With all the hype about Marxism and Socialism, I remembered this story.
Someone in my family back in the 1980s spent some time in the infamous Pul-e-Charkhi prison. They had taken him because of suspected links to anti-government elements. There were certainly more than one in every family who the authorities had locked up with no hard evidence of any wrong-doing–just guilty by association.
Once he told us a story about Marx, Engels and Linen in Pul-e-Charkhi:
One day we were all in the yard and saw that the prison guards were carrying a huge portrait of Marx, Engels and Lenin for some event. It may have been heavy so they stopped to take a breather or adjust their grips. I saw another man in the yard looking at the portrait and shaking his head. Later I asked him about what he thought when he looked at that portrait. He replied, “I just thought, ‘I wonder if these 3 were actually thinking this would happen and would be happy about it.’
What I like about the story is the man gave these three the benefit of the doubt even though he knew that his imprisonment was due to implementation of the policies based on their social, economic and political theories.
This is also a reminder that atrocities of the current invasion and the state of affairs do not diminish the pains that were inflicted by the USSR and its cronies in Afghanistan.
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