"These gentlemen [the Taliban] are the moral equivalents of America's Founding Fathers"~President Ronald Reagan 1985
"For those who may have forgotten, Ronald Reagan was a big fan of the Taliban or, as they were then known, the Mujaheddin (freedom fighters). At the time, they were fighting the Russians (then part of the Soviet Union), who had occupied their country, much as they now are fighting another occupying army — ours. America and the USSR were still locked in the grip of the Cold War, and any enemies of theirs were friends of ours. Reagan was so enamored of the Taliban that he dedicated the space shuttle Columbia to them in 1982."http://atlasleft.org/flashback-that-time-ronald-reagan-dedicated-the-space-shuttle-to-the-taliban-video/
Reagan made the dedication "on behalf of the American people" to the people of Afghanistan. That's a lot of people in the room! In truth, the people "in the room" are Reagan and the Afghan people fighting for their freedom -- these people:
Ronald Reagan meets Afghan Mujahideen Commanders at the White House in 1985 (Reagan Archives)http://www.globalresearch.ca/articlePictures/reaganandmujahideen1.jpg
But the Taliban were not Mujahideen, right? Wrong.
"The Taliban are one of the mujahideen ('holy warriors' or 'freedom fighters') groups that formed during the war against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan (1979-89).http://www.infoplease.com/spot/taliban.html
"The Taliban was formed in the early 1990s by a Pashtun faction of mujahideen, Islamic fighters who resisted the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan (1979–89)"http://www.cfr.org/afghanistan/taliban-afghanistan/p10551