[권희진의 세계는] Invasion of Ukraine, did Russia go back into ‘swamp’?

The Ukrainian War, a Replica of the Invasion of Afghanistan?

In the first 20 days of the start of the Ukrainian War alone, the Russians lost 7,000 men.

A month later, it was reported that 15,000 Russian soldiers had been killed, and the commanders, including generals, had lost 15, the highest number since World War II.

One of the reasons for the assumption that Putin was not going to start a war was that in reality it was almost impossible to occupy Ukraine. It was expected that the invasion of Ukraine would have similar results to the ‘invasion of Afghanistan’ more than 40 years ago, which promoted the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Two wars that look like twins

There are many similarities between the invasion of Ukraine and the invasion of Afghanistan in 1979.

The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan also began with the Soviet fear that Russia was losing its influence in Afghanistan, just like Ukraine is now.

Even at the time, the Soviet Union believed that Afghanistan could be suppressed easily.

Before deciding to war, the Soviet KGB had misinformed that the US was trying to use Afghanistan as a base to encircle the Soviet Union with nuclear missiles.

If Afghanistan fell under the influence of the United States in this way, it could have a cascading effect on the Warsaw Pact states. I did.

The situation is strikingly similar to the current situation, with reports that the Russian intelligence service misinformed Putin about the invasion of Ukraine may have led to the invasion.

The prediction that the United States and its allies would be fragmented and unable to respond effectively was completely wrong at the time.

President Carter of the United States responded harshly by forming alliances with Pakistan, China, Egypt, and the United Kingdom within a few weeks of the start of the war and boycotting the 1980 Moscow Olympics.

The Soviet Union decided that the US, which had lost the Vietnam War, would not be able to respond properly to the invasion, and the fragile image of Democrat President Carter also played a part.

It is similar to how President Biden gave the image of a ‘comfortable’ when the US forces rushed out of Afghanistan.

The United States provided arms to Afghanistan’s insurgents, the Mujahidin, and the then-famous Osama bin Laden played a significant role in the war against the Soviet Union with the United States on his back.

Ukrainians training to throw Molotov cocktails against Russian invasion [사진 제공: 연합뉴스]

Afghanistan is better than Ukraine.

At that time, the initial war situation in Afghanistan was much more favorable to the Soviet Union than it is now in Ukraine.

Soviet forces initially secured a strategic point in the capital, Kabul, and succeeded in assassinating the leader and his forces and placing a Soviet puppet in their place.

Having secured major cities like Jalalabad in the east and Kandahar in the south and also the Bagram Air Base, Soviet forces took control of Afghanistan within weeks.

It was better than the situation in Ukraine, where only damage was suffered in the capital, Kiiu, and even major cities were not secured for over a month before the start of the war.

Invasion of Afghanistan caused only tragedy and damage

Still, the war lasted a decade, met with internal resistance in Afghanistan, and only resulted in devastating tragedy.

The death toll has reached 2.5 million, including the death of 1 million Afghans, and there has been a staggering number of domestic and international refugees, including 3 million expatriates.

It is also known that close to 25,000 Soviet soldiers lost their lives.

In the end, the Soviet Union decided to withdraw its troops in February 1989, 10 years after the start of the war, after only killing countless innocent lives and suffering huge losses on its own.

The defeat of the war in Afghanistan that led to the collapse of the Soviet Union

This war changed the course of history.

In May 1989, Hungary, the backbone of the Warsaw Pact, opened the border with Austria, and hundreds of East Germans escaped to West Germany.

In November 1989, the Berlin Wall fell, and the Czech Republic and Romania declared their breakup with the Soviet Union.

In 1991, when Ukraine gained independence from the Soviet Union, the Soviet Union was dissolved.

Putin, a young KGB agent who witnessed all this in East Germany, called the collapse of the Soviet Union “the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th century” and the process of the collapse of the Soviet Union was so devastating to him.

It is also ironic that Putin, who was watching this process, invaded Ukraine 30 years later, dreaming of rebuilding the Russian Empire and trying to get Ukraine out of American influence.

Ukraine likely to become ‘Afghanistan’

If Putin repeats these ruthless military operations in Grozny or Syria, it is highly likely that the tragedy in which one in three citizens was killed and became a refugee during the war in Afghanistan is likely to be repeated in Ukraine.

It seems unlikely at the moment, but even if Russian forces take over Kiiu and other major Ukrainian cities, the problem will start again.

As in Afghanistan, the U.S. and other Western-backed insurgents in Ukraine will continue to fight, and it is highly likely that Russia will experience again in Ukraine what the Soviet Union did in Afghanistan in the past.

Moreover, Ukraine has a vast territory the size of Western Europe and has twice the population of Afghanistan.

It borders NATO member countries such as Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and Romania, and has a sea, so it is much more advantageous for resistance forces to receive supplies and support compared to Afghanistan, which is isolated on land. As 10 million out of 40 million Ukrainians and 1 in 4 become refugees, there is also an analysis that it is highly likely that they will eventually become resistance forces.

It is possible to guess what the US, which supported Afghanistan at the time, was thinking while supporting Ukraine now.

It wouldn’t be bad if Russia was stuck in Ukraine’s pit and couldn’t get out of it.

Putin will likely try to find an exit strategy to take shape and get out of Ukraine anyway.

But whether Putin seizes or withdraws from Ukraine, Russia and Putin’s position will not be what it used to be, and history seems to show that this situation could lead to huge unexpected changes.