Russia was going to fail. It was just a matter of time. OBL knew this and knew that a few years of money bleeding in Afganistan would tip the balance. The Russian system was unworkable in the long term.
We added to the pain but it was the system itself that died its inevitable death with OBL urging it to a quicker death.
Then we the neocons were so stupid they didnt learn the lesson. Thank the powers that be we have a system that can work if allowed to do so. Socialism is not the answer. Capitolism tempered with good regulations and fair mangement is workable in the long term.
For a guy who lives in a cave we sure heap a lot of genius on Bin Laden.
Most respectfully my sister, you do not know the story of how the CIA helped to create the muhajadeen and Bin Laden. It was the US, via Carter, Zbigniew Brezinski, and former CIA Director Robert Gates who plotted to push the Russians into a response in Afghanistan .. and their response was to invade. Both Brezinski and Gates have already declared this truth. Carter signed the first directive to aid and forment the muhajadeen on July 3, 1979, BEFORE the Russian invasion.
The idea to bleed the Russians dry and "give them their Vietnam" was Brezinski and CIA Director Standsfield Turner's idea, not Bin Laden. The CIA began to recruit and train muhajadeen fighters in Pakistan, with the help of Pakistan's ISI.
The CIA purchased and arranged for the manufacture of Soviet-style weapons from Egypt, China, Poland, Israel and elsewhere, or supplying their own; arranging for military training by Americans, Egyptians, Chinese and Iranians; hitting up Middle-Eastern countries for donations, notably Saudi Arabia which gave many hundreds of millions of dollars in aid each year, totaling probably more than a billion; pressuring and bribing Pakistan to rent out its country as a military staging area and sanctuary and put the Pakistani Director of Military Operations, General Afzal, onto the CIA payroll to ensure Pakistani cooperation.
When Reagan inherited Brezinki's program he increased it and in March 1985 he issued National Security Decision Directive 166.29 a secret plan to escalate covert action in Afghanistan dramatically. Beginning in 1985, the CIA supplied mujahideen rebels with extensive satellite reconnaissance data of Soviet targets on the Afghan battlefield, plans for military operations based on the satellite intelligence, intercepts of Soviet communications, secret communications networks for the rebels, delayed timing devices for tons of C-4 plastic explosives for urban sabotage, and sophisticated guerrilla attacks, long-range sniper rifles, a targeting device for mortars that was linked to a U.S. Navy satellite, wire-guided anti-tank missiles, and other equipment. including more than 1,000 state-of-the-art, shoulder-fired Stinger anti-aircraft missiles.
AND .. don't miss this part .. the US-backed muhajadeen carried out numerous car bombings, suicide bombings, and hijackings. They attacked airports, railroads, fuel depots, religious shrines, bridges, roads, etc..
AND they recruited radical muslims from around the world .. and Bin Laden was one of them. By 1984, he was running the Maktab al-Khidamar, an organization set up by the CIA/ISI to funnel money, arms, and fighters from the outside world in the Afghan war. In 1988, Bin Laden created Al-Queda with CIA knowledge and assistance. After the Soviet withdrawal, Bin Laden and others returned to their own countries.
In 1994, the muhajadeen morphed into the Taliban and they were funded and trained by the US, Britian, and Saudia Arabia. Afghanistan had sunk in chaos, but our geopolitical needs were being met. Almost a quarter of the population lived in refugee camps and the country was in ruins. With the aid of the ISI, the Taliban swept across the ruined country and captured Kabul in 1996. They imposed an ultra-sectarian version of Saudia Arabia style Wahhabism on the population.
When Clinton inherited the program he decided to take a more cautious approach, but he still backed the Taliban .. until 1998 when Bin Laden was accussed of bombing US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. This upset plans by UNOCOL to build a duel pipeline through Afghanistan that would carry both natural gas and oil. At this point UNOCOL exec, John J. Marenga, went before the US Congress to beg them to overthrow the Taliban (in so many words) so the pipelines could be built.
When you know the real story, not the bullshit PR Americans are fedd, you'll recognize that Bin Laden has always been a pawn and dependent on the CIA.
EVERYTHING I've said is verifiable .. Americans would just rather be told fairy-tales so they can sleep better.
By the way .. socialism has absolutely nothing, as in ZERO, to do with any of this. However, capitalism does as it was capitalists who formented the destruction of Afghanistan for profit .. which was the same reason we invaded Iraq .. for profit.
