Soviet Afghanistan War Research Paper

To understand why the Soviet-Afghan war occurred, one must first understand the history of Russia. Russia became a communist country in the year 1918 when the Bolsheviks became the ruling party. They called themselves the All-Russian Communist Party until 1925 when it was changed to the All-Union Communist when the U.S.S.R. was founded. It had its final name change in 1952 to the Communist Party of The Soviet Union (“Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU)”). The Soviet Union wanted to spread communism. In December 1979 the Soviet Union invaded and took control of Kabul and other parts of Afghanistan The Soviet Union wanted control of Afghanistan because they wanted it to be an example to the world of the Brezhnev Doctrine (“The Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan and the U.S Response, 1978-1980”). The Brezhnev Doctrine was the Soviets foreign policy, that held if any nation was to impair

Its government from 1973 to 1978 was headed by Mohammed Daud Khan ("Mohammad Daud Khan | Biography - Prime Minister of Afghanistan"). Mohammed Daud Khan had centrist political views. Mohammed Daud was overthrown, and him, his family, and his political allies were murdered by the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan, led by Nur Mohammed Taraki in 1978. This event was known as the Saur Revolution. The prime minister of this new government was Nur Mohammed Tarki. Taraki was pro-communist and pro-Soviet. There were two political groups under the Peoples Democratic Party of Afghanistan that shared power, the People’s (Khalq) Party led by Taraki and Hafizullah Amin, and the Banner (Parcham) Party led by Babrak Karmal . Both of these political groups were founded upon the same ideology, the ideology of Karl Marx. Both of these groups emerged from the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan. Even though these groups were similar they were in staunch opposition to each other (“Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan | 1979.”; “Soviet-Afghan