Charlie Wilson's War

In life, there are individuals that somehow escape the clutches of responsibility- who weave in and out of modern convention to blaze a trail whose dust others can only hope to choke on. The crowds adore them, romance envelops them, and their faltering only proves to endear. Such a person is Charlie Wilson- a man whose heart beats for his country, his only true love.

I have to admit that- even with the current occupation of Afghanistan by our armed forces due to the hunt for Osama Bin Ladin- that I was mostly unaware of just what the country is all about. But this lack of historical perspective had little effect on my overall enjoyment of the work, and I would recommend the book even for those who grasp the intricacies of the area.

The story focuses on the machinations of Texan Congressman Charles Wilson- a former military man whose love of Churchill drives him to look for the one great fight- the conceived unstoppable great evil who can only be thwarted by equally great righteousness. With the United States still smoldering after the Vietnam conflict, Charlie sees a chance at retribution through the mujahideen - the freedom fighters- of Afghanistan. As compared to the loss in South Vietnam, Charlie sees a dichotomy- where instead of putting American soldiers on the ground to stand with those who "don't want to fight", instead the Muslim jihadists will fight to their last person to defeat the Communist invaders. To do this- Charlie Wilson enlists the aid of CIA agent Gust Avrakotos- himself a gruff complicated Greek who detests the Russians almost as much as Wilson.

The characters that drive this work are great in their deeds, however unorthodox their methods. Throughout the book, there are times that the reader will question the authenticity of the events transpiring on the pages before them. But moving along through the book, the reader becomes accustomed to the methods applied by the various players. Anyone involved in a bureaucracy finds familiar truths in how the American government runs itself. Is a portion of the budget at risk of going unspent? Time to pull out the pet projects!

Having recently watched "Bush's War", it was refreshing to read about an endeavor in which America actually successfully planned and executed a military action- even if it was with another country's troops. The victory achieved through the CIA's Afghanistan/Pakistan proxies, as compared to - ahem- American soldiers, does beg to question why similar efforts could not be repeated.

The protagonists commitment to remain unconventional was perhaps the one aspect of the book that was most alluring. With the Iran/Contra affair unraveling around them, there was a "the rest be damned" attitude displayed by anyone that surrounded the war with the Soviet Union. Wilson honestly tried to have Islamic Fundamentalists use an Israeli (read "Jewish") missle defense system. No joke.

The book is "funny" in the sense that you will often catch yourself so incredulous at the facts presented, and then have to remind yourself that Crile is not writing fiction here. Despite misgivings about the lack of "character" possessed by Wilson and those that orbit him, it is obvious that his passion for victory, no matter what the angle or ally, succeeds all else. Quite frankly I can't think of anything more American.


Although there is that nagging fact that those Al-qaeda guys are now firing on our soldiers with the weapons Wilson sold them.......