Charlie Wilson's War

Yesterday I watched Charlie Wilsons War. It is a film from 2007, based on George Crile's book, Charlie Wilsons War: The extraordinary story of the largest covert operation in history. Charlie Wilson is a United States congressman from Texas who likes spirits and women. A wealthy Houston socialite named Joanne Herring convinces him to visit Pakistan where he sees the refugee camps packed with Afghans fighting for food aid. They are refugees from the Russian occupation at the behest of the marxist government of Afghanistan, and have fled to the North-West Frontier province, chiefly the city of Peshawar (If you have been listening to the news this year you will have heard Peshawar and the North-West Frontier province mentioned in relation to the Taliban).

Disturbed by what he has seen Charlie Wilson sets about using his unique position on secret defense related councils to buy soviet weapons from the Israelis and Egypt in conjunction with Saudia Arabia, to provide to Pakistan to arm the mujahideen (warriors of the jihad) in Afghanistan. This was during the Cold War, so America could not be seen to be assisting the mujahideen, hence Soviet arms were used initially, they were funneled through Pakistan, and very few people knew about it. The mujahideen began to shoot down the Russian helicopters and fighter jets that would previously strafe villages and valleys unopposed. In 1989 the last of the Russian Army left Afghanistan.

As everybody celebrates, the CIA officer running the operation hands Charlie Wilson an NIE about "the crazies starting to roll into Kandahar". (National Intelligence Estimates describe what the intelligence services expect to happen in the future. RANDOM SLIGHTLY OFF TOPIC POINT: Kandahar is an alteration of Alexander, the city was named after Alexander the Great, one of the many to invade Afghanistan (none of them particularly successful)). The CIA agent, Gust also says "Start with the roads, move on to the schools, restock the sheep herds, give 'em jobs, give 'em hope." Charlie says "I'm trying." and Gust says "Try harder."

So Charlie tries to convince the necessary people that they need money to rebuild the country, but it falls on deaf ears. The movie ends with Charlie Wilson receiving a military honour. And, in typical black screen, white-text style

"These things happened. They were glorious and they changed the world…


and then we fucked up the end game."

Charlie Wilson

And that, I believe, is where the real lesson lies. The fact that the movie was written by Aaron Sorkin, of West Wing fame, pretty much confirms that.

But not everybody would draw that conclusion, and here we become mired in politics and American foreign affairs for a bit. Michael Johns, a foreign policy analyst and speechwriter for Ronald Reagan writes on his blog that "the Reagan-led effort to support freedom fighters resisting Soviet oppression led successfully to the first major military defeat of the Soviet Union" "Afghanistan, quite simply, proved for the first time that, with determination and support, the Soviet Union's conquests were reversible. The global significance of this message surely ranks among the most important of the 20th century"

He complains that Republican senators committed to supporting resistance movements in Soviet occupied countries have not been recognised by history despite the fact that they "sacrificed political popularity to fight these battles".

Johns also says that Mikhail Gorbachev said Afghanistan was a bleeding wound for the USSR, and that "It was a bleeding wound because the Reagan army bravely stood against that Soviet occupation and consciously made it one, not just in Afghanistan but in almost every non-European nation where the Soviets sought to impose their will on people. It is late 20th century resistance that won the Cold War, and it is Reagan and the Reagan army that made that resistance against a ruthless global superpower possible."

But nowhere in his analysis entitled Charlie Wilson's War Really was America's War, does he mention the fact that the USA provided only money to the Afghans, that it was their bravery to continue fighting, after their villages had been mercilessly strafed, and people forced to lie on the ground whilst tanks ran them over, that caused the Russians to leave Afghanistan. Nor does he mention that Saudi Arabia matched American funds 1:1. I also doubt the mujahideen saw themselves as the "Regan Army". But, all in all it is a well written strongly Republican biased piece.

Finally Johns gets around to discussing the aftermath of the Russians exit.

"Unable to maintain a consensus for some continued nation-building following the Soviets' nine-year occupation, as advocated by most of the Reagan army of mujahideen supporters, the Taliban ultimately arose to fill the power vacuum left by the Soviets, making Afghanistan the breeding ground for al-Qaeda training and leading to what has become this nation's current conflict against global terrorism. Does there not exist a contemporary lesson in this? It seems impossible, if we are a nation given to learning even history's most recent lessons, not to see that U.S. post-Saddam engagement in Iraq, costly as it has been, is rooted in not making a similar mistake to the one made in Afghanistan. Had the U.S. committed just several years to help Afghanistan and its people rebuild following its 1989 liberation, what might be the state of this world today? But U.S. neglect of post-occupation Afghanistan, especially under the Clinton administration, invited a worst possible outcome, which ultimately arrived on September 11, 2001."

"the defeat of the Red Army in that conflict stands as one of the great successes of U.S. engagement in the world, sending a hugely important global signal to the Soviets and the world that the future did not belong to Moscow's totalitarian aspirations. The future belonged to those who resisted it. This change of current is at the heart of the West's Cold War victory."

Now lets get the timelines of US presidents and world events clear and you will see just how much the USA learns from history!


1977 Jimmy Carter
1978
1979 Russian army begins deployment in Afghanistan
1980
1981 Ronald Regan
1982
1983
1984
1985
1986
1987
1988
1989 George H. W. Bush - Russian withdrawal from Afghanistan complete
1990 Sadam Hussein invades Kuwait
1991 US forces attacked and defeated, the Iraqi army in Kuwait and parts of southern Iraq, and then left
1992
1993 Bill Clinton
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001 George W. Bush - US troops deploy to Afghanistan
2002
2003 US troops invade Iraq
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009 Barack Obama - US troops remain in Afghanistan and Iraq.

George H. W. Bush (and to a much lesser extent 4 years latter Bill Clinton) was the president responsible for not investing in the rebuilding of Afghanistan, leaving it empty for 'the crazies to start rolling in", which they clearly did. Hence George W. Bush went off to war again to try and get rid of the "crazies" his father let thrive, with no plan for the post-war reconstruction his father forgot about. Hence we are still there fighting a stronger insurgency than at the start of the war.

George H. W. Bush left Iraq at an appropriate time, but clearly W. Bush thought he should have stayed, and 12 years later he was back on the pretense of destroying Saddam's non-existent "Weapons of mass destruction". The new investigation in the UK into why they went to war will probably lay this all bare.

So we were back in Iraq with the US, we pulled Saddam's statue over, and thought we would be leaving. Again, with absolutely no exit strategy, or thought to reconstruction the country was not stable enough for a withdrawal, and more than 6 years later we are still there.

Clearly we fucked up the end game, and are intent on doing it over and over again.
Who knows whose home we will fuck up next….