140 International Relations Theory of War
THE SOVIET-AFGHAN WAR (1979–1988)
The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan started in 1979. It ended in 1988
after a treaty signed between the parties in Geneva following long nego-
tiations held in Geneva, Kabul, Moscow, and at the UN headquarters in
New York. In the end, the enormous Soviet army withdrew after having
bled in Afghanistan for years, like the withdrawal of another polar power,
Great Britain, from that country at the end of three previous wars: the First
and Second Anglo-Afghan Wars in the 19th century and the Third Anglo-
Afghan War in the early 20th century. According to the current study, the
Soviet Union did not learn the lessons of those past three wars in which
the ability of polar powers to expand territorially is not dependent only
on their own capabilities but also on constraints on the part of significant
systemic forces.
Why Did the Soviet Union Invade Afghanistan?The Soviet Union intervened in the civil war in Afghanistan because of
ideological factors and invaded the country because it believed that the
communist rule was not allowed to fall, particularly owing to its close ties
with the Soviet Union. Fixated on their self-expansion doctrine, the Soviets
deployed elite units to Afghanistan equipped with modern weaponry and
aircraft and built a big base in Shindand in the country’s northwest, which
had nothing to do with the country’s domestic security. Moreover, their
actions were perceived to a great extent as having strategic goals—build-
ing a large airbase—so they alarmed the West and thawed the détente rela-
tions, the process of thawing of relations between the two blocs. The cost
of the war to the Soviets was high: 15,000 troops killed, more than 1,000
aircraft, thousands of trucks, artillery pieces, and tanks, and about $96 bil-
lion (in historical terms).^190
The Systemic Constraints That Were Employed in the WarThe Soviet invasion of Afghanistan led the bipolar system that existed
at that time to apply a series of systemic constraints to bring the invasion
to an end, to maintain the territorial status quo preceding the war, and
effectively to restore the former situation. A number of significant events
demonstrate this: the threat that China felt owing to the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan led it to cooperate with the United States in order to contain
the Soviet military adventure;^191 the Soviet involvement in Afghanistan
hurt Soviet foreign policy in a number of regions of influence, primarily in
the Persian Gulf. It pushed Pakistan, China, and the United States to closer
strategic cooperation;^192 the invasion strengthened the United States’ stra-
tegic relations with Egypt and with key countries in the Gulf;^193 the inva-
sion reduced the Soviet Union’s political relations with key Gulf states;^194
the invasion focused Soviet energy on Afghanistan, which otherwise could