Russians+in+Afghanistan

Background

In 1979, the USSR took control of the Afghan capital, Kabul, and tried through the following decade to gain control over the whole country and its people. The invasion was a failure, costing thousands of lives and having serious consequences still felt today. To better understand the reason for the Soviet invasion and failure, first one must understand the geography and culture in Afghanistan. The land is mountainous and arid. Jagged, impassable ranges divide the country and make travel difficult. Due to these physical divisions, the people are extremely provincial, with more loyalty to their specific clan or ethnic group than to a government or a country. The people are Muslims, and extremely religious and conservative. The majority ethnic group is the Pashtun, but there are over ten minority groups. Starting in the 1950s, the USSR began giving aid to Afghanistan. The Soviets built roads, irrigation and even some oil pipelines. In the 1970s, a Communist party overthrew the monarchy and tried to institute social reforms. The rural populations saw land distribution and women's rights as alien to their traditional Islamic culture, a culture in which polygamy, covering of women, and blood for blood practices are accepted. The Communist governments in Kabul in the 1970s lacked the popular support of the rural population.

[|Timeline: Moscow's Afghan War]

Resistance intensifies with various mujahideen groups fighting Soviet forces and their DRA allies. The US, Pakistan, China, Iran and Saudi Arabia supply money and arms. The US leads a boycott of the Moscow Olympics. The United Nations General Assembly calls for Soviet withdrawal. Half of the Afghan population is now estimated to be displaced by the war, with many fleeing to neighbouring Iran or Pakistan. New Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev says he will withdraw troops from Afghanistan. The US begins supplying mujahideen with Stinger missiles, enabling them to shoot down Soviet helicopter gunships. Karmal is replaced by Mohammed Najibullah. The DRA, USSR, US and Pakistan sign peace accords and the Soviets begin pulling out troops.
 * A chronology of key events around the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the decade-long war it sparked:**
 * 1978**
 * 27 April:** Afghanistan's communist People's Democratic Party seizes power in a coup but begins internal feuding. The country is renamed Democratic Republic of Afghanistan (DRA). An Islamic and conservative insurgency soon begins in the provinces.
 * 5 December:** A friendship treaty is signed with the USSR, building on Soviet economic and military support given to Afghanistan since the early 1950s.
 * 1979**
 * March:** The USSR begins massive military aid to the DRA, including hundreds of advisers, as the US scales down its presence after the murder of its kidnapped ambassador. Afghan soldiers mutiny in Herat, massacring Soviet citizens before their rebellion is crushed.
 * September:** Hafizullah Amin emerges as DRA leader from a bout of bloodletting in the government during which President Nur Mohammed Taraki is killed.
 * 24 December:** The Soviet defence ministry reveals orders to senior staff to send troops into Afghanistan, following a decision taken by the Politbureau's inner circle on 12 December. Commandos seize strategic installations in Kabul.
 * 29 December:** After a week of heavy fighting during which Soviet commandos kill Amin and ground forces pour across the border, Babrak Kamal is installed as the DRA's new Soviet-backed leader.
 * 1980**
 * 1982**
 * 1985**
 * 1986**
 * 1988**
 * 1989**
 * 15 February:** The USSR announces the departure of the last Soviet troops. Civil war continues as the mujahideen push to overthrow Najibullah, who is eventually toppled in 1992.

** Afghanistan War ** 1978–92, conflict between anti-Communist Muslim Afghan guerrillas (mujahidin) and Afghan government and Soviet forces. The conflict had its origins in the 1978 coup that overthrew Afghan president Sardar Muhammad Daud Khan, who had come to power by ousting the king in 1973. The president was assassinated and a pro-Soviet Communist government under Noor Mohammed Taraki was established. In 1979 another coup, which brought Hafizullah Amin to power, provoked an invasion (Dec., 1979) by Soviet forces and the installation of Babrak Karmal as president. The Soviet invasion, which sparked Afghan resistance, intially involved an estimated 30,000 troops, a force that ultimately grew to 100,000. The mujahidin were supported by aid from the United States, China, and Saudi Arabia, channeled through Pakistan, and from Iran. Although the USSR had superior weapons and complete air control, the rebels successfully eluded them. The conflict largely settled into a stalemate, with Soviet and government forces controlling the urban areas, and the Afghan guerrillas operating fairly freely in mountainous rural regions. As the war progressed, the rebels improved their organization and tactics and began using imported and captured weapons, including U.S. antiaircraft missiles, to neutralize the technological advantages of the USSR. In 1986, Karmal resigned and Mohammad Najibullah became head of a collective leadership. In Feb., 1988, President Mikhail [|Gorbachev] announced the withdrawal of USSR troops, which was completed one year later. Soviet citizens had become increasingly discontented with the war, which dragged on without success but with continuing casualties. In the spring of 1992, Najibullah's government collapsed and, after 14 years of rule by the People's Democratic party, Kabul fell to a coalition of mujahidin under the military leadership of Ahmed Shah Massoud. The war left Afghanistan with severe political, economic, and ecological problems. More than 1 million Afghans died in the war and 5 million became refugees in neighboring countries. In addition, 15,000 Soviet soldiers were killed and 37,000 wounded. Economic production was drastically curtailed, and much of the land laid waste. At the end of the war more than 5 million mines saturated approximately 2% of the country, where they will pose a threat to human and animal life well into the 21st cent. The disparate guerrilla forces that had triumphed proved unable to unite, and Afghanistan became divided into spheres of control. These political divisions set the stage for the rise of the Taliban later in the decade. [|Political Situation in 1987]


