"Dave Smith" wrote in message
news:42812ADF.2B51CC1@sympatico.ca...
> Keith W wrote:
>
>> Not really, the Mujahideen funded by the US were the group that
>> went on to be called the Northern Alliance and proved rather critical
>> to the regime change in that country. Indeed the leader of the
>> Northern Alliance, Ahmed Shah Massoud, known as the Lion of Panjshir,
>> was assassinated by Al Qaeda suicide bombers posing as a film crew
>> in Sept 9 2001, just before the attacks on the USA. Its clear that they
>> knew
>> he
>> would be the focus of the opposition in the coming days.
>>
>> The Taleban were the creation of the Pakistani Directorate for
>> Inter-Services
>> Intelligence (ISI) and came on the scene in 1994 long after the Soviets
>> withdrew from Afghanistan and the Americans had lost interest.
>
> What were the Northern Alliance but a collection of war lords and their
> armed
> thugs? After the Russians pulled out and there was no more money coming
> in to
> fund all those little private armies they became little more than highway
> robbers, extorting money out of the population. The Taliban were welcomed
> by
> many Afghans because they brought a promise of law and order.
Indeed but they were not, as claimed, funded and trained by the US.
> But then, that is
> what the Soviets had tried to do.
>
The Soviets tried to do it by overthrowing the existing government
and installing their own puppet regime. Before they did so Afghanistan
was a tourist destination and Kabul was a stop on the hippie trail.
Keith
|