Replies to post #80534 on Tornado Alley (PROG)

[fuagf]

Brilliantly said, it is an an excellent personal note ..

Intelligence & civility were thrown out the door by an alcoholic bungler, a deserter, a cheater at every turn
in his life AND in every sense of the word ...PLUS a religious whacko who thought he was on a mission from
God. To make it even worse he was enabled + used by the creepiest political criminals in America's past .. . -

this wasn't his, but .. from F6's post you replied to ..

1978

The Taraki government proceeded to legalize labor unions, and set up a minimum wage, a progressive income tax, a literacy campaign, and programs that gave ordinary people greater access to health care, housing, and public sanitation. Fledgling peasant cooperatives were started and price reductions on some key foods were imposed.

The government also continued a campaign begun by the king to emancipate women from their
age-old tribal bondage. It provided public education for girls and for the children of various tribes.

A report in the San Francisco Chronicle (17 November 2001) noted that under the Taraki regime Kabul had been “a cosmopolitan city. Artists and hippies flocked to the capital. Women studied agriculture, engineering and business at the city’s university. Afghan women held government jobs—-in the 1980s, there were seven female members of parliament. Women drove cars, traveled and went on dates. Fifty percent of university students were women.”

The Taraki government moved to eradicate the cultivation of opium poppy. Until then Afghanistan had been producing more than 70 percent of the opium needed for the world’s heroin supply. The government also abolished all debts owed by farmers, and began developing a major land reform program. Ryan believes that it was a “genuinely popular government and people looked forward to the future with great hope.”

But serious opposition arose from several quarters. The feudal landlords opposed the land reform program that infringed on their holdings. And tribesmen and fundamentalist mullahs vehemently opposed the government’s dedication to gender equality and the education of women and children.

Because of its egalitarian and collectivist economic policies the Taraki government also incurred the opposition of the US national security state. Almost immediately after the PDP coalition came to power, the CIA, assisted by Saudi and Pakistani military, launched a large scale intervention into Afghanistan on the side of the ousted feudal lords, reactionary tribal chieftains, mullahs, and opium traffickers.

A top official within the Taraki government was Hafizulla Amin, believed by many to have been recruited by the CIA during the several years he spent in the United States as a student. In September 1979, Amin seized state power in an armed coup. He executed Taraki, halted the reforms, and murdered, jailed, or exiled thousands of Taraki supporters as he moved toward establishing a fundamentalist Islamic state. But within two months, he was overthrown by PDP remnants including elements within the military.

It should be noted that all this happened before the Soviet military intervention.
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=35679766

.. outlines why, Helen Caldicott wrote in Missile Envy, that the Soviets invaded because of US interference. Sucked in.

All should never forget the cause of the enc Taraki government of Afghanistan and the Mossadegh government of Iran, in 1953.

SECRETS OF HISTORY - The CIA in Iran

" ... the Shah requires special preparation. By nature a
creature of indecision, beset by formless doubts and fears,
he must be induced to play his role ..." -TPAJAX Plan.


Corbis / Bettmann

By JAMES RISEN

The Central Intelligence Agency's secret history of its covert operation to overthrow Iran's government in 1953 offers an inside look at how the agency stumbled into success, despite a series of mishaps that derailed its original plans.

Written in 1954 by one of the coup's chief planners, the history details how United States and British officials plotted the military coup that returned the shah of Iran to power and toppled Iran's elected prime minister, an ardent nationalist.

The document shows that:

# Britain, fearful of Iran's plans to nationalize its oil industry, came up with the idea for the coup in 1952 and pressed the United States to mount a joint operation to remove the prime minister.

# The C.I.A. and S.I.S., the British intelligence service, handpicked Gen. Fazlollah Zahedi to succeed Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh and covertly funneled $5 million to General Zahedi's regime two days after the coup prevailed.

# Iranians working for the C.I.A. and posing as Communists harassed religious leaders and staged the bombing of one cleric's home in a campaign to turn the country's Islamic religious community against Mossadegh's government.

# The shah's cowardice nearly killed the C.I.A. operation. Fearful of risking his throne, the Shah repeatedly refused to sign C.I.A.-written royal decrees to change the government. The agency arranged for the shah's twin sister, Princess Ashraf Pahlevi, and Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, the father of the Desert Storm commander, to act as intermediaries to try to keep him from wilting under pressure. He still fled the country just before the coup succeeded.
http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/mideast/041600iran-cia-index.html

Thank goodness for all those who have given us these truths. We all have a duty to inform. To
slip it in to conversations wherever and whenever, it feels right we do. Lol, yup, even at tea parties.

ps: Thanks to, F6, for getting me to the photographer Luke's magnificent photographs of Afghanistan. Thank you for posting them.

[SilverSurfer]

so this is how you see it > http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3110/3195403003_8451fc1dc9.jpg

hilarious, Bush was a putz and a push over....

Obama and "Dead Fish" Emanuel are the "Chicago Style Politicians" http://www.google.com/search?q=The+Obama+Emanuel+intimidation+tactics&rls=com.microsoft:*:IE-SearchBox&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7&rlz=1I7GGLL_en

http://seminal.firedoglake.com/diary/43337