The Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan
March 1980: After a series of military coups, transferrals of power, and factional wars, Afghanistan is in turmoil. Afghanistan has been a Soviet ally for almost 60 years, and has increasingly sought Soviet financial and military aid. But just three months earlier, due to increasing Cold War tensions, the Soviet Union invaded the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan at the behest of the ruling People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan, installing a new president. The Soviets and their new puppet, Babrak Karmal, now control most major urban hubs around Afghanistan and are pushing hard for socialist reforms. The Mujahideen, a loosely connected group of Jihadist rebel insurgencies, are united in fighting against the foreign invaders. They believe, along with the majority of the UN, that the Soviet Union has no place in Afghanistan. Leonid Brezhnev, the General Secretary of the USSR, is backing the occupation, while the Mujahideen, in true cold-war-proxy-war style, are receiving aid from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and the United States.
In an attempt to ease the tension, we have called together a conference of Afghan Government officials, Mujahideen leaders, and various world leaders embroiled in the conflict. Their goal is to stabilize the situation in Afghanistan, no easy feat considering the existing animosity between Russia and the U.S. due to the Cold War. This involves bringing together some of the most dissimilar worldviews of all time, and representatives will have to grapple with major ideological disconnects to achieve peace in Central Asia.
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