Soviet - Afghan War - The USSR's Downfall

The collapse of the Soviet Empire came suddenly, mostly due to the invasion of Afghanistan. Let's talk about that!

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[Smellbringer]

Russia in 2022: "I wonder if I can speeedrun this?"

[mardan]

I was around 6 years old and i remember the night when Russians started the assault in December 1979. I was at my uncle's house and we took cover in his basement near the airport when the fighting started. You could hear very loud gun fire all night. The next day when we left for home it was a shocker to see tons of Russian troops and tanks all over the streets. I remember this like it happened yesterday.

[TommygunNG]

"Republic of Afghanistan" turns to "Democratic Republic of Afghanistan."

General rule, folks: The more a country tries to claim to be "democratic" or representative in its name, the less it actually is.

[nicholascauton]

22:26 “Fighting a counter-insurgency is like trying to eat soup with a fork…”

As funny as this analogy is, it’s a pretty good one. Next time I get into a complicated situation in life, I’ll think back to this analogy.

[davidtaylor]

Steve Coll's "Ghost Wars" is an excellent book about America's involvement with Afghanistan during the Soviet-Afghan War and the lead-up to 9/11. The book was an eye-opener for me.

[mcwildstyle]

This is why learning from history is important now. Because if we don't, we'll make the same mistakes over and over again

[ignitionfrn]

0:55 - Chapter 1 - Down with the crown
8:00 - Chapter 2 - Tajpeg palace assault
14:50 - Chapter 3 - Squashing the rebellion
19:35 - Chapter 4 - Final years
22:35 - Chapter 5 - Graveyear of empires

[SpencerGD]

Maybe you mentioned it and I missed it, but a key reason the USSR escalated from an advisory role to direct military action was the murder of two or three soviet officers in an Afghan city. Prior to that, soviet generals/officers had been in the country primarily to advise the Afghan army on strategies. After a few officers were killed by locals, though, the USSR became a belligerent in the conflict.

Also worth noting, during the Mujahideen's resistance, many of the country's women and children fled to Pakistan. During their time there, many were given refuge in mosques. The clerics of those mosques provided food & shelter, in addition to providing education for the children. Of course, the education provided had an Islamic slant/bias, so the children were effectively indoctrinated with pro-Islamic sentiments. When the boys were old enough, they returned to Afghanistan to join the fight, but their ideologies didn't necessarily align with the original Mujahideen's. As a result, this second generation of fighters became known as the Taliban. The name "Taliban" comes from the word "talib", which is the Pashto word for "student, " owing to the religious education those fighters had received while in Pakistan.

[theawesomeman]

I have two American Afghan vets as friends and this video was helpful in letting me know what they went through though it covers the Soviet's involvement its near identical to when my friends deployed there to fight the Taliban.

[MrTexasDan]

No mention of the Stinger effect. The Soviets lost 350 aircraft, many over the battlefields from Mujaheddin use of US-supplied Stinger missiles (sound familiar?). It hastened their withdrawal, for without the tactical advantage of air superiority, they were done.

[karny]

The raid on the palace is the most Russian special operation I’ve ever heard of

[jameslovallo]

I was stationed at the bottom of Tajbeg hill. I've never seen a picture of the palace before it was destroyed. The area was littered with destroyed Russian equipment and fighting positions

[nickmauldin]

“The Mujahideen. You may know them as the bad guys from 9/11…or the good guys from Rambo 3”. (Another YouTuber).

[PavelAVasilevich]

My uncle served in the 350 Regiment Guards Paratrooper 1984-86. didn't like to talk about it..at times he would tell us experience and moments..drank quiet often.

[PerfectSense]

Your explanation on the palace assault was excellent. I previously read about it but the way you worded it explained the events very precisely and cleared up some misconceptions I had.

[ilajoie]

I'm glad you covered this. Despite being in Afghanistan twice I never looked too much in detail about the modern history which let to the current situation

[CartoonHero]

Soviet Military Strategy:
Phase 1: Invade Nation
Phase 2: ???
Phase 3: Victory!

[JoshEmerson]

The amount of information you give every time is astonishing. Thank you guys for all your hard work.

[Grayman]

Iam British and after watching this iam amazed how many times we as a nation have stuck our nose into other people's country's and messed them up and then left .

[aaronpylinski]

It would be awesome to see a sequel to this. Post-Soviet to the assassination of Masoud. Great job, BTW!!! I really enjoyed this video.