Liberty Maven

In the recent movie, Charlie Wilson’s War, Congressman Charlie Wilson is given credit for being the main contributor in ending the Cold War. The movie suggests by spending billions of dollars to aid Afghanistan against the Soviet Union it ultimately caused the Soviet Union to collapse. I’m not sure how accurate that really is. It seems that the Soviet Union was headed for collapse due to their flawed economic system anyway. Their attempt to take over Afghanistan being thwarted certainly pushed them more towards their already inevitable collapse, but it should not be considered the main reason.

Ron Paul preaches the foreign policy ideology of Thomas Jefferson and George Washington in an age where doing so is quite unpopular. Neither the Democrats or Republicans are willing to keep the over-reaching US hands overseas to ourselves. Charlie Wilson seemed to possess this trait as well. The Cold War then is equivalent to the War on Terror today. How ironic it is that if it weren’t for Charlie Wilson’s interventions in Afghanistan in the 1980’s the War on Terror may not even exist today. At least not in its current form.

Osama Bin Laden was amongst those rebels we gave weapons and money to in order to help them defeat the Soviets. This was Charlie Wilson’s doing. He like many at the time were blinded by the evils of the Soviet Union and communism. So instead of foreseeing the inevitable economic collapse of their empire and letting Afghanistan run its course, he lobbied to get weapons and funding funneled covertly to the Afghanistan resistance. This propped up Afghanistan enough to push the Soviets back in retreat. Once this was complete, the US stopped the funding. This left Afghanistan out in the cold and alone with 50% of their population 14 years old and younger (according to the movie).

I’m no expert on the middle east or Islam. I do know the common sense of cause and effect though. It seems to me the problem was not with the United States “abandoning” Afghanistan following their conflict with the Soviet Union, but rather getting involved in aiding Afghanistan in the first place. If we never allied with Afghanistan against the Soviets, the Soviets would have occupied the country. Yet another country for the Soviets to maintain would likely have cost them more economically than retreating as they did thanks to the American aid.

It is arguable that if the US did nothing, the Soviet Union would have fallen even sooner than it did. It is estimated that up to $20 billion in tax payer money was funneled into Afghanistan in the effort. In hindsight that seems like a colossal waste of money for trying to affect something that was already going to occur without that expenditure.

Today we are spending ourselves silly with our foreign aid and interventionism.  We have 700 bases all over the world. We continually pass legislation giving monetary aid to foreign governments as our own debt increases (now over $9 billion and growing). It is seemingly more and more likely that the only way this behavior will end is by an economic collapse. I was born in an America full of dreams and boundless hope. I hope I don’t leave behind an America in ruin for my children and yours to sort out. They deserve better. We deserve better. Our founding fathers wouldn’t even recognize the country they created. It is not too late to turn it around now, but sooner or later that point of no return will come. That is unless we do something about it by getting involved.

At the end of the movie Charlie Wilson says “we f—– up the end game.” Perhaps the best way to avoid that in the future is to never begin his kind of game in the first place.