Soviet+Invasion+of+Afghanistan

=by Eugene Galkine, Margaret Bussineau=

=__Overview__=

[]

• Soviet troops invaded to end anti-Soviet agitation in 1979 in Afghanistan • US and 60 nations boycotted 1980 Moscow Olympics as protest SALT postponed; detente suffered setback. So basically, from my understandings, there were rebel groups in Afghanistan that tried to overthrow their government. They wanted it to be founded on Islamic traditions, not by communism.The Soviet Union stepped in to help Afghanistan take down the rebels. Due to the previous relations, where they have been supporting the Afghan army, they invaded to take down the Mujahideen (rebel groups), yet ended up taking over the country. In the process of taking over the country, the president of Afghanistan, Amin was killed by the soviet forces on December 27th of 1979 (Kakar). The United States then began helping the Mujahideen and gave them supplies, in addition to the United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia and the People's Republic of China's help. The United States, in general has supported revolutionaries, and they didn't want communism or the Soveit Union to spread, so president Carter gave $30 million to the forces (Kakar). Many other countries didn't want the Soviet Union in Afghanistan; its own people especially. Because the Soviet Union stepped into the country, it was clear that the coutry's current communist ways were not working. Eventually, the Soviet Union withdrew from the country, mainly due to their new president, Gorbachev's new ideas. The United States estimates that there were 100,000 Soviet troops in Afghanistan, just before they left (Pike). Mikhail Gorbachev called to remove troops from the country, after negotiations were created within the United Nations. The very last troop left Afghanistan on February 16th, 1989 (Keller). It cost the Soviet Union 15,000 lives approximately.

__ @http://www.guidetorussia.com/russia-afghanistan.asp __

•On Christmas of 1979 the Russians invaded Afghanistan and arrested thousand of Muslim leaders. Over 40,000 armed soviet troops marched into Afghanistan initially (Pike). Thousands of Afghanistan formed the Mujahideen; a gorilla force on a holy mission for Allah. They declared war on supporters of Amin(It was their Leader). While the Russians claimed they had been invited by Amin and were to support them. They also said that they were told that the Mujahideen were a bunch of terrorists. On the 27th of that same moth the Russians killed Amin and replaced him with Babrak Kamal. The Mujahideen had old rifles but had a good knowledge of the mountains. There soon became more rebel fighters than their supporters could arm. The only problem, was that the Mujahideen's people could not agree on any one way to fight. The russians were using napalm, poison gas and helicopter gun ships. By 1982 Mujahideen controlled 75% of Afghanistan although they were fighting the worlds second most powerful military.

**__Source Annotation__**


 * Source:** []
 * **Summarize** This is a list of years of that have a sentence or two of what happened that year in Afghanistan. It talks about the years 1980 to 1989. Which is when the soviet union was Afghanistan.
 * **Asses** Appears to be real and not fake, It is a news sight. The information is not very detailed but it tells you what happened.
 * **Reflect** This sight is not biased but says nothing of the actual conditions.


 * Source:** __@http://www.guidetorussia.com/russia-afghanistan.asp__
 * **Summarize** It gives a deep explanation of what happened during the the afghanistan invasion.
 * **Asses** The information was detailed and good.
 * **Reflect** I would have liked for the site to tell me more about why the russians invaded afghanistan


 * Source**: []
 * **Summarize** Soviet forces were strong, as they were considered the second largest military in the country, yet they were fighting their own version of the Vietnam War. This web site basically just talks about the soviet's use of machinery, their initial invasion of Afghanistan in December of 79. Also, there was quite a lot said about the 'Islamic Fundamentalists,' the people who believed that the government should basically support their religion.
 * **Asses** The information provided good detail, and enough facts to add to the overview. There is a somewhat simplistic explanation of the start, which is better for me currently.
 * **Reflect** This source seems to be reliable, because I have found similar information from other sources- it just seems to go in deeper with facts. There is plenty of use worthy information for my overview, and to support my opinion (although currently, I don't have one).


 * Source:** 20th Century day by day(book)
 * **Summarize** This book has a couple news articles from that time period. So it just says some stuff about american opinion on the war in Afghanistan.
 * **Asses** This is a good source. It just only has 2 article on the invasion of afghanistan and they are not very long.
 * **Reflect** It tells me very little on what actually happened in the war.


