Reply #11: Your history is pretty accurate but [View All]

[ConsAreLiars]

the statement that "Afghanistan was a fairly prosperous and modern country until the US decided regime change was needed" is a bit off. Afghanistan was mostly ignored, serving as a "buffer state" and about as impoverished and medieval as any country I had ever visited. But is was a place where change was taking place. Women within the elite could walk around freely without being covered head to toe, and tribal nomads had the same right. There was a natural process at work. Not prosperous by any measure, not modern - but it was a society where even "alien" visitors like myself were treated with respect. The militarization and empowerment of the Taliban extremists by the CIA as an anti-soviet force deformed the natural forces of social evolution at work in Afghanistan. The CIA turned an extraordinary and unique culture which had its own dynamic for change and a form of tolerance into a society dominated by rabid fundies of the Falwell-Dobson-Graham-Ashcroft ilk. The Afghanistan I spent a few months in (in 1970-71) was no utopia, but it was a country where many tendencies were at work and a natural evolution was uderway before the CIA decided that arming the most extreme fundies would serve US geopolitical interests.

(edit: delete extraneous letter)