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The Great Gamble: The Soviet War in Afghanistan | 
| Author: Gregory Feifer
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Category: Book
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Rating:  17 reviews
Sales Rank: 159418
Media: Paperback
Edition: Reprint
Pages: 336
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 8 x 5.3 x 1.1
ISBN: 0061143197
Dewey Decimal Number: 958.1045
EAN: 9780061143199
ASIN: 0061143197
Publication Date: January 1, 2010
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Product Description
The Soviet war in Afghanistan was a grueling debacle that has striking lessons for the twenty-first century. In The Great Gamble, Gregory Feifer examines the conflict from the perspective of the soldiers on the ground. In gripping detail, he vividly depicts the invasion of a volatile country that no power has ever successfully conquered. A riveting account as seen through the eyes of the men who fought in the war, The Great Gamble tells an unforgettable story full of drama, action, and political intrigue whose relevance in our own time is greater than ever.
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 17
 Bad decision making at the Kremlin. March 30, 2010
Kevin M Quigg (Carol Stream, Illinois United States)
As the author states, the Soviet War in Afghanistan was due to a series of bad decisions by senile old men who believed the reports of their representatives in Kabul. It shows how bad and ruthless leaders in Kabul were suceeded by even more bad and ruthless leaders there. One wonders whether we are doing the same thing in Afghanistan right now.
Some of the choices these leaders made are in hindsight bad. The Kremlin turned down past requests for intervention in Afghanistan. When the regime started to crumble, the Soviet Union decided to get rid of the Afghan leader Amin and install their own man Karmel. The book shows the decision making at the Kremlin level and those on the ground. In fact, the intervention was only to replace leaders. not to be a complete occupation. It turned into a complete occupation when they met opposition.
This is a great book about the Soviet War in Afghanistan. I got a good view of how the Soviets made decisions in regards to this war. Hopefully the United States will not make the same mistakes as they wage their war in Afghanistan.
 Being long overdue but not 5 star February 25, 2010
Christian Kober (Shanghai)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Finally a book on the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. The reader may draw his own conclusions about todays war effort in Afghanistans - this book merely offers a tremendous heap of primary material from which to draw inferences.
It sets of with a brief description of the background of the Afghan adventure and then jumps right into the middle of things, describing the war froma mostly Soviet perspective and as such from mostly a lower ranking soldiers perspective.
This makes for a gripping narrative which probably would also hold true for other Soviet military adventures.
What the book nevertheless lacks is a clear narrative. Sometimes one can be to close to the ground to see the larger picture. All changes in Soviet military approach are explained only fleetingly. Yes, the numerous new approaches not only remind us of current multitude of solutions which are being tried in Afghanistan and also highlight a possible reason for the ultimate defeat of the Soviet Union in this country, namely the lack of a consistently persued policy and military strategy.
Therefore this book resembles more a quarry. There are wonderful gems to be found and it is of huge utility, but it is unchartered and everyone has to do the search for himslef in this mountainscape of a book.
 interesting account January 7, 2010
Harriet Klausner
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Anyone who has followed the historians' perspective on the Bush-Obama war in Afghanistan knows the mountainous country has been considered a graveyard for outsiders. Before the Americans, the Soviets became engulfed in a nine-year war there that many say was a much greater factor to the collapse of the Soviet Union than Reagan's build-up; as it exposed the weaknesses of the rag-tag nature of the Red Army. Using predominantly interviews with Soviet veterans and translations of released Russian information, Gregory Feifer provides an intriguing look at why the Russians' felt they lost and believe likewise the Americans will too. In some ways the anecdotal glimpse of the war is overwhelming as there is so much material from so many vets. Yet ironically this deep look from mostly the perspective of Russian war veterans lacks two critical interrelated elements in light of today's debate over whether the United States can win in Afghanistan. First why the Soviets felt they could win a protracted war when they issued rations stamped 1942 and second why did the Afghanistan resistance believe they could defeat one of the world's two superpowers. Still this is an interesting account of the Soviet war in Afghanistan worth reading over several weeks.
Harriet Klausner
Useful but with Predictable Trappings November 12, 2009
MHP
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Greg Feifer's "The Great Gamble" is one of only a handfew of books written in English that examines the USSR's occupation of Afghanistan from a Soviet perspective, peeling back the layers of officialdom and historical narrative to examine the real-life people and interactions that shaped that horrendous ten-year conflict. Given the dearth of previous material, Feifer relies on primary sources, primarily interviews with actual war participants, unearthing the real human tragedy of what Willam T. Sherman succintly described as 'hell." Tackling such a gripping subject is a gamble of its own, but the author is able to present the authentic thoughts and emotions of those involved without the trappings of turning bloodletting soldiers into sympathetic, order-following actors on an infernal stage. Although tremendously incisive when dwelling on its cental theme, Feifer's "The Great Gamble" repeats the all-too-common mistake of recent books on Afghanistan by straying off-topic and ultimately misrepresenting the Afghan side of the conflict in an attempt to bring cohesion, consistency, and present-day parallels to a complicated story.
