To me he did nothing impressive except use U.S. tax money to fund U.S. imperalism and to help the oil idustry who ten years latter would benifit form the taliban controlled Afganstan. That money could have gone to help U.S. citezens .
P.S. I am a liberal and I think that he should be in jail for mismangment of U.S. funds
I think this movie has anti-American government overtones - depicting decadence, corruption, and showing how we supplied, trained, and armed bin Laden's group in the 80s
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I don't think its Anti-American . I think the filmakers made him a hero and to me he did nothing heroric.
P.S. I like the book better
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f course he's not a hero, he's a gear in a big machine.
Regardless of how he helped, remember that those same weapons are currently being used against our troops right now via Taliban etc.
When the Russians left, we also left... without helping with schools, aid, et al.
So, I guess you could say that nothing has changed. This book (and film adaptation) is more of a peek behind the curtain for me than it is a character study or a "hero vehicle".
http://us.imdb.com/name/nm2339870/
An outstanding Amazon customer review of Crile's book:
First let me say that if even half of what is written in the late Mr. Crile's book is true, then former Texas Congressman Charlie Wilson is not only guilty of official corruption on a massive scale, he is also guilty of having been an Israeli agent, witting or not.
While the greed, gluttonly, and personal corruption of the members of Congress is hardly news anymore, for an American Congressman to report directly to a foreign embassy for instructions is almost unbelievable. This is not AIPAC or other multi-initialled Israeli front organization we're talking about here. Wilson physically reported to the Embassy of Israel, itself, seeking instructions - from a man whom even Charlie considered to be a Mossad agent - on what positions he should take in Congress! And when he finally fell out of love with his Israeli friends he went on to more years of shameless influence peddling for Pakistan and its intelligence agency. This man should consider himself very fortunate, indeed, not to be sharing a cell with others of his ilk such as Duke Cunningham. I have never seen the members of Congress and agencies of the executive branch pictured in such a bad light. A fish truly does rot from the head.
Like a kid in a candy store, Wilson ate, drank, whored, and debauched around the entire world, usually at huge taxpayer expense, but often on the tab of defense contractors and foreign governments. His personal quest for booze, sex, and flattery just happened to coincide with his desire to arm the Afghan Mujaheddin to fight the Soviets in 1980's Afghanistan - yes, the same Mujaheddin who eventually harbored al-Qaeda and who soonafter turned their CIA-provided weapons and training to the killing of American soldiers. Another well thought out plan, heh?
The fact is that Wilson comes across in this book as just another venal, squeaky-wheel, tin pot Texan who, by virtue his position of power in Congress, was manipulated in turn by John Birchers, defense contractors, Israel, the CIA, Pakistan, and a whole passel of gold-diggers. Charlie rolled over for every one of them. How far did all this go? At one point President Zia ul-Haq of Pakistan presented Wilson a tailored Pakistani Army Marshall's uniform. God bless him, it seems everyone had Charlie Wilson's number.
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The only reason why this cretin Amazon.com critic has the luxury of dissing Wilson and of pontificating on the so-called virtue a "proper" US congressman should have... is because his a** wasn't blown up in a nuclear showdown between Moscow and Washington, back in the "Cowboy Reagan" 80s.
I feel sorry for bleeding-heart idealists who think they hold some upper truth.
your comment shows your ignorance of the reality of the coldwar, ur still shaking with government induced fear so you'd fearfully approve and morally justify the USA's endless streak of wars around the world, commies in the 80ies, nowadays it's islam, and it seems they hit the jackpot by vaguely naming their new wars the "war on terror", so now they can hit any country they want, and keep inducing people like you (the stupid majority) with fear for an unknown enemy, how evil do you want things to get before you think it's appropriate for you to question your own government and stop being part of the stupid ignorant naif masses?
shareWhy do you blame America first, and paint such a broad brush?
"Don't step on the chickens!"
cuz that's the topic? geez
shareThat's a fair question to the ideologues on the left. The one for the ideologues on the right is "why don't you think America is ever wrong or to blame for anything?"
share"That's a fair question to the ideologues on the left. The one for the ideologues on the right is "why don't you think America is ever wrong or to blame for anything?" "
We do think America is sometimes wrong. But when a person does something wrong he should try to not repeat it in the future. He shouldn't sit around and wallow in his guilt and lash himself on the back and, in some quest to feel "clean" or something, load as much guilt on himself as possible. I get the feeling liberals feel all noble and righteous and "honest" for owning up for America's bad deeds to the point at which they almost WANT to see American bad deeds (lack of objectivity), so they can own up to it and feel all righteous and noble. Wasted energy.
Regret and guilt are useless emotions in and of themselves. The only value in them, is if a person changes his/her behavior as a result of them. Change of behavior is the only thing that is valuable. Try not to make the same mistake again. There is nothing noble about sitting around wallowing in guilt and maximizing it for all to see.
