger was supplied through two CIA agents Milton Bearden, and Frank Anderson sent by former CIA chief William Casey. From then on the Soviets were unable to use their aircraft as they've been since 1979. By 1988 the Soviet Union announced its withdrawal from Afghanistan. This war turned out to be what Brzezinski had hoped it would be: Russia's Vietnam. The hope for a decent future for Afghanistan was lost. In early 1989 Sovet forces were completely withdrawn from Afghanistan. When the Soviets retreated, the Americans broke out expensive champagne to celebrate their victory over the "Evil Soviet Empire". Two years later the Soviet Union fell to the Capitalists, and the following year the PDPA fell to Islamic reactionaries, who would from there turn their weapons on each other. What happened to these Afghan "Freedom Fighters"? You know them as the Taliban, and al-Qaeda. |
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| The creators of the Taliban, and al-Qaeda |
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| Jimmy Carter |
| Zbigniew Brzezinski |
| Ronald Reagan |
| George (Papa) Bush |
| Margaret Thatcher (The Wicked Witch of the West) |
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| William Casey |
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| Milton Bearden |
| Frank Anderson |
| From 1992 to 1996 the former Afghan "Freedom Fighters" were fighting each other for control of Afghanistan. By 1996 the Taliban had gained full control over Afghanistan. Once again the Afghan people returned to primitive living conditions. The Afghan working class were denied education, access to proper medical care, food, proper shelter, and a decent future. Women were required to cover every part of their faces including their eyes, and could not go out without a male companion. The penalty for women if they violated these laws was rape, torture, and death. This is a very strange idea of freedom. The Taliban would also ruthlessly shoot at men, women, and children trying to leave Afghanistan. US support for the Taliban went far into the 90's, despite the fact that Osama Bin Laden (now a terrorist), and his al-Qaeda network were already carrying out attacks on US targets in the Muslim world. The support for the Taliban would continue until 2001 after al-Qaeda succeeded in crashing two planes on the World Trade Center twin towers in New York City on September 11th, and crashing another planes into the Pentagon. From then US president George Bush Jr declared a "War on Terrorism" against the Taliban, and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. Just in May of 2001 the United States gave over 60 million dollars to the Taliban for banning opium. The Taliban in a very short amount of time became a target for the USA. On October 7, 2001 the United States started to commence airstrikes in Afghanistan against Taliban, and al-Qaeda forces. Also killing Afghan civilians, as if they haven't gone through enough suffering with the Taliban, and the war with Russia in the 1980s. To date thousands of Afghan civilians have been killed by US bombs, or are starving. Just after the bombing began Baby Bush had food shipments dropped from planes which have said to have been poisoned. Baby Bush is very confident that this "war on terrorism" will be successful. But we need to remember the fact that the Taliban, and al-Qaeda were once the "good guys" in the eyes of the United States, hence they recieved training via the CIA. The Taliban knows all the US tactics, and plus just as they were fighting the Soviets, they will fight the US. By using the mountains, and gorges that they know well to ambush US convoys, and soldiers. These are the same tactics that was given to them by the imperialist powers in which they used to bleed the Russian Army. However the Red Army was ultimately bled due to the training and weaponry supplied by the west to the Mujahideen, not to mention Mikhail Gorbachev weakening the Soviet economy can be seen as the cause for the Russian withdrawal in 1989. Therefore Soviet victory in Afghanistan was quite possible had it not been for the Western intervention which financed this anti-Soviet war. The Taliban regime fell to the US-backed Northern Alliance on December 17, 2001. Afghanistan today is under the rule of a bourgeois democratic government. In spite of this the US military operations in Afghanistan still continue. The Afghan people continue to die from US cluster bombs, napalm, depleted uraniun, and starvation. For what? It is because the United States is now fighting fanatics that they put into power. The Taliban was just as fanatical as it is today when they were labled "freedom fighters". How can the USA claim that it wants freedom in Afghanistan, when they said the exact same thing about the Taliban in the 80's? The United States will supports terrorists when it favors them, and then become shocked at their tactics when they turn against the USA. How much suffering will the Afghan people have to go through because of US imperialism? Hopefully, until they unite and give the United States another Vietnam, and free their country from Islamic fundamentalists. The chance for the Afghan people to live united was crushed by the west. If Afghanistan has the same people's unity as in 1978, they can live free. |
