by DD Sow

Created on: November 14, 2008

The Soviet Union was unable to assert its control on Afghanistan because of a poor foreign policy strategy and lack of internal support within Afghanistan to bolster their strength in making it part of a Communist block.

Its true that based on the 1978 Treaty of Friendship between the two states and support for the Parcham faction of the Communist Party of Afghanistan that the Soviets intervened but this was also an added intention to maintain a presence in Middleast since at this time many Middleastern countries like Egypt, Yemen and Iraq were slowly turning to the Western sphere of influence.

The roots of this crisis, stemming from the fall of a stable Afghan government may have convinced Moscow to force its hand in the black-hole like environment of Afghan politics to help an ally but the flaw of this policy itself centered on from the start when Moscow was backing an unpopular and incompetent Afghan regime with very few allies.

Afghanistan was not new to past Soviet Generals. The Soviet Union from the days of Czar Alexander II have had desires to bring Afghanistan to its fore but the reality was that though many tribes of Afghanistan had links to Soviet Republics of Uzbekistan, Tajikistan or even Turkmenistan there were significantly larger number of other ethnic tribes like the Pashtuns that had no relationship. As a result, when the government had fallen in 1979, most of the larger ethnic groups like Tajiks, Hazara, Aimak, Uzbeks, Turkmen were all at odds about which course to follow. This is where Moscow should've taken the initiative. Instead of invading in full stretch of 100,000 Soviet troops in December 24, 1979 they should have built alliances with every tribal faction before openly invading and allowing several tribal factions to unite and cause havoc for the Red Army.

In the late 1970s, there were several hundred Soviet Consultants and Military Advisors in Kabul helping in the development of various Afghan government agencies. Already at this time there were joint co-operation in many Afghan agencies with Soviet Advisors, why didn't the Soviets allow a joint venture with civil and political administrations before taking on by brutal force?

Even after invasion and on to occupation, the Soviets did not engage themselves with dialogue or bring forth peace resolutions with tribal elements that would bridge a kind of unity of peace and solidify the Red Army presence instead they involved themselves into further violence, fighting with nationalist, tribesman

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