Afghanistan and the Vietnam Syndrome: Comparing US and Soviet Wars

Description

Great powers have often found that military adventurism to force their will in distant lands comes with the risk of spending excessive military, economic, and moral capital to the extent that war is no longer sustainable. Written by a former BBC Afghanistan correspondent who set up the corporation’s bureau in Kabul in the early 1990s, this book draws both from scholarly knowledge as well as first-hand insights on how the Americans met that fate in Vietnam, and the Soviets and Americans in Afghanistan. America’s 1975 retreat from Vietnam was a consequential event, prompting US commentators to explain it as reluctance to get involved in foreign wars, a mindset described as the Vietnam Syndrome.  As Deepak Tripathi points out, the Vietnam experience made the Americans determined to give the Soviets their own Vietnam. The 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and retreat after a decade of occupation, represented the revenge America sought. However, President George W. Bush’s decision to invade Afghanistan after the 9/11 attacks was the beginning of a long military venture that ended in retreat in 2021. Addressing an academic as well as a general audience, Tripathi explores parallels between wars in Afghanistan and Vietnam, and shows how the United States and the Soviet Union met the same fate. Foreword Preface Acknowledgments About This Book Contents About the Author 1: 9/11 Reprisal 1.1 Pakistan Dimension 1.2 Return to Afghan-Pakistan Theater 2: Overreach 2.1 Vietnam Syndrome 2.2 North Vietnam 2.3 South Vietnam 2.4 Laos 2.5 Cambodia 3: War on Terror 3.1 Guantanamo Bay 3.2 Drones 3.3 Abu Ghraib 4: Afghan War 4.1 War on Soviet Communism 4.2 War on Al Qaeda and the Taliban 5: Iraq War 5.1 Desert Storm 5.2 Containment 5.3 Operation Iraqi Freedom 5.4 Uprisings 5.5 New Iraqi State 5.6 Obama’s Withdrawal and Reentry 5.7 Retreat 6: Arab Spring 6.1 Egypt 6.2 Libya 6.3 Yemen 6.4 Syria 6.5 United States in Syria 7: Return to Kabul 7.1 Taliban Regroup 7.2 Haqqani Network 7.3 Miran Shah Shura 7.4 Peshawar Shura 7.5 Karachi Shura 7.6 Political Crisis 7.7 Toward the End Game 7.8 Trump and Afghanistan 8: Conclusion Appendix A America’s Long War, 2001–2021 Afghanistan Iraq Arab Spring Tunisia Libya Egypt Bahrain Saudi Arabia Yemen Syria Jordan Sudan Appendix B Part One Part Two Part Three Appendix C Remarks by President Biden on the End of the War in Afghanistan, August 31, 2021 Bibliography (Summary) US Government Documents Afghanistan Papers Iraq Papers National Security Archive (Georgetown University, Washington, DC) The Following Documents Were from the NSA Document Collection Titled The Soviet Withdrawal from Afghanistan: Wilson Center Digital Archive Other Archives Miscellaneous Sources Articles and Books News Index