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| Afghan Mujahideen, once darlings of Washington, now an enemy. |
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| Memorable Lines From Rambo III |
| You may recall a certain Sylvester Stallone movie made at the end of the Reagan era in 1988 called Rambo III. John J. Rambo in this movie goes to Afghanistan to rescue his former commander Col. Samuel Trautman. In order to do so Rambo must neutralize several hundred Soviet, and Afghan troops, with the help of the Afghan "Freedom Fighters". Here are some memorable lines from this movie that tell how the US saw the future Taliban. |
| US Field Officer Robert Griggs: John, I'd like you to take a look at some of these photos. I don't know how much you know about Afghanistan, most people can't even find it on the map. But over 2 million civilians, mostly peasant farmers and their families have been systematically slaughtered by invading Russian armies. Every new weapon including chemical warfare has been used to eliminate these people, and they've been very successful on many levels. I assume you're out of touch with the current status of the war, but after 9 years of fighting the Afghan forces are now getting shipments of stinger missiles, and are begining to hold their own against airstrikes. Except for one region, 50 miles over the border. Apparently the Soviet commander there is exceptionally brutal as those photos indicate. And he's managed to strangle off all aid from the outside, so we want investigate the problem first hand. |
| First scene: Trautman accompanied by Griggs locates Rambo in Thailand and attempt to get Rambo to go on a secret mission in Afghanistan. Griggs then shows Rambo photos of the Afghanistan war. But they fail to get Rambo to accompany Trautman in this secret mission. |
| Second scene: After Trautman, and his team are intercepted by Soviet forces, Trautman is imprisoned in a Soviet fort in Afghanistan, and interrogated by Col. Zaitsin, and unaware that Rambo is coming to rescue him. Srgt. Kourov drags Trautman into Zaitsin's office with a gag around his neck. Kourov sits Trautman down in front of Zaitsin, while he wave Kourov away and begins the interrogation. |
| Comrade Col. Zaitsin: My name is Col. Zaitsin, the regional commander of this sector. Do you realize you're the first American captured in Afghanistan? Congratulations! I believe you are planning to supply enemy rebel forces with stinger missiles intended to destroy Soviet aircraft. Col. Samuel Trautman: If I'm going to be interrogated, I want to be interrogated by your superiors. Comrade Col. Zaitsin: Out here I have no superiors. I am in full command. You are alone here. Abandoned by your government. Col. Samuel Trautman: What do you want? Comrade Col. Zaitsin: Cooperation. This sector has been under total control for over five years. There is little more I can do here. It is as you say: "without challenges". If you supply to me worthy information about more stinger missiles you are planning to deliver, it could provid a way out of this for us both. After all in the end what everyone really wants, is peace. Col. Samuel Trautman: The Kremlin's got a hell of sence of humor. Comrade Col. Zaitsin: Please explain. Col. Samuel Trautman: You talk peace, and disarmament to the world, and here you are wiping out a race of people. Comrade Col. Zaitsin: We are wiping out no one. I think you are too intelligent to believe such absurd propoganda. Now again, where are the missiles? Col. Samuel Trautman: I don't know anything about any missiles! Comrade Col. Zaitsin: Of course you do. But you do not seem to realize, I'm providing a way out of this for us both. Col. Samuel Trautman: You expect sympathy? You started this damn war, now you'll have to deal with it! Comrade Col. Zaitsin: And we will. It is just a matter of time before we achieve a complete victory. Col. Samuel Trautman: Yeah, well there won't be a victory. Everyday you'll have war machines on lose ground to a bunch of poorly armed, poorly equipped Freedom Fighters. The fact is you underestimated you competition. If you'd studied your history, you'd know that these people have never given up to anyone. They'd rather die than be slaves to an invading army. You can't defeat a people like that. We tried, we already had our Vietnam, and now you're gonna have yours! Comrade Col. Zaitsin: So you wish to test me? Good! |
| Third scene: Right after the chat between Trautman and Zaitsin, Rambo and his guide Mousa Gani whom he met in Pakistan cross the border into Afghanistan. They reach the nearest village to the Soviet fort. They then come together with the other Mujahideen to plan how they're going to infiltrate the Russian fort, and free Trautman, with the help of Yuri, a Russian traitor. Then Masoud, the Mujahedeen leader tells Rambo about the war. |
