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Subject:
Comparison of US Occupation of Iraq and Soviet Occupation of Afghanistan
Roman
6/13/2004 8:11:37 PM
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This is not a moral comparison between the two. I am merely comparing their military success thus far.
Iraq has a land area of 432,000 square kilometers and is mostly flat. The maximum elevation is a respectable 3,611 meters, but the mountains are concentrated in the north in the quiet Kurdistan right by the Turkish and Iranian borders. Because the Kurds are not part of the insurgency, the US military does not have to operate extensively in the mountainous region.
Afghanistan has a land area of 647,500 kilometers and the terrain is extremely rugged. The maximum elevation is a ridiculous 7,485 meters and mountains cover most of the country. There are some plains in the south, but these two have to be accessed through the mountains if you are moving or supplying from the territory of the former Soviet Union.
Iraq has a population of 24.7 million people of whom about 20% are Kurds, Turkmen or other ethnic groups friendly towards the US. Another 60%-65% are Shi?a Arabs, who are at least somewhat friendly to the US. Only about 15%-20% of the population is Sunni Arab (less than 5 million people in total) ? the ethnic group truly hostile to the Coalition troops.
Afghanistan currently has a population of 28.7 million people who are split up among a plethora of nationalities, but all of these ethnic groups were hostile to Soviet forces. At the time of the Soviet occupation, Afghanistan?s population was about 20 million people including the displaced.
USSR completed its invasion of Afghanistan very quickly at the end of 1979 and lost 86 dead in total that year. This can be seen as the equivalent of the period of ?major combat operations? that cost the Coalition 170 troops killed and were declared as being over by President Bush on May 1, 2003.
In 1980 the USSR suffered 1,484 dead (both combat and non-combat deaths included), while the first year of occupation of Iraq (May 2003 to April 2004) cost the Coalition 697 killed (not including allied Iraqi?s ? the Soviet figures also do not include allied Afghans). This means that the Soviet Union suffered just over 2 times the casualties in its first year of occupation of Afghanistan as the Coalition suffered in the first year of occupation of Iraq.
The worst year for the USSR in terms of deaths was 1984. During that year the Soviet Forces suffered 2,343 dead ? just over 3 times the number that the Coalition has suffered in its first year of occupation of Iraq.
In total the USSR lost 13,833 soldiers during 10 years of occupation of Afghanistan the peak strength of Soviet Forces in Afghanistan was about 100,000 troops (compared to 150,000-160,000 Coalition troops currently in Iraq). That is an average death of 1,383 soldiers per year for Soviet forces ? less than 2 times the loss of Coalition troops in the first year.
Looking at the above comparison and taking into account the fact that weapon technology has advanced enormously during the past 15 years, it seems to me that the Soviet army did not do all that badly in Afghanistan after all! I used to hear a lot of comments about how the Afghanistan war showed that the Soviet army was a paper tiger and would not in fact stand a chance against the West at the time, but looking at the Afghanistan war with the perspective of the current occupation of Iraq by a super-modern army 15-25 year later (and thus 15-25 years of technology advancement), that appears to have been a false conclusion on that basis alone. Again I reiterate ? looking at the situation objectively the Soviet forces in Afghanistan have done comparatively well militarily given the circumstances (though politically the invasion was a disaster [but then again so is the Iraqi one]), or else one would be forced to conclude that the US forces in Iraq are doing militarily very poorly, which is a conclusion I do not agree with (though both forces were/are not doing well politically/PR).
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