Striking parallels: Ukraine, Afghanistan, story of unsuccessful invasions

Drawing parallels between the two adventures Russia made in 1979 and 2022, it wouldn’t be difficult to foresee the fate of Russia in the Ukraine conflict. The Afghan war devastated the reputation of the Soviets and the ongoing Ukraine invasion has equally a potential to risk Putin’s regime, writes ETV Bharat's Bilal Bhat

Unthinkable a month ago, Russia's invasion of Ukraine entered its 36th day today making it clear that Vladimir Putin hadn’t foreseen the level of resistance his forces would face in the country. He had perhaps also not anticipated the magnitude of support Ukraine would get from across the world as Russia brought war and misery to its cities.

This is not the first time that Russian adventure is met with such a fate. In 1979, when KGB - Soviet Intelligence Agency - reported to the Soviet government of the growing proximity between Afghans and the West, particularly the US, it started to assume a threat far bigger than what it could actually pose. Soviets, bordering Afghanistan, out of security threat, planned for an Afghan invasion without looking much into the consequences it could have for Moscow. The attack brought the Soviet enemies an opportunity to defeat the Russian army.

The USA and Pakistan planned for a proxy war against Russia in a bid to humiliate a powerful nation getting defeated at the hands of insurgents. The US intelligence agency CIA and Pakistan spy agency ISI started supporting Afghans secretly with training and weapons. They built their capacity to an extent that they met the Soviets head-on in the last phase of the conflict. Pakistan army and ISI had brought their resources together to support the Afghan insurgency. Borders between Afghanistan and Pakistan were made porous to allow a free movement of refugees and resources to help Afghan fighters.

Mohammad Yousaf and Mark Adkin in their book 'Afghanistan: The Bear Trap', reveal how the USA and Pakistan supported the guerrilla war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. Pakistanis were supporting Afghans on religious and ethnic grounds and the Americans were attempting to settle their score by weakening the Soviets. The common agenda was to vanquish the Russian army.

As a result, the Soviets could not hold ground for long and had to withdraw their troops from Afghanistan in 1988-89. Ironically, three decades later, the US would leave the country in the same way in the middle of the night in 2021 after 20 years of war. It seems Russia had not learned any lessons from its earlier mistakes nor had it drawn any insights from what the US experienced during the 20 years of war in Afghanistan. It was the Afghan war that the USSR had to pay the price for as it disintegrated into 15 small nations, one of which is Ukraine now fighting Russian troops.

Russia again feared an enemy at the gates and plunged itself into the Ukraine invasion. In the grander scheme of things, Putin's decision to enter Ukraine would be nothing short of a knee-jerk reaction that made him bite more than he could chew. The growing proximity of Ukraine to the European Union and its urge to be a member of the EU made Putin restless, the fallout of which was his grand invasion plan. Putin expected the invasion would sail through easily and quickly with some reports saying he had planned it to end in 3-days. The calculations went horribly wrong as the wild and disastrous assumption met with devastation and resulted in heavy civilian and military casualties. The deaths and destruction, though leaving Ukraine in utter chaos, bolstered its people to resist harder and stronger with each passing day.

Drawing parallels between the two adventures Russia made in 1979 and 2022, it wouldn’t be difficult to foresee the fate of Russia in the Ukraine conflict. The Afghan war devastated the reputation of the Soviets and the ongoing Ukraine invasion has equally a potential to risk Putin’s regime. Agreeing to scale down the operation in Ukraine in the talks which came to pass between Russia and Ukraine in Turkey on Tuesday (March 30) clearly reflects that Putin has started thinking that there is less scope for him to take over the country so easily. He has therefore slacked the activities in the region.

But Putin has given the West a reason, rather a justification, to push him to the wall and now the option with him is to give up on Ukraine. Considered a minnow when this all started, Ukraine has emerged as a strong nation in eastern Europe and is going to be a big challenge for Russia in the future. The biggest strength Ukraine will have will be its displaced population spread across Europe. Ukrainian refugees crossing into these bordering NATO countries are being met with sympathy and support the same way Afghans would get from Pakistan, India, and elsewhere. The increasing number of refugees would increase the voices against Russia and its tyrannical actions in Ukraine.

Ukraine fighters will consolidate their bases and would seek military support capable of fighting any powerful army in the future. The insurgency which Russia started in some parts of Ukraine earlier is going to be a headache for Moscow as the war has had a paradigm shift among the populace and will fuel the insurgency against Russia. Even most of the Russian-speaking population in the country has gone hostile against Putin.

Atrocities by Russians and the civilian casualties are going to be a major currency for the US and its European allies against Russia. Putin is seen in his own land as an enemy and is being hated. The major takeaway from this war would be that no powerful nation can assume to venture out freely into a smaller territory with the notion that it can be invaded.