 * Source:** []
 * **Summarize** This source gave me an idea to the ending of the war. I learned about the Mujadeen's beliefs and dissaprova's of Amin. It briefed me on the day of December 27th, 1979, the day when the Russians shot and killed Amin to replace him with their support, Babrak Kamal.
 * **Asses**: This information wasn't very detailed, and I am not 100% sure I can rely on the information, but because I have found similar stuff from many other websites, it seems reliable enough.
 * **Refle**ct: I still need to know more about the war itself, and how it was faught. I also want to know more about the other country relations (the help of foreign countries, with their aid to the Mujadeen)


 * Source:** []
 * **Summarize:** This article was about strictly, the Soviets leaving Afghanistan. It compared this war to our Vietnam war, and descussed how the Soviet government was slightly ashamed at its loss. It talked about the United Nations view on the war; they didn't believe in it whatsoever, and told the Soviet Union to leave the country.
 * **Asses**: This information, I knew was reliable because of its origin. The New York Times is pretty trustworthy, about getting the facts straight. It ws also important that I read this, because the end of the war still seemed vague to me.
 * **Reflect** What I find really interesting about this article, was the last paragraph, in which it said " The Bush Administration has indicated that it plans to continue arming the rebels after the Soviet withdrawal." I find it rather odd, considering we didn't need to supply them with arms after that point.

Source: __The Soviet Invasion and the Afghan Response, 1979-1982__ by Hassan Kakar
 * **Summarize**: This book was too long for me to fully read, but I pulled important information on the Sovet Union's 1st invasion, on December 27th. I learned about their killing of the president, and was suprised to find that he hand ended up being poisoned, rather than shot. I also read about
 * **Asses**: I got this information from a PDF download, and though it isn't the full book, I learned quite a bit from it. It was more personal and included more information on the towns specifically. As a book, I find it more trustworthy than any internet site, and it had good enough detail to add to my summary.
 * **Reflect**: I think that this was just an addition to my knowledge, just adding in facts or sentences here or there. It is a shame that our library didn't have quality information on this event.

**__Reflections and Conclusions__**

=
Well, I think this was the Soviet Union's minny Vietnam. They basically got themselves wrapped up in a war that they couldn't win, against guerilla groops that knew the land much better (similar to the Vietmen and Vietcong). What really bugs me though, is the United States supplying aid to the rebels. I feel like the US gets wrapped up in so much revolutionary action, that we basically overexpose our country (our involvment in Lybia for example.) What also kind of bugs me about our aid, is that we ended up giving arms to what would later become an enemy. Weren't the 9/11 terrorists, a form or branch off of the Mujahideen? =====

=
I found that most sites that I found said the something word for word (maybe a few words were different). None of them had any sitation so, that was weird. Like many sites said and I think myself is that It was similar to vietnam in the way that the powerful country lost and they were fighting a militia that used guerrilla warfare.=====

I think it was also embarrasing to the Soviet Union, just as we were embarrased about having to pull out of Vietnam... I wonder if it is a war that they don't really talk about, just as we infrequently don't discuss Vietnam, because we lost. Oh, and with the word-for-word stuff, I noticed similar things. I think that lots of other sites just copy and paste from Wikipedia. It's rather dissapointing actually, because I can't find myself able to really trust many of the sources now. I would much prefer our school library to have books, I am sure that the books are more trustworthy than the random sites I had to resort to to find my information. =__Multimedia__= [|Video] It's a fairly good film, describing what was going on with the fighting specifically.

media type="youtube" key="zrRE50tFlR4" height="349" width="425" This just show the conditions of afghanistan.
 * Russia's War in Afganistan "Bear in the sand"**

**__Works Cited__** //Afghan Response.// University of California Press. Berkeley. 1982. Print.

"BBC News - Afghanistan - Timeline." //BBC News - Home//. N.p., 15 Mar. 2011. Web. 23 May 2011.

Kakar, M Hassan. //The Soviet Invasion and the// http://youtu.be/zrRE50tFlR4

Keller, Bill. "Last Soviet Soldiers Leave Afghanistan." __New York Times.com.__ 2/16/89. Web. 5/16/11.

Pike, John. "The 1978 Revolution and the Soviet Invasion." __Global Security.org.__ 3/7/09. Web. 5/12/11.

Schlesinger, Arthur. 20th Century day by day. DK. london. 2000. Print.

"Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan." Guide to Russia. Web. 5/11/11.

Trueman, Chris. "Russian Invasion of Afghanistan." __History Learning Site__. Web. 5/21/11.

//Wars In Peace//. ITN/ Pro Video, 1990. Web.