In opposition to that USSR went in to Afghanistan because of a friendship treaty signed in 1920 which committed Soviets to help the afghan government. At the time the afghan socialist government was under attack by the islamic fundamentalists which allowed the USSR to interfere and help to crush the fundamentalists. The USSR claimed that they were invited to the country however this clashes with the fact that of Amin being assassinated by the Soviets apparently because he was “too communist”. Some historians claim that the USSR went in to afghanistan to get rid of Amin rather than to help him. As I have mentioned earlier about Amin being too communist, he did not allow any religion to be practised in the country which could let conflicts effecting the USSR. Soviets thus saw Amin as a problem maker rather than a communism expansionist. Despite these reasons there still were many other reasons which led the USSR go in to Afghanistan.
Another reason for USSR’s intervention in Afghanistan is to maintain their influence in the strategic region. It was important for the USSR’s reputation globally to maintain the peace around their neighbouring countries. Otherwise they would seem weak and in a cold war an image counts a lot, thus if you seem weak you will lose. Thus Afghanistan was the perfect place for USSR to show its power to the rest of the world.
As to conclude all my points, it was only to a certain extent that USSR went in to Afghanistan to crush Islamic fundamentalism.There were many other reasons for the USSR’S intervention in Afghanistan which include the friendship treaty, the reputation, ans etc. It could also be thought as the iceberg’s unseen mass under water.
The second statement which claims that the only reason why USSR failed in Afghanistan was because Mujaheddin( the afghan fundamentalist leader) was too powerful is also true only to a certain extent.
Firstly Mujaheddin had many advantages against USSR such as the terrain of Afghanistan, the effective guarrilla tactics,the support of the civillians and religious fighters.
The afghan population supported Mujaheddin instead of the red army mainly because they hated the army because of the terror tactics they used. Whereas on the other hand Mujaheddin was from the same religious group with them. Eventhough religion was the main reason why they supported Mujaheddin it was also because of the nationalistic reasons. In addition to the support from the civillians, Mujaheddin was also one step further than of the Red Army because of the Afghan terrain. It was hilly and made it very hard for the Soviet troops, who were very unfamiliar with this kind of environment.
The red army was not strong enough against Mujaheddin’s because of a lack of morale. As of the army consisted mostly of soldiers from Uzbekistan, Kazakistan and those muslim countries, those muslim soldiers had no will to kill another muslim just because a communist general said so. Thus the same scene as in Vietnam, the soldiers being on drugs, was up again. Both these factors weakened the Red army and led them to a failure.
The Red Army failed economically as well. The cost of the war was over 8 billion dollars which was too much for the USSR to afford. Because it was too expensive for the USSR Gorbachev decided to give up the fight and pull the troops out. Although some historians claim that eventhough the aid Afghanistan got from the US seemed to be higher than of the USSR’s expenses if USSR had not pulled back the troops and fight for another year, they could have won.
At last, there were many reasons for the intervention of the USSR in to Afghanistan as well as the reasons why they failed. It was more than the Islamic fundamentalism itself, thus both statements are true only to a certain extent.
Zeynep Hatipoglu
13th Grade, History
