To the Editor:

In the fall of 1980, the CIA interviewed law students at the University of Michigan for positions within the Agency. The recruiters were met by about fifty demonstrators. One carried a sign which read: “Extend the Gains of the October Revolution to Afghanistan.” That which amused for its idiocy in 1980 now horrifies when one finishes reading Michael Barry’s “Afghanistan—Another Cambodia?” [August]. The October Revolution has swallowed that country, and Mr. Barry’s article reveals just how ghastly that process has been. . . .

There is now a full-fledged peace offensive under way’ in the West. There are negotiations at many levels on a great variety of subjects. There are powerful lobbies pushing nuclear-freeze referenda in California and Michigan. There are weighty statements from groups like the Catholic bishops on the immorality of nuclear weapons. . . . Of the West’s mission, however, there is little news.

For those who focus solely on the GNP and on missile ranges, on pipelines and on IMF credits, the parochial interest is a sufficient compass. If we assure our own security, the reasoning goes, the rest of the world will mend itself in due course. Such a view has no moral anchor. It lacks even the dimmest perception that all these deliberations and policies can make no sense unless they are measured by their effect on the prisoners of Pol-e Charkhi. . . .

Attention to the West’s mission has long been overlooked, but whatever its precise boundaries, it cannot exclude concern for and actions on behalf of the Afghan people. If Mr. Barry’s article produces this recognition in the eyes of only a few, he deserves unique congratulations. It is not an easy thing, after all, to reverse the momentum of abdication.

Hugh Hewitt
Ann Arbor, Michigan