were there any terrorist attacks (suicide bombings etc) before the afghanis were played as pawns in a war between russia and the US
or were they systematically radicalized by US back then? ...
makes sense....a soldier thats not only not afraid to die but WANTS to die and meet virgins and allah is formidable.
My understanding is that the Islamic radical element was absent in pre-invasion Afghanistan.
The origins of it all go back to the OSS (precursor to the CIA) and the sending of various agents to the area on information collection activities. Eventually the OSS became the CIA and the later started to take a more aggressive stance, going from mere information-gathering activities to actually putting together and training groups of radicalized individuals under the only thing that united them: Islam. Yes, we trained Islamic radicals. And they eventually attacked us. Blowback at its bestest.
These groups of now Islamic terrorists actually carried out terrorist attacks in the USSR's stans, a move that sped up an invasion they always wanted to carry out, that of Afghanistan. When the invasion was complete the CIA kept on training these nutcases and actually provided them with weapons, some of which are now being used against US military. Blowback again.
Needless to say the Russians were eventually defeated, but, by then, these radicalized elements considered us, the U.S.A; a target.