Did the USA screw the Native American Indians over? Yes. Is there any point in getting caught up in some morbid national introspection over it? No. I'm not saying ignore it. But there is a point at which examining oneself turns into a paralyzing morbid introspection, which is useless. Better to not screw the Native-American Indians over again in the future. It is not noble to feel guilty. Yes, it is natural to feel guilty. But guilt is like the pain you feel when you touch a hot stove. Is one proud of feeling pain? It's stupid to keep your hand there and focus on the pain. Better to change your behavior--take your hand off the stove; that is what the pain is telling you to do!
If you'll excuse a Biblical illustration: Even Judas wept over his betrayal of Jesus. Peter wept over his disowning of Jesus. The different between them? Judas went out and hung himself. A completely worthless and selfish deed. He remained in his guilt and misery. There is nothing good or noble about that. Peter changed his ways and made a difference and spent the rest of his life productively. He didn't spend his life going "Woe is me! I am a bad man." He got over it and moved on.
Slavery happened in America. The past cannot be changed. Dwelling on it is pointless. We all know what happened. Doesn't mean we need to relive it. Much of the racist problems in America persist because we, as a nation, have an unwillingness to let go of the past. We don't want to forgive ourselves. It would feel like letting ourselves off the hook, and we feel we don't deserve that. We probably dont' deserve it. But one does not EARN forgiveness. You just receive it. And sometimes you just have to give it to yourself, because not doing it results in pointless guilt. So what do we do as a country? We shove our face in the past over and over again and study it under a microscope. We are like a nation that won't let a wound heal by covering it with a bandage (which is how you heal a wound!--by covering it up!). We tear off the bandage, rip open the wound, and study it over and over and over again and say, "Look at this! Look what we did here! This is so bad! See what a bad thing we did here! We must study this and preserve this wound as a reminder always!" Maybe that is "educational" or "honest" but it's pointless and it does not allow for true healing to take place. What happens when a wound truly heals? It disappears. At worse, it leaves a scar behind. But people dont' want that in this nation. We want to broadcast our failures, maximize our guilt, and shove our noses in our dirt over and over so that we can feel like we're all noble and "honest" and so on. It's energy poorly spent.
And other nations certainly don't do it. They all have their own list of failures, but they try to be proud as a nation despite it.
I agree with most of what wintermonk said, with a few excpetions. Yes, dwelling on mistakes of the past and reveling in a guilty sense of self-loathing is not productive. But we still need to remember the mistakes of the past, and learn from them, lest we repeat them. Yes, when you touch a hot stove, you move your hand away, rather that revel in the pain. However, it is important to remember touching your hand to that stove, and remember the pain it caused, so that you don't touch the stove again. You cover up a cut in order to heal it. But you don't forget what caused the cut in the first place, so that you don't play with knives again.
shareYour, much too wordy, response contends that the US made mistakes in the past and should be forgiven. I contend that the elitist factions of the world continue to do things that harm the masses for the benefit of themselves and disguise them in order to fool folks like you. Looks like its working quite well.
share[deleted]
In all the years of the Cold War, it was the Russian leaders who showed the most restraint. It was our side who kept testing newer and more "effective" bombs. Reagan even made jokes about bombing Russia over a public address system. We "enjoyed" overwhelming superiority over the Soviet Union in the number and quality of our nuclear ballistic missiles. Our side came up the dreaded MIRV. President Johnson called for SALT talks only because he learned that Russia was developing technology for self defense by deploying anti-ballistic missile systems around Moscow.
there was no "bin Laden's group" in the 80s
shareObviously none of you were alive during the Cold War... Russia was our biggest enemy in these days, not to mention they had if not the best one of the best armies in the world... We did not want The Russian to occupy Afghanistan because we were scarred they would conquer the middle east and take all of that oil... We were terrified of Russia during the cold war... When Russia launched their satellite MIR most Americans thought that was the end of the world and they were going to be able to shoot at us from space... Not to mention the Cuban Missile Crisis... Russia was in those days what the Taliban are now The Number One Threat
shareWhat's 'anti-American' about bringing truth to America? Or bringing America to the truth, for that matter?
Lands of the Free and Homes of the Brave should never be afraid of the truth. Let alone call it its enemy.
Michel Couzijn
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Quite rightly.My enemy's enemy is my friend.Thing was to get the Russians out of Afghanistan.Charlie-great guy.His lifestyle-I wish it was mine!
share"My enemy's enemy is my friend"
Yeah quite right, problem is: once the common enemy is gone you might get a surprise when you find out how much of a friend that "friend" really is................
..................................sense of deja vu?........
His lifestyle-I wish it was mine!
Poorly Lived and Poorly Died, Poorly Buried and No One Criedshare
I don't see how telling (more or less) what actually happened is anti-American. He thought he was doing the right thing at the time, and maybe, had the government been willing to put funds into rebuilding afterwards, it wouldn't have come back to bite us so hard. At the same time (as I mentioned in another post), Al Qeda is not a direct descendent of the Mujahideen; other groups, such as the Northern Alliance, are also offshoots and have been our allies as recently as 2002.
I'm not particularly a fan of US imperialism either, but you're looking back at this with 20/20 hindsight. It's unfair to criticize him for how things turned out ten years later.
This is exactly what Philip Seymour Hoffman's characters was talking about with the story of the boy and the Zen master. "We'll see..."
I liked the movie.