| [Mujahideen talking amongst themselves] [1st Afghan Mujahid orders them quiet down] Yuri: Mines start here, at one meter like this, then go two meters like this and like this. They have four towers, four gaurds. Here, here, here, and here. John Rambo: Where do they keep the prisoners? Yuri: Here. John Rambo: If we get in there, is there another way out? Yuri: Underground, where there's all the bad water. I do not know words for this place. Mousa Ghani: He means sewer. Where is it? Yuri: Here. Outside it goes there. Gaurds patrol there. I do not think you go this way. John Rambo: Then we should go through the mine fields. They'd never expect it. 1st Afghan Mujahid: This cannot be done. In there are many Spetsnaz commandos. We have only this. We have lost many men, we lose more men if we go there. John Rambo: I don't need many men. 1st Afghan Mujahid: What is it you want to do? John Rambo: I need 2 men to get me through the mine field, and 2 to help with the escape. 2nd Afghan Mujahid: If this is done, Soviet will come here like before, and more people will die. John Rambo: I can't wait. 1st Afghan Mujahid: You must wait for help the way we wait. John Rambo: Then I'll go alone. 1st Afghan Mujahid: And you will die. John Rambo: Then I die. Masoud: Wait! Please don't go! My name is Masoud. You must not judge us before you understand why you're not ready to handle. Most of the Afghan people are very strong, and we are determined not to be driven from our land. Our children die of diseases, mines, and poison gas. And the women are raped and killed. Last year in the valley of ligmahn, the next valley 6,000 Afghans were killed. Pregnant women were cut with bayonets, and their babies thrown into the fires. This is done so they will not have to fight next generation of Afghans, yet nobody sees anything, or reads anything in the papers. What you see here are the Mujahideen soldiers, holy warriors. To us this war is a holy war, and there is no true death for Mujahideen, because we have taken our last rites and we consider ourselves dead already. To us death for our land, and god is an honor. So my friend, what we must do is to stop this killing of our women, and children. If getting this man free, so he can return to the free world and tell what happens here if nessesary, then of course we will help. Leave us now, so we may speak among ourselves, and find the best way to free this man. John Rambo: Thank you! Masoud: We thank you! |
| From this point on the rest of the movie is basically Rambo killing Russians, and their Afghan comrades. |
| I put these Rambo III lines on this page not for fun, but so people could see the idiocy of the conservative Americans at that time. And now lets look over these lines from the movie: Scene one: Griggs shows Rambo photos of the Afghanistan war. He stated that the Russians' intentions are to eliminate the Afghan people, by all means possible, and including chemical weapons. But what did the American's do in Vietnam? The massacred, and bombed villages, and used chemical weapons such as Agent Orange on the Vietnamese people. Over three million Vietnamese were killed during the U.S occupation. Scene one demonstrates a lot of hypocrisy. Scene two: During the argument between Trautman, and Zaitsin; Trautman accuses the Soviets of wiping out the Afghan people, and Zaitsin replies by saying it is propoganda. In reality Zaitsin would have brought up American aggression on Vietnam, the nuclear bombs dropped on Hiroshima, and Nagasaki, Japan, or US aid to death squads in Central America. Then Trautman refers to the Afghan Mujahideen as "Freedom Fighters". Today they're known as the Taliban, and al-Qaeda. Very odd example of a freedom fighter. Trautman then says that if Zaitsin studied history, he would know that the Afghans have never given up to an invading army. Apparently the Americans had this belief in the 1980's. But what happened to it? Today many Americans believe that the US military action in Afghanistan will be successful. Aren't they fighting a people who have never given up to anyone? Why do they believe the USA will win? Scene three: Masoud, the Afghan Mujahideen leader explains to Rambo is specific details about Soviet atrocities in Afghanistan. Such as raping women, killing babies, and mutilating. When the Mujahideen became known as the Taliban, they comitted many very similar atrocities against women who didn't hide their beauty, or was without a male companion. The Taliban would also kill the children of these women by mutilation. Yet this movie portrays the Taliban as fighters against attrocities. During the Afghanistan war, many wounded Soviet soldiers were cut to pieces, and certain organs placed in their mouths. Afghans loyal to the PDPA also met with the same fate. |
| Another movie made at the same time is the Rambo wannabe film Red Scorpion with Dolph Lundgren. This movie takes place in an un-named African country where the situation is a cross between Angola, and Afghanistan. This nation is Soviet-Cuban occupied. When Nikolai Petrovich Rachenko(Dolph Lundgren) is sent to this nation to assassinate an anti-Communist rebel leader, he turns against the Communists, and joins the counter-revolutionaries. This movie will also show you the conservative American idiocy of the 1980's. M. Emmett Walsh plays Dewey Ferguson, the American anti-Russian bigot, and moronic journalist sent document the war. He does an excellent job of showing the conservative American mentality, and hypocrisy. |
| Afghanistan and the great lie of the Soviet invasion An excellent piece written by an Australian comrade. |
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