Size: 19.5×12cm./7.6×4.7inch.
Weight: 156gr./5.5oz.
Pages: 173
Year: 1980
S
 
Book made in the Soviet Russia, 1980, in the French language. The title of the book reads:”The truth about Afghanistan. Documents, facts and testimonies”.
The Soviet–Afghan War lasted over nine years, from 1979 and ended in 1989. Insurgent groups known collectively as the mujahideen, as well as smaller Maoist groups, fought a guerrilla war against the Soviet Army and the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan government, mostly in the countryside. The mujahideen groups were backed primarily by the United States making it a Cold War proxy war. Between 562,000 and 2,000,000 civilians were killed and 32.000 Sovjet/Afghan forces and 57.000 mujahideen.
The war derives from a 1978 coup when Afghanistan’s communist party took power, initiating a series of radical modernization reforms throughout the country. These reforms were deeply unpopular among the more traditional rural population and established power structures. It led to the rise of anti government armed groups and by April 1979 large parts of the country were in open rebellion. The ruling party itself experienced deep rivalries, and in September 1979 the President, Nur Mohammad Taraki, was murdered under orders of the second in command, Hafizullah Amin, which soured relations with the Soviet Union. Eventually the Soviet government, under leader Leonid Brezhnev, decided to deploy the 40th Army in December 1979.
Arriving in the capital Kabul, they staged a coup, killing president Amin and installing Soviet loyalist Babrak Karmal from a rival faction.