 * ~ Color ||~ Group ||~ Leader ||~ Supporters ||~ Orientation ||~ Fighting Quality ||
 * [[image:http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/images/255-0-0.gif width="25" height="25"]] || People's Democratic Party of Aghanistan ||  || USSR || Communist ||   ||
 * [[image:http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/images/0-128-0.gif width="25" height="25"]] || Jamiat-i-Islam || Barhannudin Rabbani || Uzbeks, Turkomens || Fundamentalist || "the best fighters" (Laffin) ||
 * [[image:http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/images/0-192-0.gif width="25" height="25"]] || Hezb-i-Islam (Islamic Party) || Younis Khalis || Pathans || Fundamentalist || 2nd best ||
 * [[image:http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/images/0-255-0.gif width="25" height="25"]] || Hezb-i-Islam || Gulbuddin Heckmatyar ||  || Fundamentalist || 3rd best ||
 * [[image:http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/images/0-128192.gif width="25" height="25"]] || Mohaz Milli Islami (National Islamic Front of Afghanistan) || Pir Sayid Ahmad Gailani || Pushtu || pro-Royalist, pro-Western ||  ||
 * [[image:http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/images/0-255255.gif width="25" height="25"]] || Harakat-i-Inqilib-i-Islami (Islamic Revolutionary Party) || Mohammed Nabi Mohammedi || Pathans || Traditionalist, village-based ||  ||
 * || Jabhe Mille Nejad (National Rescue Front) || Sigbatullah Mojadedi || Sufis || Monarchist ||  ||
 * [[image:http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/images/19-25-19.gif width="25" height="25"]] || Shia Muslims ||  ||   ||   || "much talk but little action" ||
 * [[image:http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/images/25-25-12.gif width="25" height="25"]] || other groups ||  || mixed ||   ||   ||
 * [[image:http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/images/25-25-25.gif width="25" height="25"]] || Sparsely populated or in dispute ||  ||   ||   ||   ||



An estimated 10,000 to 15,000 people have been displaced by the insurgency in the south, but the numbers fluctuate as some have been able to return home when the fighting moves elsewhere.The International Committee of the Red Cross has warned that the displaced who have reached the cities represent only the tip of the iceberg, and many others are trapped by violence in remote areas without assistance. Many of the families who have arrived in Kabul have suffered traumatic losses and injuries, and they say that they are pessimistic about the future. Many of the displaced people complained that villagers found themselves trapped between Taliban fighters, who used the villages for cover to attack foreign forces, and NATO and American forces, which would often call in airstrikes on village compounds where civilians were living. Many of the villagers said that the civilian deaths were particularly galling given the sophisticated technology of the coalition's warplanes. Since 2002, in the largest refugee return process ever, over five million Afghans have gone home, the vast majority from neighboring Pakistan and Iran. More than half of these returns took place within the first two years, as Afghans seized the opportunity to rebuild their lives and their country following the fall of the Taliban regime. Today more than three million registered refugees remain in exile – 2.1 million in Pakistan and 0.9 million in Iran – and hundreds of thousands more are living abroad to escape economic hardship or targeted violence. Many are now being pressured to re¬turn home despite the fact that conditions for sustainable returns are often not met.
 * AFGHAN REFUGEE CAMPS**
 * Current Humanitarian Situation**

The Soviets paralyzed the Afghan government initially with troops airlifted into the capital city of Kabul and since then have used helicopter, fighter-bomber, and bomber operations in the war. The Soviets shipped more weapons into Afghanistan, including tanks, artillery, small arms, fighter aircraft and helicopter gunships. They also deployed a combat unit—an airborne battalion—to the Bagram airbase north of Kabul. There were now between 2,500 to 3,000 military advisors in Afghanistan, not counting the airborne battalion. Some of these Soviet military personnel were attached to Afghan units engaging in combat, including piloting helicopters in combat operations. **Afghan weapons:** Of the many caches discovered in Afghan, 41 mortar rounds, 144 recoilless rifle rounds, and eight rocket-propelled grenade rounds were found in Uruzgan province, as well as 56 mortar rounds, 82 tank rounds and 100 RPG rounds found in Helmand province. A citizen in Paktika Province reported a cache site that contained a ZPU antiaircraft weapon, 20 mines, five machine guns, 10 RPG rounds, and thousands of rounds of small-arms ammunition.Coalition forces secured the weapons for destruction or redistribution to the Afghan National Army.
 * Soviet weapons:**


 * Soviet air power**: http://www.airpower.maxwell.af.mil/airchronicles/aureview/1985/jan-feb/nelson.html