(no subject)
Sep. 6th, 2014 06:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
aleatoriusЛивен про излишнюю надежду американцев на информацию поступающую по каналам спецслужб, и даже про веру в собственную пропаганду
из книги America Right or Wrong an Anatomy of American Nationalism
"Part of the genesis of this book lies in a conversation at a U.S. Embassy party in
May 1989 in Islamabad, Pakistan, where I was then working as a stringer for
The Times (London), covering both Pakistani affairs and the war in Afghanistan
from the side of the mujahideen. The party was in honor of a newly arrived U.S.
diplomat, who to the best of my recollection had never worked in Pakistan or any
other Muslim country before.
I backed up a colleague, Kathy Gannon of the Associated Press, in criticizing
U.S. policy on Afghanistan. We argued that especially now that the Soviet forces
had left, the United States' giving massive financial and military aid to Pakistan so
that its secret service could help mujahideen groups of its choice was lunacy. The
groups in question (we were thinking at the time chiefly of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar,
who since the overthrow of the Taliban has emerged as an anti-American warlord)
and their Arab allies were not only a serious threat to peace and progress in
Afghanistan, they were pathologically anti-Western.
To this the U.S. diplomat replied that because of his access to intelligence sources,
his knowledge of Afghanistan was greater than ours (we had both visited Afghanistan
repeatedly with the mujahideen, Kathy for much longer and much more often
than I; he had never been there). He said that he was confident that the Afghan
resistance was going to build a "successful free market democracy" in Afghanistan.
When these arguments were demolished, others emerged: that the destruction
of the Soviet-backed regime in Kabul was essential to "defeat communism" in
the world and that "the Russians did it to us in Vietnam, and we're going to do it to
them in Afghanistan." Finally, he declared in exasperation that Kathy and I were
"the kind of people who lost us Vietnam."
This diatribe encapsulated many of the features of American nationalism addressed
in this book. They include the belief of the national security elite that its
access to intelligence makes it supremely wise and well informed—despite repeated and catastrophic evidence to the contrary. The belief in the democratization of
Afghanistan by the mujahideen reflected a messianism rooted in the American
Creed but was accompanied by a total ignorance of Afghan history, society, tradition
or reality in general."
из книги America Right or Wrong an Anatomy of American Nationalism
"Part of the genesis of this book lies in a conversation at a U.S. Embassy party in
May 1989 in Islamabad, Pakistan, where I was then working as a stringer for
The Times (London), covering both Pakistani affairs and the war in Afghanistan
from the side of the mujahideen. The party was in honor of a newly arrived U.S.
diplomat, who to the best of my recollection had never worked in Pakistan or any
other Muslim country before.
I backed up a colleague, Kathy Gannon of the Associated Press, in criticizing
U.S. policy on Afghanistan. We argued that especially now that the Soviet forces
had left, the United States' giving massive financial and military aid to Pakistan so
that its secret service could help mujahideen groups of its choice was lunacy. The
groups in question (we were thinking at the time chiefly of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar,
who since the overthrow of the Taliban has emerged as an anti-American warlord)
and their Arab allies were not only a serious threat to peace and progress in
Afghanistan, they were pathologically anti-Western.
To this the U.S. diplomat replied that because of his access to intelligence sources,
his knowledge of Afghanistan was greater than ours (we had both visited Afghanistan
repeatedly with the mujahideen, Kathy for much longer and much more often
than I; he had never been there). He said that he was confident that the Afghan
resistance was going to build a "successful free market democracy" in Afghanistan.
When these arguments were demolished, others emerged: that the destruction
of the Soviet-backed regime in Kabul was essential to "defeat communism" in
the world and that "the Russians did it to us in Vietnam, and we're going to do it to
them in Afghanistan." Finally, he declared in exasperation that Kathy and I were
"the kind of people who lost us Vietnam."
This diatribe encapsulated many of the features of American nationalism addressed
in this book. They include the belief of the national security elite that its
access to intelligence makes it supremely wise and well informed—despite repeated and catastrophic evidence to the contrary. The belief in the democratization of
Afghanistan by the mujahideen reflected a messianism rooted in the American
Creed but was accompanied by a total ignorance of Afghan history, society, tradition
or reality in general."
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no subject
Date: 2014-09-06 09:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-09-06 09:56 pm (UTC)а то чувак с биографией!
Грэм Грин (англ. Henry Graham Greene, урождённый Генри Грэм Грин; 2 октября 1904 года, Беркхэмстед, графство Хартфордшир — 3 апреля 1991, Веве, Швейцария) — английский писатель, в 1940-е годы — сотрудник британской разведки.
В 1956 отказался от ордена Британской империи; принял орден Кавалеров Почёта в 1966 и орден «Орден Заслуг» в 1986. Лауреат Иерусалимской премии (1981).
no subject
Date: 2014-09-09 07:04 pm (UTC)Шпион и католик, однако.