page_title: Russia involvement in regime change
section_title: 1979–1989: Afghanistan
hierarchical_section_title: Russia involvement in regime change / 1953–1991: Rest of the Cold War / 1970s / 1979–1989: Afghanistan
context_page_description: Russia involvement in regime change has entailed both overt and covert actions aimed at altering, replacing, or preserving foreign governments.
  During World War II, the Soviet Union helped overthrow many Nazi Germany or imperial Japanese puppet regimes, including in East Asia and much of Europe. Soviet forces were also instrumental in ending the rule of Adolf Hitler over Germany.
  In the aftermath of World War II, the Soviet government struggled with the United States for global leadership and influence within the context of the Cold War. It expanded the geographic scope of its actions beyond its traditional area of operations. In addition, the Soviet Union and Russia have interfered in the national elections of many countries. One study indicated that the Soviet Union and Russia engaged in 36 interventions in foreign elections from 1946 to 2000.
  The Soviet Union ratified the UN Charter in 1945, the preeminent international law document, which legally bound the Soviet government to the Charter's provisions, including Article 2, which prohibits the threat or use of force in international relations, except in very limited circumstances.
context_section_description: During the 1978 coup d'état in Afghanistan, where the communist party took power, it initiated a series of radical modernization reforms throughout the country that were forced and deeply unpopular, particularly among the more traditional rural population and the established traditional power structures. The regime's nature of vigorously suppressing opposition, including executing thousands of political prisoners, led to the rise of anti-government armed groups and, by April 1979, large parts of the country were in open rebellion. The ruling party itself experienced deep rivalries and, in September 1979, the President, Nur Mohammad Taraki, was murdered under orders of the second-in-command, Hafizullah Amin, which soured relations with the Soviet Union. Eventually the Soviet government, under leader Leonid Brezhnev, decided to deploy the 40th Army on December 24, 1979. Arriving in the capital Kabul, they staged a coup, killing president Amin and installing Soviet loyalist Babrak Karmal from a rival faction. The deployment had been variously called an "invasion" (by Western media and the rebels) or a legitimate supporting intervention (by the Soviet Union and the Afghan government) on the basis of the Brezhnev Doctrine.
  In January 1980, foreign ministers from 34 nations of the Islamic Conference adopted a resolution demanding "the immediate, urgent and unconditional withdrawal of Soviet troops" from Afghanistan. The UN General Assembly passed a resolution protesting the Soviet intervention by a vote of 104 (for) to 18 (against), with 18 abstentions and 12 members of the 152-nation Assembly absent or not participating in the vote; only Soviet allies Angola, East Germany and Vietnam, along with India, supported the intervention. Afghan insurgents began to receive massive amounts of aid and military training in neighboring Pakistan and China, paid for primarily by the United States and Arab monarchies in the Persian Gulf. As documented by the National Security Archive, "the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) played a significant role in asserting U.S. influence in Afghanistan by funding military operations designed to frustrate the Soviet invasion of that country. CIA covert action worked through Pakistani intelligence services to reach Afghan rebel groups." Soviet troops occupied the cities and main arteries of communication, while the mujahideen waged guerrilla war in small groups operating in the almost 80 percent of the country that was outside government and Soviet control, almost exclusively being the rural countryside. The Soviets used their air power to deal harshly with both rebels and civilians, levelling villages to deny safe haven to the mujahideen, destroying vital irrigation ditches, and laying millions of land mines.
  The international community imposed numerous sanctions and embargoes against the Soviet Union, and the U.S. led a boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics held in Moscow. The boycott and sanctions exacerbated Cold War tensions and enraged the Soviet government, which later led a revenge boycott of the 1984 Olympics held in Los Angeles. The Soviets initially planned to secure towns and roads, stabilize the government under new leader Karmal, and withdraw within six months or a year. But they were met with fierce resistance from the guerillas, and were stuck in a bloody war that lasted nine years. By the mid-1980s, the Soviet contingent was increased to 108,800 and fighting increased, but the military and diplomatic cost of the war to the USSR was high. By mid-1987, the Soviet Union, now under reformist leader Mikhail Gorbachev, announced it would start withdrawing its forces after meetings with the Afghan government. The final troop withdrawals started on May 15, 1988, and ended on February 15, 1989, leaving the government forces alone in the battle against the insurgents, which continued until 1992 when the former Soviet-backed government collapsed. Due to its length, it has sometimes been referred to as the "Soviet Union's Vietnam War" or the "Bear Trap" by the Western media. The Soviets' failure in the
caption: The location of Afghanistan