Many military analysts believe or fear that the wars of the 1990s will be akin to the wars in the former Yugoslavia: small-scale but long-lasting and recurrent ethnic wars that also elude easy international resolution. There are consequently well-founded concerns about prospects for deployment of U.S. forces there in a unilateral or U.N. capacity. Some of the lessons of this kind of war were already apparent in the wars of the 1980s. They were known then as low-intensity conflicts and now as operations other than, or short of, war. This report focuses mainly on lessons from one of the most crucial of these wars, i.e., in Afghanistan as a result of the Soviet invasion in 1979, and attempts to draw lessons that are relevant for current wars, like those in Yugoslavia or the ex-Soviet Union. The purpose is to stimulate analysis and reflection on the strategic and operational, if not also tactical nature of these wars by both analysts and policymakers so that all interested groups can more easily come to terms with a form of warfare that promises to be both deeply destructive and deeply rooted in longstanding political and social antagonisms that cannot be easily or quickly resolved. Naturally some of the lessons drawn from Afghanistan and other wars may either only apply to Russian and Soviet forces or conversely may apply to war in general. But our primary intention is to make a contribution to the study of future wars particularly of the ethnic and small-scale type that promise to continue in many parts of the globe lest we devise better ways for averting and then resolving them.
The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan at the end of 1979 was, in many respects, a milestone in Soviet history. On the one hand it represented the high-water mark of Soviet intervention in Third World states and thus served as the archetypical example and justification for the intensification of the cold war in the early 1980s. On the other hand, the ultimate defeat and poor performance by this military in Afghanistan was one of the key forces that triggered the drive for a comprehensive reform of the entire Soviet national security system and its decision-making structures. Thus this war had profound domestic and foreign repercussions. This analysis focuses on the purely operational and strategic lessons of the war. It insists that lessons of these kinds were present and that they offer significant insights both for such wars in general and for the course of Soviet military developments in the 1980s and 1990s. These lessons also offer important clues concerning the reforms required in order to preserve democratic civilian control over the military. It should also alert analysts everywhere as to the nature of local wars in the Third World in the 1990s, a phenomenon that shows little sign of abating. Though in many ways like all wars, this war was unique; it was not merely a series of random tactical exercises that were ultimately futile. Rather, like all wars, it shows us something of the shape of our present and future, if we are only insightful enough to understand it correctly.
War, as Clausewitz reminds, is the most uncertain of human political and social activities. It also imposes burdens. In an alliance among states for the promotion of collective defense or security, such as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), burdens have to be shared. This study looks at the experience of the United States and other member states of NATO in four situations of multinational military intervention - Lebanon, the Persian Gulf, the Balkans, and South Asia - and considers the implications of nuclear arms reductions and nonproliferation for the US and NATO. Each case study represents an important period in the distribution of power, interest, and values, amounting to more than a sequential consideration of incidents of military intervention and/or conflict prevention. These politico-military challenges include a major coalition war, a traditional peacekeeping operation, an exercise in peace enforcement, and a conflict that combines counter-insurgency and counter-terrorism with stability and security operations.
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