My grandma said that President Regan is responsible for the rise of the extreme Islamics, is she right?

Question

Ok, my grandma was a peace demonstrator during the vietnam war even though my other grandpa (not her husband is a vietnam veteran). She said that there was a peaceful non religious government in Afganistan in the 1970s (I think thats the date she gave) and President Regan sent troops into that country and caused the government to fall because they were not religious. He supported the Taliban government because they believed in G-d. She said that the non religious government gave women equal rights. If she is right than our own country made the problem we are currently facing. Oh I happen to believe in G-d. My grandma does not beieve in G-d. She says the comunists were right and when they were in power there were no religious wars like we have now. Is she right?

Answer 1

I think your Grandma is wrong. The USSR sent troops there in the eightys.

Answer 2

One thing about peace movements, they paint the world with a brush that is void of reality at times. Afghanistan has always been what has been commonly called "no man's land" meaning it was really without governments. As far as the women's rights issue one must understand that in the desert during those time one did not have to be of any religious sect, women were owned and ruled by their tribal leaders. View the list of wars below. The communist were not right and neither were the peace demonstrators of yore.

Wars foughts in Afghanistan include:

First Anglo-Afghan War (from 1839 to 1842)
Second Anglo-Afghan War (from 1878 to 1881)
Panjdeh Incident (1885)
Third Anglo-Afghan War (1919)
1929 Afghan Civil War - Afghan rebel Bacha-i-Saqao briefly overthrew the government and became emir.
Soviet war in Afghanistan (from 1979 to 1989)
Afghan Civil War (from 1992 to 2001)
2001 war in Afghanistan (2001 to present)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghanistan_timeline_1971%E2%80%931975

You need to go to above site, the nation was straving in the 70's, many coups and rulers, it was very turbulant time perhaps not wars with outsiders but within it was really bad.

Answer 3

Your grandma is a pinko.

Here's some history for you:

1980 - Soviet Union Invades Afghanistan as a pre-emptive measure in order to secure a larger crossing for a subsequent invasion of Pakistan. Their goal? A warm water Naval port and a quick and easy way to move nuclear submarines carrying short range missiles into the Pacific, and as a way to circumvent the SOSUS line in Europe (an underwater sonar cable that listens for Soviet Submarine crossings).

United States Boycott's the Summer Olympic games in 1980, held in Moscow, as part of a response to the Soviet Invasion.

The CIA assisted the Afghani fighters by providing them with Stinger Missiles to combat Soviet Air Forces. The Muhajaddin (sp) fighters became well equipped as a result. Osama Bin Laden was a member of this group.

In 1991 Iraqi Forces Invade Kuwait as a response to alleged findings that Kuwaiti oil drillers were using a technique called "slant drilling" meaning that they could angle their drills in such a way to sneak them underneath the Iraqi border underground and steal their oil.

The Muhajadin (sp) fighters offer to Saudi Arabia their 'troops' to defend that country. The Royal Saudi government refuses, instead accepting the offer of the United States and it's more professional military forces. This measure, pissed off the Muhajadin and Osama Bin Laden. It was this event, that eventually led to the formation of Al-Qaeda, and Bin Laden's rise to power, and subsequently, the attacks on the United States.

1991 President George H.W. Bush sends U.S. Forces to Saudi Arabia. The country of Kuwait is liberated, U.S. Forces stop short 100 Miles from invading Baghdad, using the argument that the Iraqi Forces had been thwarted, were withdrawing, and Kuwait was again free. The other reason given was that the United States would have to install a temporary government, headed by the military, in the way that Paul Bremer was in Iraq until the Iraqi provisional government was formed.

George W. Bush Invades Iraq, using 9/11, and so called, "Weapons of Mass Destruction" as the reason. No WMD's were found, and no direct link to the 9/11 attacks was either. Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld was overheard saying that the 9/11 attacks could be used as an excuse to go after Saddam Hussein. Hussein and his government complied with UN inspectors, and the fact that no WMD evidence was found is proof that sanctions leveled by the UN post Desert Storm were working.

President Reagan was a defender of Freedom, and Democracy. If it was not for him, the Cold war would still be a hot contest, the Berlin Wall would still exist, and the world would be a worse off place to live in than it is now. I think your Grandma needs to read a history book.

Answer 4

As much as I respect your grandmother, she is not correct on this one. The one president we had that made the Islamics bold because he did nothing was during the late 1070s with Jimmy Carter as president.

Now, Jimmy Carter is a good guy, he's a Christian and he works a lot today with Habitat for Humanity. I have nothing against him as a person, but as a president he was horrible when it came to confronting Islam. It was Carter who took in the Shah of Iran when he had cancer and prevented the Shah from stopping the Islamic revolution in 1978. It was Carter who did nothing as the militant Muslims first started under the Ayatollah in Iran. It was Carter who did nothing as Iran took hostages from our embassy and did nothing until Reagan got them out when he took office. It was Carter who depleted the power of the US military then sent them in to Iran to rescue the hostages and the US soldiers got the rear ends kicked. It was an embarrassment. Because of Carter the Muslims first realized that the US was not a total superpower and then the rest is history.

Like I said, your grandmother being an ex-protester most likely has a bias toward the left and has either forgot or selectively remembers history. I, on the other hand am a history teacher and what I write here is a commonly known fact in academic circles. Carter was a bum as president.

