Zvi Rafiah must be crazy

"It's likely that a villager would live his life without having contact with another village just three miles down the road unless he was going to war against them."  ----------------- [Weapons expert Mike Vickers, presenting information at a Langley briefing, in the movie Charlie Wilson's War] ----------------  "Now my thinking is instead of 400,000 sloppy guys, we concentrate on several elite forces totaling about 150,000.  Give these guys real training, covering irregular warfare disciplines."


Gust Avrakotos -- And do you have anybody in mind?
Vickers -- The most successful rebels today are in the Panjshir Valley.  They're called the United Front of the Council of the North.  We've earmarked them for 10 million in weapons and 10 to 15 agency advisors for training.


Charlie Wilson -- Who's their leader?


Vickers -- Ahmed Shah Massoud.  He's Tajik, so he's not well liked by the Pashtun.


Charlie -- So...the, what, the Tajiks have a problem with the Pashtuns?


Gust Avrakotos answers this with a regional joke he's learned..."Well, they say when a Tajik wants to make love to a woman..."


The joke kind of doesn't take off.  Everyone is silent.  (I didn't get it, either.)
By way of explanation, Avrakotos says, "It's -- uh -- funnier in the original Pashto."


[Gust is the Languages Guy.]


Charlie Wilson says, "All right I've heard enough.  I'm going to go get our money.


CUT TO:
--------------------------------


Charlie's up on Capitol Hill





where he's got to visit with his committee chairman, "Doc Long."
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(Gust -- All you need are the nine other Subcommittee members.
-- All I really need is the committee chairman!
-- Doc Long.
-- Doc Long!


...Gust -- Now, me and three other guys are killin' Russians.  I mean, is it possible that I've met the only elected official in town who can help?)


------------------------------------------
It CUTS TO Charlie talking with the Committee Chairman.





Chairman Clarence Long, U.S. Congressman from Maryland, is telling Charlie, yadda-yadda, that he is not open to this idea.


Doc Long -- Afghanistan, Egypt, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia -- these are all totalitarian dictatorships.  And they'd like to blow the only democracy in the region -- right -- into -- the Mediterranean.


Charlie -- Now, you heard me say that Israel's gonna be on board.


Long -- Oh, well, Zvi Rafiah's out of his mind.  These people are draconian thugs, and in an -- evil and twisted -- derby between the Communists and the Fundamentalists -- it's 6 to 5 and pick 'em, as far as I'm concerned.
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