To me, Charlie was made out to be a hero in the movie, but, in my estimation, he was not.
People here are asking, "How could he have known."
How could he have known? That people who, as one character put it, believe in a system that jails female rape victims, could ever be antagonistic to the United States?
Give me a break. The nature of this threat has been clear for centuries.
Please CNN glorfied these "Northern Alliance" Tajik warlords as some sort of liberating force in the war against terrorism, while many of the Pashtuns there are former members of Taliban - it's not that simple - and true, Al Queda is relatively new group, BUT Taliban government that harboured Al Queda training came to power DUE to American intervention in defeating socialist apprising and allowing Islamic fundies to come to power; just like what they are trying to do in Kosovo now - why is American government so narrow-minded?
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honestly you guys are quite retarded charlie wilson is a hero he stopped the massacre against hundreds of thousands of afghans. the russians would rape the children make the parents watch then put them in a tent and burn it that is quite inhumane and charlie wilson stopped this he went out of his way so that other peoples lives could be saved while the rest of congress was sitting there waiting for the iraqis to run out of bullets they ended up screwing us but in the end charlie wilson had no power in letting them fund 1 million for schools so quite frankly charlie wilson was one
shareOkay now, down from your high horses your empire does not have any better track record than Soviets did what come to massacres and slaughtering of civilians (to name a few: incidents in Philippine-American War, No Gun Ri and other incidents duiring Korean war, My Lai Massacre in Vietnam and plenty of more will come up in time from Iraq). Fall of the Soviet Union was hastened by their defeat in Afganistan but it did not cause it. It is pure speculation that cold war was won bechose of it (Soviet economy was allready in breaking point and that is main reason for the fall). As stated earlier atrocities would count in this conversation only if there had not been any committed U.S troops. Talebans and the rest are pretty much direct result of U.S involvement in Afganistan. To question if the raise of islamofacists could have predicted answer is: yes it could have and by using only the most basic deductive skills.
share>>>Please CNN glorfied these "Northern Alliance" Tajik warlords as some sort of liberating force in the war against terrorism, while many of the Pashtuns there are former members of Taliban - it's not that simple - and true, Al Queda is relatively new group, BUT Taliban government that harboured Al Queda training came to power DUE to American intervention in defeating socialist apprising and allowing Islamic fundies to come to power; just like what they are trying to do in Kosovo now - why is American government so narrow-minded?<<<
You might as well complain about how we rescued Stalin in our desire to defeat Hitler.
The fight against Islamofascism would have no meaning if we had lost the cold war. We fought yesterday's battle yesterday, and need to fight today's battle today.
I saw the film today and am not totally clear on the boy and the Zen Master story. Can you shed some light on this?
shareI saw the film today and am not totally clear on the boy and the Zen Master story. Can you shed some light on this?
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It's eight years later and you may no longer care, but others may.
As best as I remember the story was that every time something good happened, the zen master, instead of agreeing how good it was, would say "we'll see." The good events would lead to bad events, then bad events to good events, back and forth, and each time the zen master would respond the same way. The point was that there are no good or bad events, that each event leads to another event that may be very different than what was anticipated. Our task is to simply handle each event as it comes, without labeling it, since we don't know what unintended consequences it will bring.
What is a “hero” anyway? Pappy Boyington-who won the Medal of Honor- described himself as being a drunk and a bum and he was right. He was a drunk and a really poor role model.
Boyington sure did shoot down a lot of Japs though.
i think the film-makers clearly cast Charlie Wilson as an ANTI-hero, what with the drinking, drug use, and clear womanizing. He comes across as deeply flawed individual who is still trying (and possibly failing) to do some good.
sharere: "that money could have gone to help US citizens." As if participating in bringing down the Soviet empire was of no use to US citizens or to free loving People everywhere. Actually some of the money could have been spent for education, epecially history, grammar and spelling!
share@emperorlastone
I know you're just a troll but maybe you can enlighten me on how Charlie Wilson helped the oil industry?
He can't be jailed for mismanaging funds. He did nothing illegal when it came to supplying the Afgan rebels. He could however be voted out of office by his constituency if they were unhappy with him. And you are completely missing the point, you didn't even mention the Soviets. Should have he done nothing while the Soviets invaded countries? He wanted to get rid of the Soviets and setup schools and an infrastructure that would benefit the Afgans. PSH's character Gust even mentioned that something must be done now that the Soviets left Afghanistan. But nothing was done. And oil has NOTHING to do with Afghanistan or the taliban. The taliban main source of income is sales of heroin. Liberals believe that humans were born inheritanly good, the Afgans were being massacred by the Soviets. So why not help them because it is the humanitarian thing to do? President FDR said, "If your neighbor's house is on fire, you don't haggle over the price of the garden hose."
shareI have to agree with you, particularly the FDR quote. And just as is shown in the movie, Wilson did try to help the Afghans beyond this, but was stopped at every step by Congress. My opinion boils down to war and people getting blown up is sexy, schools are not. Simplistic? Yes. but I think it gets the point across.
shareIts just a movie based on what he said happened. Who knows what he DIDN'T want anyone to know.
share