Was there a way for the USSR to have easily "won" Afghanistan?

USSR could not win in Afghanistan because of the ideology. The Book said Afghani peasants were their best friends. But they were not and soviets minds exploded from the cognitive dissonance.

>>30594273
They could have brought one of their several million soldiers and occupied the entire country, controlled every aspect of peoples' lives while they trained a new aghan elite to take over what they were doing so they could pull out after a while.

>>30594332
Upholding (or at least performing damage control for) the afghan elite they had already installed was the whole reason they were there in the first place. Its not the sort of place you can install a ruler over, because Kabul only has influence over Kabul.

Afghanistan is a black hole where no state can arise without constantly flowing money into it. Today is not different.

>>30594375
The afghan leadership was therefor before the soviets came in at their request, they didn't install or train them, which was a mistake clearly.

You can occupy and control any place, if you have the determination to do so, they didn't, they send a tiny force but nothing prevented them from sending millions if they had wanted to.

>>30594273
No.
Afghanistan is akin to the final, hardest stage in a video game.
White people do not know how to fight Afghanis.
There is no diplomacy with Afghanis.
There is no kindness with Afghanis, for they themselves have none.
You have to go the way of Maharaja Ranjit Singh and his Afghan wars if you want any control in that country.
You have to take their cities with no regards to the inhabitants, because either way they want to kill you.
You have to deface what they value.
You have to show you're going to utterly destroy them, not that you COULD or that you WOULD but that you're going to and WILL destroy them.
You must be ruthless to capture Afghanistan, that's how it's always been.
There's little tactics or any of that sort of fancy stuff.
Go in there, bomb them all to hell, fuck the U.N., and conquer what's left.

>>30594881

Except that's not feasible in this day and age, since political support for a war effort is a very real and important military resource, and it's one that will run out very quickly if you act that brutally.

>>30594273

Nope. Cutting off border with Pakistan is nearly impossible task.

Only effective way to get job done would have been genocide.

>>30594881
>Maharaja Ranjit Singh
POO
IN
LOO

People don't understand Afghanistan.

Afghanistan isn't hard to occupy because the people are so strong.

It's hard to occupy because the people are so weak.

The people there are utterly incapable of participating in modern government, so you will never be able to leave the country without the state you created falling to pieces.

Look at the abysmal performance of the DRA and ANA. Even the Taliban couldn't completely take over.

It's like trying to build a house out of shit, once you take away the scaffolding it just falls apart.

>>30596204

Why was it impossible? Helicopter passes along the border every few hours would be enough. Defiantly would stop convoys.
Just far enough from the border to prevent rocket launches shooting down the helicopters/planes.

USSR focuses on the border. Let the Government worry about the interior.

>>30594273
>Was there a way for the USSR to have easily "won" Afghanistan?
Yep, occupy Pakistan.

>>30594273
They lost in Afghanistan much in the same way the US lost Viet Nam.

They were kicking ass up until the time they started to actually pull out.

>>30596262
Don't you have your wife's son to look after?

>>30597687
The Liberal media messed things up for the Soviets.

They were fighting an idea using arms and bombs. The Mujahadeen, who were simply religious rebels, saw the Soviets as invaders to their territory seeking to get rid of Islam.
A better way to approach the Afghan Soviet conflict, would be to better the image of the Soviets.
Help out local villages by giving them supplies but let them sort themselves out, if they ask for protection or assistance go ahead. Make it seem less like an occupation and more like a friendly visit, while bearing gifts. Reduce the footprint of Soviet forces by decreasing the amount of operations and bases in the area.
Participate with locals if invited or make your garrison seem friendly to Islam.
If the rebels attack, it'll place them in a bad light and rebel numbers would dwindle as the people no longer see the Soviet forces as a threat and merely another neighbor.
Make the rebels cause seem unjust.
That being said, most of these things go against Soviet doctrine/agendas.

>>30594273
Well, after they left they installed a puppet regime that kept the peace until the fall of the USSR. As it turned out, the way to "win" was to leave.

>>30594273

The Soviets were a fucking mess. You had soldiers stealing from each other and selling off their buddies kit to the enemy in exchange for homemade booze and drugs. The tanks deployed had terrible elevation. The Aircraft losses endured could have been reduced if they only equipped countermeasures from the beginning. A lot of the equipment was shitty as well. Most troops traded their boots for cheap knockoff sneakers.

>>30597550
Didn't the Pakis have nukes by then?

>>30594881
>Maharaja Ranjit Singh
BRO-TIER

>>30602120
Nope.

>>30596616
>Let the government worry about the interior
The DRA was notoriously shitty, maybe even worse than the ANA in terms of ineptitude and cowardice. Even when the Soviets were at the height of the war they never had much control beyond the cities and roads, and the roads only during the day. Redeploying most of the military to the Pakistani border leaves the rest of the country open.
>>30594491
>Sending millions
This is a retarded idea, and you should feel bad for suggesting it.
>>30597550
Would've meant an even larger deployment of Soviet troops and even more pissed off Muzzie countries, not to mention having to occupy two countries at once. Also basically guarantees that China and the US would flip their shit and move to a near-war footing, thus causing the Soviets to further extend themselves to defend against a possible attack.
>>30594273
There was no way the USSR could've won "easily". They encountered much the same problems we do,
>locals do not trust you
>or they will feign trust to steal from you/fuck you over
>locals do not care for shit that happens in Kabul
>Pashtuns will almost always be belligerent no matter how you try to negotiate with them
>local troops near worthless (Afghan commie army became somewhat decent in last few years, but it wasn't enough)
>typical Soviet scorched earth tactics ineffective, makes locals more likely to turn into angrier snackbars than they already were
>would've had to somehow stop the flow of weaponry from multiple countries into Afghansitan (China, the US, Egypt, Pakistan, UK, etc)

Maybe if the Soviets had adapted their tactics and troops toward a more fluid kind of war then things would've been a little different, but they often tried to apply overly conventional strategies (see the multiple Panjshir offensives) to a guerrilla war. In the end I have a hard time imagining a soviet victory that doesn't involve large scale purges/killings, mass deployment of specialist troops, or incursions into Pakistan.

