But even that justification obscured the deeper reality that America had built a complex infrastructure in the 1980s to transfer weapons to the mujahideen fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan. That network of supply chains ran through the tribal regions of Pakistan, making use of Pakistani intelligence and Saudi money that facilitated everything from training camps to madrassas for austere religious education. Ronald Reagan welcomed the mujahideen to the White House as freedom fighters, men of God, comparing them to George Washington.
