I Think regarding twenty-five
years ago, the USSR pulled its last troops out of Afghanistan, Probably the
Soviet troops on the move in Afghanistan, mid-1980s. ending more than nine years
of direct involvement and occupation. The USSR entered bordering Afghanistan in
1979, attempting to shore up the newly-established pro-Soviet regime in Kabul.
In short order, nearly 100,000 USSR soldiers took control of major cities and
highways. Rebellion was swift and broad, and the Soviets dealt harshly with the
Mujahideen rebels and those who supported them, leveling entire villages to deny
safe havens to their enemy. Foreign support propped up the diverse group of
rebels, pouring in from Iran, Pakistan, China, and the United States. In the
brutal nine-year conflict, an estimated one million civilians were killed, as
well as 90,000 Mujahideen fighters, 18,000 Afghan troops, and 14,500 Soviet
soldiers. Civil war raged after the withdrawal, setting the stage for the
Taliban's takeover of the country in 1996. As NATO troops move toward their
final withdrawal this year, Afghans worry about what will come next, and Russian
involvement in neighboring Ukraine's rebellion has the world's attention, it is
worth looking back at the Soviet-Afghan conflict that ended a quarter-century
ago. Today's entry is part of the ongoing series here on HIA low-flying Afghan
helicopter gunship in snow-capped valley along Salang highway provides cover for
a Soviet convoy sending food and fuel to Kabul, Afghanistan, on January 30,
1989. The convoy was attacked by Mujahideen guerrillas with rockets further up
the highway, with Afghan government troops returning fire with artillery.
Russian-built Afghan MIG-17 jet fighters lined up at an airport in Kandahar,
southwestern Afghanistan, on February 5, 1980
The USSR soldiers direct tank traffic outside Kabul on January 7, 1980. Tank
units had set up positions all around the capital city.Afghans wait outside the
Kabul central Pulicharkhi prison on January 14, 1980, days after the
Moscow-installed regime of Babrak Karmal took over. Although the regime released
126 prisoners from the notorious jail, around 1,000 residents stormed the
compound to set 12 inmates free. The Afghan refugees flee fighting, entering
Pakistan near Peshawar, in May of 1980. Afghan guerrillas, armed and equipped
with motorcycles prepare for action with Soviet and government forces, in the
mountainous western region of Afghanistan on January 14, 1980. The guerrillas
were able to slip in and out of neighboring Iran, where they re-supplied from
Muslims who sympathized with a mujahideen, a captain in the Afghan army before
deserting, poses with a group of rebels near Herat, Afghanistan, on February 28,
1980. At the time, it was reported that the Afghan capital of Kabul returned to
normal for the first time since bloody anti-Soviet rioting erupted there,
killing more than 300 civilians and an unknown number of Soviet and Afghan
soldiers.
In this late April 1988 Soviet soldiers prepare to change their position while
fighting Islamic guerrillas at undisclosed location in Afghanistan.
Three Muslim rebels, one armed with a Soviet-made AK-47 assault rifle, left, the
others with older bolt-action rifles, pose on horseback during a rebel meeting
at village near Herat, on February 15, 1980. Despite the presence of Soviet and
Afghan government troops in the area, the rebels patrolled the mountain ranges
along the Afghan-Iran border.
A troop of Muslim rebels equipped with old-fashioned rifles, east of Kabul, on
February 21, 1980. At the time, anti-Communist rebels were attacking traffic at
will on the main supply route from Pakistan to Afghanistan's capital. In this
late April 1988 photo, Soviet soldiers observe the highlands, while fighting
Islamic guerrillas at an undisclosed location in Afghanistan. A Soviet soldier
runs for cover, as his armored car comes under fire from Muslim rebels, near the
town of Herat, on February 13, 1980.Two Soviet soldiers taken prisoner by the
Afghan resistance forces loyal to the fundamentalist faction of Hezb-i-Islami in
the Afghan province of Zabul In September of 1981. The prisoners had told
journalists then they would be executed by the Afghan resistance for refusing to
covert to Islam to make eligible to be tried by an Islamic court A Soviet-style
military parade, held on the occasion of 5th anniversary of Afghanistan's 1978
Saur Revolution, in the streets of Kabul on April 27, 1983. Afghan guerrillas
atop a downed Soviet Mi-8 transport helicopter, near the Salang Highway, a vital
supply route north from Kabul to the Soviet border, January 12, 1981
U.S. President Ronald Reagan meets with a group of Afghan freedom fighters to
discuss Soviet atrocities in Afghanistan, especially the September 1982 massacre
of 105 Afghan villagers in Lowgar Province. A Muslim guerrilla in Afghanistan's
Paktia Province shows off his combat ration of peanut butter from the United
States, on July 11, 1986. Many of his fellow guerrillas battling the
Soviet-backed Communist government don't like the American food and had been
throwing it away.
