Former Congressman Charlie Wilson, Who Played A Key Role In Funding And Arming The Mujahadeen In Afghanistan To Drive Out The Soviets, Dies At 76

The Washington Post reports that former "U.S. representative Charlie Wilson, a flamboyant 12-term East Texas Democrat who used his control of CIA purse strings to finance and arm an Afghan insurgency that drove out the Soviet occupation in the 1980s, died Feb. 10 at a hospital in Lufkin, Tex. He was 76 and had a history of heart ailments. Mr. Wilson's epic overseas engagements outlive him. The power vacuum left in Afghanistan when the Soviets exited in 1989 contributed to the rise of the Taliban, and the weapons that Mr. Wilson helped bring to that country were probably in use when the United States went to war there in 2001. 'We were fighting the evil empire,' he told Time magazine in 2007. 'It would have been like not supplying the Soviets against Hitler in World War II. . . . Anyway, who the hell had ever heard of the Taliban then?' If Gust Avrakotos was the CIA agent who got the mules that carried automatic weapons, antitank guns and satellite maps from Pakistan to the Afghan mujaheddin, Mr. Wilson was the congressman who used his position on the Appropriations Committee to supply the cash to make it all happen. Beginning in the early 1980s, he orchestrated the secret effort to funnel billions of dollars to the Afghan battles that would later take his name: Charlie Wilson's War. Published in 2003, investigative journalist George Crile's book of that title told what was then the largely unknown story of Mr. Wilson's key role in a decisive Cold War battle zone. In the 2007 film adaptation, Tom Hanks portrayed Mr. Wilson and Philip Seymour Hoffman played Avrakotos. Mr. Wilson, who served in the House from 1973 until declining to seek reelection in 1996, was not a particularly prominent legislator. Nicknamed 'Good Time Charlie,' he was better known for his penchant for wild parties and wilder women. Tall, sinewy and with matinee idol looks, he frolicked in hot tubs with Vegas showgirls and staffed his office with a parade of young female assistants of dubious qualifications, who were dubbed 'Charlie's angels.'" To read the full article visit http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/10/AR2010021003848.html?hpid=topnews. Tweet