POLITICS: Missing in Action
Fund, John H.
P o L I T I c s Missing in Action Ronald Reagan was Charlie Wilson’s commander in chief. by John H. Fund tells the story of how a libertine Democratic congressman teamed up with other Cold...
...Despite the sad state of bipartisan cooperation in foreign policy today, Charlie Wilson’s War provides an unwitting lesson, namely that the bipartisanship that was the backbone of its story may be needed again...
...Despite the sad state of bipartisan cooperation in foreign policy today, Charlie Wilson’s War provides an unwitting lesson, namely that the bipartisanship that was the backbone of its story may be needed again...
...Gary Schmitt, who served as the Democratic staff director on the Senate Intelligence Committee, recalls that early in the Reagan administration CIA career bureaucrats “were insisting that the Soviets could not possibly lose the war, and the folks from the operational side at Langley were saying, ‘Let’s bleed ’em, but let’s not start World War III either.’” 6 6 T H e a M e R I c a n s P e c T a T o R f e b R U a R Y 2 0 0 8 William Casey J o H n H . f U n d Ronald Reagan changed all that...
...Gordon Humphrey, worked with a maverick CIA agent named Gust Avrakotos, helped stitch together a weapons package that involved improbable simultaneous support from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Israel...
...Ruefully he observes that “the constant blaring of the media, from the left and the right, has taken us to a point where there’s no legitimate discussion” on serious issues...
...To his credit, Wilson in real life doesn’t see it that way...
...aid went to Hekmatyar, who “had the dubious distinction of never winning a significant battle during the war, training a variety of militant Islamists from around the world, killing significant numbers of mujahedeen from other parties, and taking a virulently anti-Western line...
...In early 1989, the last Soviet troops pulled out, and the experience convinced many in the Politburo to think twice about putting down rebellions in Eastern Europe...
...In Congress a small team of committed antiCommunists, including Wilson and New Hampshire Republican Sen...
...Peter Bergen, who served as CNN’s terrorism analyst, believes at least $600 million of the U.S...
...The Texas Democrat was a liberal on many issues and a libertine in his personal life...
...Indeed, he says that one reason he was able to get beaucoup funding for the Afghan mujahedeen was that many House Democrats, intent on blocking Reagan White House support for the Nicaraguan Contras, were happy to let Wilson and his friends have their way in a far-off land in order to prove their own anti-Communist credentials...
...Charlie Wilson maybe sealed the deal with Egypt by bringing an exotic belly dancer friend of his from Texas to impress the Egyptian defense minister...
...Sadly, he notes that nothing like the Afghan operation could survive today’s poisonous Washington atmosphere...
...Initially, no one thought the Soviets could be dislodged from Afghanistan...
...Funding for the mujahedeen eventually grew from $5 million to, with matching funds from Saudi Arabia, a cool $1 billion—making the operation the largest “overt-covert” initiative ever pursued by the U.S...
...But in foreign policy he was a hawk and fiercely anti-Communist...
...aid was wasted for several years because so much of it went to what he calls “an America-hating Khomeini-loving Islamofascist named Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, and his ‘Hezbi’ mujahedeen...
...Once again, Ronald Reagan stepped in and changed things...
...Because of fierce opposition from CIA bureaucrats, the Stingers didn’t begin arriving until September 1986...
...Charlie Wilson certainly deserves accolades for his role in helping to hand the Soviets their first military defeat since World War II...
...That’s all gone now...
...Their elite special forces units (Spetsnatz) and Hind helicopter attack gunships were laying waste to the Afghan countryside and killing the rebels faster than they could bring in new recruits...
...First, he signed topsecret directives to use covert action and economic warfare to weaken the Soviets...
...I despised the tyranny,” he told me earlier this year...
...Everyone helped in his own way...
...We wouldn’t have won the Cold War without them...
...In April 1985 he signed an Executive Order giving the CIA authority to transfer Stinger missiles to the Afghans...
...Within months, the Berlin Wall fell without Moscow raising so much as a single AK-47 in anger...
...As Reagan biographer Lou Cannon notes, “Reagan expressed revulsion at the brutal destruction of Afghan villages and such Soviet policies as the scattering of mines disguised as toys that killed and maimed Afghan children...
...The war began to turn in favor of the mujahedeen...
...John H. fund, The American Spectator’s Politics columnist, is author of Stealing Elections: How Voter Fraud Threatens Our Democracy (Encounter Books...
...Someone who praises Charlie Wilson notes that he accomplished what he did despite working under “a Republican president...
...But Jack Wheeler, an expert on how antithem went to rebel groups that had a more effective track record than Hekmatyar’s forces...
...f e b R U a R Y 2 0 0 8 T H e a M e R I c a n s P e c T a T o R 6 7...
...Hollywood’s new film hasten its end...
...Charlie Wilson, who is on the mend from a heart transplant he received last September, is quick to note that the success in Afghanistan was the result of a lot of teamwork for “a helluva bunch of guys and gals...
...We need reminding that those who break out of the partisan or bureaucratic boxes can be valuable,” Wilson told me...
...by John H. Fund tells the story of how a libertine Democratic congressman teamed up with other Cold War riors to humiliate the Soviet Empire in Afghani stan and Alot of things wound up on the cutting-room floor of Charlie Wilson’s War...
...For a change, many of Tom Hanks, who brings the dapper, albeit sometimes debauched, Wilson to life in the film, agrees...
...He and CIA Director William Casey and Undersecretary of Defense Fred Iklé then decided that Afghanistan could become the Soviet Union’s soft underbelly...
...The first day the Stingers were used, three Soviet Hind helicopters were downed...
...The only problem with Hollywood’s paean to Wilson is that many of his allies and the Reagan administration itself have been airbrushed out of the film...
...Communist insurgencies helped bring down the Soviet Union, notes that much of the U.S...
...We may not win the war on terror if we don’t have any...
...He sadly adds that he doesn’t think anything like it could happen today...
...Once Ronald Reagan gave us the OK to employ hand-held Stinger missiles [against the Soviets], the war was over,” he told me...
...We won because there was no partisanship or damaging leaks,” he emphasizes...
...The only reference to the man who was president for almost the entire period the movie covers comes at the end, and it’s an insult at that...
...P o L I T I c s Missing in Action Ronald Reagan was Charlie Wilson’s commander in chief...
...T d t late ’86 through ’88, the Soviets retre s p n r c w t i S f s d r d he e end o came o v sw e iftly a . r “After aft a the d loss ilot of a e f hun ro i m n - defeat,” Jack Wheeler writes...
...Until my dying day, I’ll give him credit...
Vol. 41 • February 2008 • No. 1
