
[CNN]
Transcript of AMERICAN MORNING, aired April 24, 2009 – 06:00 ET
JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR: “These are new pictures of mass Taliban militants withdrawing just an hour ago. The Taliban’s recent land grab has raised global concerns. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says Pakistan has failed to deal with the Taliban problem, but the United States is also partly to blame. She says not that long ago, we weren’t fighting the Taliban, we were funding them.”
“(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) HILLARY CLINTON, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: We also have a history of kind of moving in and out of Pakistan. I mean, let’s remember here, the people we are fighting today, we funded 20 years ago. And we did it because we were locked in the struggle with the Soviet Union. They invaded Afghanistan and we did not want to see them control central Asia. And we went to work.”
“And it was President Reagan in partnership with the Congress led by Democrats who said, you know what? Sounds like a pretty good idea. Let’s deal with the ISI and the Pakistani military and let’s go recruit these Mujahideen. And that’s great.”
“Let’s get some to come from Saudi Arabia and other places importing their Wahhabi brand of Islam so that we can go beat the Soviet Union. And guess what? They retreated. They lost billions of dollars and it led to the collapse of the Soviet Union. So there is a very strong argument which is it wasn’t a bad investment to end the Soviet Union, but let’s be careful what we sow because we will harvest.”
“(END VIDEO CLIP)”
Read more: American Morning (transcript) (archived)
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