[papertyger]

The Islamic extremism of the past is now viewed with great hostility, but in the 1980s U.S. policy strongly supported such extremism. There is scarcely any recognition that a little more than a decade ago, the U.S. press waxed eloquent about the Afghan "freedom fighters" that included bin Laden.

What a load.

There's a big difference between supporting someone you assume will be grateful for assistance in achieving self determination, and blythely throwing lethal toys at someone who approves biting the hand that feeds it because that hand is different.

While the first case may be ignorant, it is at least noble in that it assumes the best of other cultures. The second is a leftist's bigoted wet dream.

[Destro]

Lysander is absolutely correct. Did you forget Bosnia? Kosovo? Chechnya? The Central Asian movements? The Taliban via Pakistan?

Like I said in my #19 reply to #15 "When has the USA never given circumstancial support to mujahadeen at first? We were probably (and maybe still are) the most mujahadeen freindly Western nation."

[Lysander]

There's a big difference between supporting someone you assume will be grateful for assistance in achieving self determination, and blythely throwing lethal toys at someone who approves biting the hand that feeds it because that hand is different.

It had nothing to do with gratitude. It was Jummy Dummy and Raygun fighting the cold war by opposing anything the Russians did. We often support those who turn on us. Do I need to list them? Our foreign policy has never been based in altruism, but immediate convienience.

[kellynla]

BTW it has been learned that it was the Iranians who were responsible for the bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983. And to this day, I haven't seen anyone from Iran come forward with the guilty parties. Yet they want us to come "liberate" them too. Maybe you have "sucker" tattooed on your forehead but I don't. Let the Iranians carry out their own trash! We've left enough blood already on the sands of the Middle East.