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Leonid Brezhnev
Leonid Brezhnev was a Communist Soviet politician. In 1950, he was elected to Supreme Soviet and in 1957 was considered one of the most powerful men in Soviet politics. He became a communist party official in 1964. He did nothing to improve relations between the east and west in the 1960s. However, he was said to have gotten along well with Nixon at a personal level. He died in 1982. -
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Jimmy Carter
Jimmy Carter was the 39th president of the U.S. He established the Camp David Agreement, which helped bring peace between Israel and Egypt. He also ratified the Panama Canal treaties, established full diplomatic relations with China, and negotiated the Salt II nuclear limitation treaty with Soviet Union. While he was in office, Iran held 52 members of the U.S. embassy staff captive, which contributed to his defeat when he ran for his second term. Inflation increased during his presidency. -
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Operation Cyclone (Mujahideen Alliance)
Code name for the CIA to arm and finance the Afghan Mujahideen from 1979-1989. President Carter authorized funding of anti-communist guerrillas in Afghanistan. President Reagan sent CIA Special Activities Division paramilitary officers to equip the Mujahideen forces. According to Peter Bergen, no Americans trained or had direct contact with the Mujahideen. The CIA was afraid of being blamed as they had been in Guatemala. -
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Babrak Karmal
Babrak Karmal was an Afghan politician during the Cold War. He was a founding member of the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan. He also served in the National Assembly from 1965-1973. When the Soviets invaded Afghanistan in 1979, they called Karmal to be president of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. However, Moscow saw him as a failure and replaced him in 1986. -
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Osama Bin Laden
Leader of al-Qaida, and Islamic group dedicated to symbolic acts of terrorism. To Bin Laden, his Islamic beliefs affected everything he did and every decision he made. He wanted al-Qaida to be the "master of the world" instead of America. He trained rebels and committed over 10 separate acts of terrorism on America and Egypt alone. He took credit on the 2001 World Trade Center attack. He was located in 2010 and killed by Navy SEALs in 2011. -
Geneva Accords
The Geneva Accords of 1988 were a series of three agreements signed by Pakistan and Afghanistan in order to end war in Afghanistan. The U.S. and USSR served as guarantors and witnesses. The peace accords marked the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan on May 15, however; civil war in Afghanistan continued as the Mujahideen refused to accept the accords and continued to fight after they were put into effect. -
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1992 Civil War
Afghan Civil War that began when communist president Mohammad Najibullah resigned. Gulbuddin Hekmatyar began the civil war when Najibullah resigned by voiding the Peshawar Accord, a peace and power-sharing agreement that united Afghan political parties. -
Taliban Seize Kabul
The Taliban held a public execution of former president Mohammed Najibullah. This marked the end of the 1992 Civil War and began the Taliban's five year rule of Kabul, the capital of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan. They were driven out in 2001. -
UN Air Embargo on Afghanistan
The UN stopped shipping ammunition and guns to both armies in Afghanistan. In October 1999, air transport was also banned. The UN froze all assets of the Taliban as a response to human rights abuse and while the embargo was never officially lifted, it eventually became obsolete. -
September 11th Attacks
19 Islamic extremists associated with al-Qaida hijacked 4 aircrafts. Two were flown into the World Trade Center in New York City. One hit the Pentagon outside of Washington D.C. The last one crashed in a field in Pennsylvania. -
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U.S. Invasion of Afghanistan
The U.S. invasion of Afghanistan was partly in retaliation for the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The war had three phases: toppling the Taliban, defeating the Taliban militarily and rebuilding core institutions, and protecting people from Taliban attacks and withdrawing troops from Afghanistan. Phase one lasted two months and succeeded fairly quickly. Phase two lasted from 2002-2008. Phase three lasted from 2008-2014 and worked to transfer security responsibilities to the Afghan military and police.
