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125ft Buddha statue, of the Buddhas of Bamiyan, Afghanistan. It stood from approximately 570 until 2001.
(media.piefed.world)
It was one of two large Buddha statues in the Bamiyan valley, but they were destroyed in 2001 by the Taliban.
This is a common misconception. The Pakistani-funded Taliban overthrew the post-Soviet Mujahedeen government after being founded in the mid-90s, largely recruiting from Pashtun-majority religious schools in Pakistan.
Operation Cyclone trafficked weapons and funds to extremists via Pakistan, and many did not actually reach the target Afghanistan extremist groups, but were instead sold at local markets in Pakistan.
The US armed and trained "freedom fighters" in the entire region.
"Much of the aid was sold instead of reaching the intended recipients" is a far cry from "They funded and trained the groups that became the Taliban and AQ", and, as noted in the source, the most notable extremist recipient of the aid, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, was not part of or aligned with the Taliban or AQ.
Lmao.
He was literally driven out of Afghanistan by Taliban fighters during the civil war in the 90s.