Реферат: The Consequences of the Soviet-Afghan War
Реферат: The Consequences of the Soviet-Afghan War
Essay: .
“What did the Afghan war give us? Thousands of
mothers who lost their sons, thousands of cripples, and thousands of
torn-up lives” (qtd. in Tamarov 156). These are the words of a
veteran of the Soviet-Afghan war. The Soviet war was against an
internal Afghan problem – the Mujahideen, an Islamic
Fundamentalist group that was trying to overtake the ruling Afghan
government. Even after nine years of intense fighting, the war left
nothing but thousands of lost innocent lives, and an undefeated
Mujahideen. The Soviet Union established diplomatic relations with
the ruling Afghan government in the early 1920’s, and sustained
that relationship until the government crumbled. They provided both
military and economic aid (Lester, par 23).
The Soviet Union had its own reasons for helping Afghanistan. Their
intention was to make Afghanistan the first Muslim state to become
part of the Soviet Union. By doing so, they would show the world the
power of the Soviet Empire, because no non-Muslim empire had ever
included a Muslim state. But they couldn’t succeed; on the
contrary they created haters of non-Muslim states called the Taliban,
who teamed up with the Saudi terrorist Bin Laden. This team has
destroyed many innocent lives.
In 1979, more than
50,000 soldiers from fifteen Republics of the Soviet Union entered
Afghan territory. More than 20,000 of those soldiers died during the
nine-year-long war (Lester, par 37). The Soviet Union, and especially
the news media, blamed this failure entirely on its youthful
soldiers.
Military
service was mandatory. The boys, who averaged 18 or 19 years of age,
had no choice but to serve for 2 to 3 years. Recruits for Afghanistan
would receive 8-10 weeks of training before being sent to their
units. This training, of course, didn’t cover all the necessary
preparation. They received some basic information on how to operate
weapons, but no information on how to fight effectively in the war
situation they would face in Afghanistan.
Did
the Soviet government think about the ruined lives of the Afghan
veterans? No. Instead it blamed them for the failure of policies
that were not their fault.
Coming
back to normal life was very difficult for the Afghan veterans. After
they came home they started organizing the sort of communities they’d
become accustomed to during their long stay in Afghanistan. This was
their way of isolating themselves from ordinary people. In these
communities they tried to do almost everything they used to do in
Afghanistan. Here they could do drugs, and talk about the war. But
the government shut down the communities because of the illegal use
of drugs. (Galeotti 41).
One of the
veterans said, “We never came home. Our minds were always at
war.” (qtd. in Galeotti 45). But the soldiers did come home,
and all soldiers came back differently. Some of them were on
crutches, some had no hands or legs, some had prematurely gray hair,
and many of them returned in zinc coffins. Many soldiers, who were
injured during the war, were never able to find a job, because of
their physical condition. Thus they had to rely entirely on relatives
for the rest of their lives. These people hated the government for
not assisting them financially, because when they needed help, the
same government that had sent them to war turned away from them. Sick
of their lives, and sick of being an extra burden to their relatives,
many invalid veterans committed suicide.
While many veterans were physically injured, others
suffered from complicated psychological disorders such as flashbacks,
emotional numbness, withdrawal, jumpy hyper-alertness or
over-compensatory extroversion. (Cordovez 247). One Afghan veteran
recalled that when their leading vehicle broke down, and the driver
got out, a boy about ten years old ran out of nowhere and stabbed him
in the back. He added that they turned the boy into a sieve (Galeotti
69). Soviet troops killed a number of children in Afghan villages.
A commander who ordered one massacre said, “When they grow up,
they will take up arms against us.” (qtd. in Shansab171).
So how can a person who brutally killed a ten-year-old boy lead a
normal life after coming back home? Killing children, knowing that
anytime a bullet can hit you, knowing that no place is safe, can
drive any sane person insane. What could this have done to an
18-year-old boy, who was drafted into war right after graduating from
high school, who had never seen any hardship in life?
In normal society the killing of another person is punished,
sometimes by the death penalty. But during the Afghan war, Soviet
soldiers received the power of life and death over others. The
tendency of treating people however they wished became common among
Soviet soldiers. This triggered the official imprisonment of 2,540
Soviet soldiers by the Soviet government, for atrocities against
Afghan civilians. (Galeotti 81).
This created another problem when they returned home.
They were unable to overcome the feeling that they had the authority
to treat people however they wished. Some veterans, unable to square
the demands of war with the demands of conscience, were locked behind
the bars of mental hospitals. Other became compulsively violent. By
the end of 1989, more than 3,000 veterans were in prison for criminal
offenses. Of the 3,000 prisoners, more than half were convicted of
murder or rape. (Galeotti 52).
Another consequence of the Afghan war was drug addiction and excess
consumption of alcohol. Because combat in any area wasn’t safe,
the soldiers had to be always on high alert. In order to relax, many
relied on drugs. Afghanistan was the major supplier of poppy to the
world during those times. Drugs became part of the Soviet soldier's
lives. Many felt that drugs were essential for survival. Drugs helped
a soldier to carry 90 pounds of ammunition up and down the mountains.
It helped them to overcome the depression resulting from their
friend’s deaths, and to overcome their own fear of death. Drugs
and alcohol became the usual procedure of self-medication, because
other options were unavailable. One veteran said “There wasn’t
a single person among us who didn’t do drugs in Afghanistan.
You needed relaxation, or you went out of your mind.” (Galeotti
51). This created a generation of drug addicts and alcoholics.
According to the Soviet Department of Health Services, a 20.4%
increase was registered from 1979 to 1985, compared to 1950-1978.
(Galeotti 53).
Today we have witnessed the gravest consequence of the Soviet-Afghan
war. It created the monster the world called the Taliban. This harsh
fundamental ruling body came to power in the vacuum that came about
after the Soviets pulled out and returned home. The Afghan government
was weak and lacked national power. It soon collapsed giving rise to
the Taliban, who turned Afghanistan into world's terrorist center.
Even today, the Afghans and Soviets still suffer the results of the
war. Clearly there were no winners. Perhaps today that
has changed, because the Afghan people, the Soviets, and the US this
time are all on the same side. Perhaps this time all will be
winners, and only Bin Laden and the Taliban will be the losers.
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