Afghan guerrilla leader, Ahmad Shah Massoud, center, is surrounded by Mujahideen
commanders at a meeting of the rebels in the Panchir Valley in northeast
Afghanistan in 1984. Massoud was central to much of the anti-Soviet resistance,
and after the troops left, struggled with others to create a new government. In
a few years, Massoud and his forces were fighting the Taliban, and he had become
an enemy of Osama bin Laden. On September 9, 2001 Massoud was assassinated by
two attackers backed by Al Qaeda, just days before the September 11 attacks on
the U.S.
An Afghan guerrilla handles a U.S.-made Stinger anti-aircraft missile. The
shoulder-fired, heat-seeking missile supplied to the Afghan resistance by the
CIA during the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, is capable of bringing down
low-flying planes and helicopters. At one point, late in the war, rebels were
reportedly downing nearly one Soviet aircraft every day with Stinger missiles.
Afghan boys orphaned by the war between Kabul's Soviet-backed government and
Muslim rebels salute visitors at the Watan ('Homeland') Nursery in Kabul on
January 20, 1986. Communist political education started young in Kabul schools
during the occupation, as part of the government's drive to win the population
over
Two Soviet Army soldiers emerge from an Afghan shop in downtown Kabul on April
24, 1988.Aftermath in a village located along the Salang Highway, shelled and
destroyed during fights between Mujahideen guerrillas and Afghan soldiers in
Salang, Afghanistan. Mujahedeen positioned on rooftops about 10 kilometers from
Herat, keeping watch for Russian convoys, on February 15, 1980. A Russian T-62
Commando tank destroyed in the Panjshir River Valley in Parwan Valley about 180
km north of Kabul, on February 25, 1981. Soviet soldiers work with two German
Shepherd dogs trained to sniff out explosives in and around their base near
Kabul on May 1, 1988.Wrecked Soviet vehicles are shoved alongside the street in
the Panchir Valley village of Omarz in northeast Pakistan in February of 1984
Muslim anti-aircraft gunners in eastern Afghanistan's Paktia Province on July
20, 1986.
Wheels down, a Soviet transport aircraft seems to brush the treetops as it comes
in to land at Kabul Airport on February 8, 1989. Soviet pilots flying in out of
Kabul took defensive measures, including the firing of flares to divert
heat-seeking missilesA Soviet air force technician empties a bucket of spent
flare cartridges at the Kabul airbase on January 23, 1989. A Soviet soldier
smokes a cigarette at a checkpoint of the Soviet military airport in Kabul on
February 10, 1989 as the other one forbids pictures. As the planned withdrawal
of Soviet troops began, Afghan troops were trained and supplied to take their
place. Here, a soldier crawls with his comrades, during a training session in
Kabul on February 8, 1989. According to officials, the soldiers were from a new
unit formed to defend vital installations in the Afghan capital.
Police and armed Afghan militiamen walk amid the debris after a bomb, allegedly
placed by the Mujahideen rebels, exploded in downtown Kabul during celebrations
marking the 10th anniversary of the Afghan revolution backed by the Soviet Union
on April 27, 1988. Afghan firefighters carry the body of a young girl killed in
a powerful bomb blast that shattered rows of homes and shops in downtown Kabul
on May 14, 1988. At least eight people were killed and more than 20 injured by
the explosion, believed to be planted in a truck on the eve of the Soviet
withdrawal from Afghanistan. #Red Army soldiers stand for review on October 19,
1986, in downtown Kabul during a parade, shortly before they returned to the
Soviet Union.
Afghanistan's president Mohammed Najibullah (center) smiles as he meets Red Army
soldiers on October 19, 1986, in downtown Kabul during a parade. Najibullah who
became president in 1986, was later hanged in a street near the UN compound in
Kabul on September 27, 1996, where he had sought sanctuary since April 1992 when
Mujahideen guerrillas entered Afghan capitalA Red Army soldier and an Afghan
army officer pose for the press on October 20, 1986, in downtown Kabul. A Red
Army soldier atop of his armored personal vehicle smiles as Soviet Army troops
stop in Kabul prior to their withdrawal from Afghanistan, on May 16, 1988.A
column of Soviet armor and military trucks moves up the highway toward the
Soviet border on February 7, 1989 in Hayratan. The convoy came from the Afghan
capital Kabul as part of the withdrawal of Soviet soldiers.
Emotional mother embraces her son, a Soviet soldier who has just crossed the
Soviet-Afghan border in Termez, during the withdrawal of Soviet army from
Afghanistan, on May 21, 1988. After the Soviet withdrawal. On a ruined fortress
in the outskirts of the western Afghanistan city of Herat, a young man, formerly
fighting for the Muslim guerrillas, but now on the payroll of the Afghan
government, mans a weapon as cattle peacefully make their way to water in the
background, on August 30, 1989. Now the same condition of USA in Afghanisan
rather Bush have also declared their comments that the crusted war begin now.
God Bless all the Muslims majority in the whole world. from all cunning jew’s (Amin)