>>30604381
>large scale purges/killings

Well, it's not like the Soviets never did that before...

>>30604381
>Would've meant an even larger deployment of Soviet troops and even more pissed off Muzzie countries, not to mention having to occupy two countries at once. Also basically guarantees that China and the US would flip their shit and move to a near-war footing, thus causing the Soviets to further extend themselves to defend against a possible attack.
They didn't "occupy" Afghanistan, silly. Read definition of that word. If their target was to "win" Afghanistan, then kicking Pakistani balls was the easiest way. Afghan-Pakistani border was main supply corridor for mujahidins. Afghanistan would be secured.

>>30594273
>Just cut the flow of arms and mercenaries into the country, right?

I bet the moment the Soviets thought of that issue was when they pulled out.

>>30594273
They had no way of knowing that it would turn out that way. Do you know what the last wars fought under the pan Islamic goals before that was?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six-Day_War
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_Attrition
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yom_Kippur_War


Before Afghanistan they had a very bad record.

>>30604763
How are they that bad?

Sure. Just fucking kill everyone.

>>30594273
They could have just killed literally everyone there and then had a nice new sandbox to play in.

Other than that, no.

>>30604763
>Pan-Islamic
Those were Pan-Arab, big difference if you actually study rather than get your information from /pol

>>30594273

Biological warfare and then replacing the inhabitants with Slavs. Hate to say it, but Afghanistan does not want to be run by anybody BUT Afghanistan, so you might as well replace the population...

But then you get a worthless desert. Seriously, why is everyone fighting over this place!?

>>30596262

D E S I G N A T E D

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>>30594273
>Was there a way for the USSR to have easily "won" Afghanistan?
No.

>>30604477
I understand, still the border between Afghanistan/Pakistan is porous as fuck and even with modern tech like drones and IR we can't catch everyone coming over the border. As I already pointed out, the Soviets shifting their attention to the border may have produced some results, but may have left the rest of the country vulnerable to some degree. Also initiating open warfare with Pakistan (which in all honesty would've done a lot of good for the Soviets) would've strained their international diplomatic image more than it already was in the 80's.
>>30605485
>be some random Soviet conscript
>do mandatory service, you hope to luck out but you are sent to Afghanistan
>fuck my life
>stationed in an even more backwater and shitty area than the rest of the country
>not a lot of dushman out here thankfully
>but you keep hearing about the "dushman killer" from the old hands who're near the end of their tours
>probably just trying to fuck with new guys like me
>one day radio transmission from neighboring outpost is cut off mid-sentence
>sounds like they were under attack
>hop in a truck with some other conscripts and haul ass to the outpost
>get there
>everyone's gone
>not gone as in dead, there's little trace they were ever there to begin with
>few signs of a firefight, a couple dropped AKs (don't care what they call it in game, it's what they're supposed to be) and shell casings indicate that few were used in anger
>any sort of vital equipment is either gone (wonder how an emplaced anti-air position can simply disappear) or destroyed
>hear a noise behind me
>turn sharply
>holy shit, it's the fucking Dushman Killer
>catch a glimpse of an eyepatch, camo fatigues, and a metallic looking arm
>he's moving so fucking fast
>I'm caught completely by surprise, everything seems to be moving too slow for me to react properly
>his metallic fist crashes into my face
>go down hard
>wake up completely alone, truck is now also gone
>Mfw C-class recruit

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You can't "help" a country. It's not their country if they don't do the work. Going in, taking shit over, changing regimes, and then telling everybody to play nice always will end in tears and death.

Either you wipe Afghanistan clean with a nuke, or you just leave it the fuck alone.

>>30605304
We're there for the rare earths, the reds eventually wanted a port on the indian ocean

Didn't they give criminals a choice of either serving in Afghanistan or helping to "liquidate" Chernobyl?

>>30594273
the best way to win afghanistan is not to play

>>30597687
They were whittling away at the Mujahideen until the Kremlin realized they'd killed most of the brave ones, and the smart ones were just going to kill a few soviet soldiers for every one of their own while never revealing themselves and teaching a new generation similarly.

When there's only five-thousand guys left, but they refuse to fight you and your guys just keep dying, why stay?

>>30604910
Arabs seemed incompetent and stupid. Russia thought they'd roll in, crush the oppressive leaders and be welcomed by the people as a hero.

Now doesn't that sound familiar?

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>>30605687
It was called the "SVG-76"
That being said, despite how much I did like the game, I really wish they used the actual guns they were standing in for, that would of boosted my enjoyment of the game by a huge amount.

>>30605852
Yeah, I'm with you. I guess they wanted to give more options regarding customization but honestly building frankenguns in the customization menus using real guns sounds a lot more exciting to me.