I. Introduction
A. Attention Getter – During the Cold War, Soviet students, and military cadets in particular, were taught geography using an upside-down map of the world with the USSR at the bottom and India up top.
B. Logical - Due to Eastern Europe and red-colored already being communist allies and states, Afghanistan was the logical gateway through the mountain barriers into China, India, and Iran. Taking Afghanistan would begin a move to encircle the Persian Gulf and China and then complete Soviet dominance of Eurasia.
C. Thesis - The Soviet invasion ended up turning the Afghans’ worlds upside-down, and though the US had many chances to prevent the war, end the war quickly and install a non-hostile government in Afghanistan, it failed to do so.
D. Psychological – That’s why the Taliban is now in power instead of a government that’s not actively hostile towards us.
II. Body
A. Preventative Opportunities
1. After WWII – relations go downhill
a. King Zahir Shah was on good terms with Franklin Roosevelt and the US was ready to aid Afghanistan now that it that war had made it a superpower.
b. Truman turns totally away and Eisenhower spent a total of 2 hours in Afghanistan during his term.
2. In 1963
a. Cold war been going on for 20 years
b. Afghanistan tries democratic experiment without initialization/prodding from US.
c. According to Leo Poullada, a State Dept official at the time, “It was in America’s interest to know what the Afghan Communists were up to, and to support and encourage the democratic political development of Afghanistan – but again, American diplomacy failed to rise to the occasion. A measure of this failure is the fact that in every year of the democratic experiment American economic aid declined.”
B. During the coup before the invasion
1. King Zahir Shah usurped
2. 30,00 killed in Heart aerial bombings, 1100 dissidents, women, kids, elderly killed in Kerala
3. Infusion of 10,000 Soviet officials to “stabilize” the country
4. After the third ruler since the king’s fall, US is asked to help purge KGB from Afghan gov’t.
5. US deaf/blind to pleas/events
6. Passive spectator in communists revolutions in Nicaragua, Angola, Mozambique – USSR thought same would apply to Afghanistan, so they went ahead and invaded.
C. During War
1. The US did give small arms throughout, but it took six year to give them Stingers to counter Soviet aerial attacks.
2. A reporter who regularly went to and from Afghanistan and was best friends with a leader of the mujahaddin resistance (holy warriors) gave him opportunity to come to US a couple times to ask for help, but US only squeezed him for info and sent him packing.
3. According to the journalist, Kurt Lohbeck, who spent 8 years covering the war, the US outlook was to exclude the mujahaddin from having any say in their country’s future though they were the fighters. “Conspicuously absent from the high command of [the] extensive covert operation were the Afghans. Their participation was considered unnecessary, since they were viewed as mere cannon fodder for American and Pakistani objectives.” – pure selfishness by US.
D. After the War – civil war ensues
1. Seven mujahaddin factions (including Abdul Haq’s) vying for Kabul – all have separate agendas and beliefs but one (Gulbaddin Hekmaytar) is very anti-American. He has no military power, but buys off and assassinates other mujahaddin leaders to further himself. Guess who the US supports?
2. The US could support the “brilliant military commander, gifted political planner and analytical genius” Abdul Haq who envisions a technological, productive, and free Afghanistan.
3. The factions end up being unable to end the civil war or solidify any type of government in Kabul.
III. Conclusion
A. As we’ve seen, the US had opportunities to prevent the war, end the war quickly, and aid the formations of a non-hostile Afghan government, but instead they were constantly on the lookout for number one, and not the well-being of the Afghanistan, so that when they withdrew in the early 90’s they left a sick and war torn country, which spawned the Taliban we all know and hate.
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