TX Guy

Answer 5

The reagan administration did train and equip Bin Laden and the peopole who would later become the Taliban and called them "freedom fighters". He did it because he wanted kick the communists out of Afghanistan. Your grandma is free to draw her own conclusions of why people were so afraid of the communists, but Reagan also supported Saddam Hussein and most people agree it's because he was not religious, so I'm not sure religion had much to do with it.

But things are not so black and white, the russians were probably on balance going to do more good than bad in that country and in hindsight it was a mistake to arm and support the taliban, just as today it's a mistake to arm and support the Brutal Drug Warlords that control afghanistan now.

Answer 6

Man makes war, not God.
Russia went into Afganistan and went to war with the rebels. Perhaps that was the catalyst. I know that America supported the rebels against Russia. But that is old history.
Communism is a religion in and of itself, in that it was a religion of Anti-God. It is a very strong government that sucks all of the life of it's people and presses down on creativity, engineering improvements, commerce, quality of life. It can not permanently sustain itself because it becomes more & more dependent on other countries of other government systems to subsidize them (such as the Russians purchasing wheat to feed it's people from the US).
There have been wars in the name of religion since the beginning of recorded history. To pinpoint this era as something new is ludicris! The more desperate the Taliban gets, the more strikes they will make. Understand that they are now recruiting women; they are that desperate. History shows that right before a regime falls, there is one last strong upsurge of fighting, then it stops and dwindles down to little splinter groups that eventually pan out. Did you know that as recently as the last two years, they found another Japanese soldier in one of the South Pacific Islands, still poised and ready to fight in the 2nd World War? He had no communication, and assumed that the war was still on-going. After the American Civil War, there were renegade groups of former Southern soldiers that went about doing guerilla warfare against the newly United States? The James Brothers, The Younger Gang and others kept on fighting for the South.

So the more I hear of the Taliban getting aggressive, the more I sense that they are loosing footing and getting desperate, and it's just a matter of time when things will settle down.

But the war of the Islamic people will continue to simmer, as they have for the past 1500 years, as they are focused on destroying the Nation of Israel. That is their primary goal. So long as the United States supports Israel, the Islamic people will be at war with us and other supportive nations.

So this war will continue, just lessen with time. I am sorry that you have a grandmother that can not see God all about her. Pray for her, that God be revealed to her, and her eyes and heart be opened to Him. She needs to know of the Trinity and the great love that God has for her, if she'd listen just listen to God's Word.

Answer 7

I don't think it had so much to do with G_d as it did with beating the Russians.

Reagan was secretly funding the Islamic miltants in Afghanistan and giving them special war training because, at the time, Russia had invaded Afghanistan and Russia was our enemy (I mean the USSR, the communists, when I say this--this is what the cold war was all about--beating the communists). The idea was, if Russia was OUR enemy, and the militants were RUSSIA's enemy, they must be our friend.

During this war training the CIA was supposedly giving the militants, they learned a lot of the techniques that militant groups are using now.

Answer 8

The US government sent the US Army into Afghanistan not because the Taliban were not religious, but instead because the Taliban was fighting the Russians who invaded Afghanistan. It wasn't at all about religion - it never is. It's always about money, power, and control. Religion is just an excuse that the government uses to wage war.

Answer 9

It is true that we fought with BinLadin to repel the Russians when they invaded Afghanistan, but it was probably more due to them trying to take over Afghanistan. Because we have separation of Church and State it would be unlikely that we would send troops to a country to repel invaders in the name of religion. We would, on the other hand, send troops in the name of democracy, which is one of the reasons we are in Iraq.

As to your other statement about this event giving rise to violence by Extreme Islamics. I personally don't think Extreme Islamics don't need a reason to do their violence, but I'm sure they use the fact that the US is over there now as a good excuse. Unfortunately, people in this country somehow believe that if the US was not in Iraq or Afghanistan that the violence would end. If that were true then where was the US on Sept 11?

Answer 10

No, she is not. Refer to 1978, Iranian Revolution, Carter Administration. There was no Taliban government during the Reagan years. Grandma is just an old hippy with an axe to grind. Reagan supported the "resistance" afghans against the Soviets. The Soviets were the bad guys in that era.
The fact that Afghanistan pushed the Soviets out, with US covert help, and the USSR collapsed shortly thereafter did give militant Islam delusions of grandeur.
Afghanstan was a troublesome soviet satellite in the 70's and the soviets invaded Afghanstan in 79 to put their guy back in power. Afghanstan has NEVER, NEVER been a peaceful place.
P.S. I am an old hippy too, but I grew up.

Answer 11

theres some truth in it. the US government didnt support the taliban for religous reasons, they supported them becuase they were anti-communist and fought russian troops for 10 years. Also the US funded Sadam in Iraq for years in his war against Iran. The US funded the IRA in Ireland for years in their struggle against Britain too in the past. That all stoped in 2001 after the trade centre bombings and the US wanted British support to invade Afghanistan to push out the taliban who they now believed to be in cahoots with Bin Ladens crew. hardly a coincidence is it. By the way this is not some cooky conspiracy theory but all well known fact, ask any one else.
I have to say that your gran is right in that the elevated levels of danger in the worlds politics are the result of very bad US foreign policy since 1945 to now.
I cant say that i agree with the communists. she is right that they kept religious wars down, in their sphere of influence anyway. they did it by being highly repressive and banning all religion as it goes against communist theory. next time she says how great they are just metion that jospeh stalin muredered at least 30,000,000 (yes 30 million) of his own people to maintain his domination. take heart it isnt only the US that have behaved badly over the years. Dont get me started on the British empire before 1945 lol