The United States had a vested interest in the conflict and devoted considerable resources, including weapons, training, and money, to Afghanistan in support of the mujahideen. President Ronald Reagan, like Carter before him, viewed the mujahideen as important Cold War allies and lavished praise on their courage, referring to them as “our brothers” and as “the moral equivalents of America’s Founding Fathers” (see image 5).

XREF: Connects to the broader history of U.S. proxy wars during the Cold War and the eventual blowback in Afghanistan.

Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Intro…, loc. 256