This insightful work begins by diving into the Soviet decision to invade Afghanistan. It examines the Politburo power brokers participant to that decision, including in the discussion their various backgrounds, prejudices, and motivations that contributed to one of the greatest tactical blunders in the history of Communism. Rather than being the result of a thoughtful, expansionist military decision based on history and facts, it is revealted that Brehznev practically stepped backwards into the conflict, clearly not anticipating or even truly understanding in what the Soviets were getting involved. From there, the book relays the stories of combatants who were involved in the actual execution of the war plan. This is the truly fascinating component of the book, as all the miscommunication, blunders, and battlefield triumphs and failures are revealed from the perspective of those on the ground. To take as a example, the drama of Hafizullah Amin's disposition by his Soviet patrons is particularly eye-opening, from the failed attempt at poisoning to Russian doctors who were unaware of their country's intentions and mistakenly tried to save Amin's life only to give up their own in the ensuing chaotic firefight that happened at Taj-Bej palace. Stories like this expose how doomed the Soviet invasion was from the start, regardless of the resources or brutality utilized to quiet the unrest. Also revealed through such candid recollections is how incogruent and ultimately unachievable Soviet goals were on the ground. Soldiers imbued with a sense of duty to prop up a Communist system meant to improve the lives of everyday Afghans were also responsible for some of the most reprehensible and cruel acts known to humanity, utterly destroying a people and country in the process. Seen from this vantage, "The Great Gamble" uncovers hidden wisdom and meaning that paints the potrait of a doomed Soviet misadventure.
The book itself fails when it attempts to describe events, people, and comparisons less well-researched. The author spends disproportion time on Soviet incursions into the Panjshir valley, which has enjoyed much notereity in the years after the war but enjoyed no special tactical importance at the time of the occupation. Much is made of the Ahmad Shah Massoud and his defense of the valley without doing what the author does best, which is revealing hidden truths about that portion of the conflict from Soviet sources. There are in fact are multiple Russian accounts of Massoud's questionable loyalty to the greater Afghan struggle as witnessed through well-documented side treaties he had with Russian forces throughout the course of the war, and this important, given the post-conflict legend of Massoud, yet overlooked fact of the conflct is glossed over in one sentence. Much of the commander's heroism is supplied to the book by his own supporters, and the discerning eye of the author fails to catch mistakes that contribute to the cult of Massoud: a defense of the town of Sarawbi in the direction of the eastern city of Jalalabad is attributed to Panjshiri rebels, as well as the fall of Kandahar in 1992 being attributed to Massoud's forces who played no role in either event. This emphasis on one particular person ultimately deprives the unnamed Afghan villagers, freedom fighters who gave their lives in defense of their country, from their rightful positions as heros of the conflict. In his epilogue, and most relevant to the current situation, the author misses to compare Soviet relationships with their Afghan counterparts, which he portrays in-depth, with American relationships in the country today. The obvious lesson gleaned from the book, and any study of occupation, is that regardless of the force involved, losing the people will lose the conflict. However, there is no discussion of the lessons to be learned from the Soviet interaction with Afghan leaders at the time, and how the decisions made on who to support and not support have almost as much influence in the endgame as do any particular battle or military strategy. These lessons have become increasingly important today as dubious decision-making in terms of which locals to support has created an impervious cadre of drugdealers and warlords who counted on outside support to establish themselves internally.
Despite its peripherial shortcomings, Gregory Feifer's work shines when focused on the relatively unknown element of the conflict, actions on the ground seen through the Soviet soldier perspective.
Not the Definitive Work, But Very Informative August 27, 2009
David M. Dougherty (Arkansas)
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
Several of the other reviews are accurate in informing the prospective reader of the book's content, so I will confine my remarks to several additional points. This is not the definitive work, but is almost the first book to come out based on recent Soviet archival material release (& personal inverviews) to give Western readers an appreciation of the Soviet involvement in Afghanistan and the reasons why they went into the country. No doubt other works will appear in the coming years to flesh out the story in a very scholarly fashion, but this one will do for now.
Communist doctrine was a poor fit in Afghanistan due to a missing element -- there was and still is essentially no proletariat (e.g. no workers.) That immediately brings in the question as to how Mao was successful in China (or Stalin in the Soviet Union) for that fact, but neither had to contend with a very strong religious presence which governed the lives of the people. Simply put, Communism was unable to supplant the Islam and Islamic Law. It now remains to be seen if the United States will do any better with its attempt to impose a nationwide secular democracy. The forces against the U.S. are the same as were against the Soviets.
The Soviets attempted to modernize Afghanistan and liberate its people from medieval institutions yet were unable to comprehend that the people preferred to live as they wished rather than to have civilization, progressivism, and modernization forced on them, particularly by outsiders. Gee, that sounds exactly like what the U.S. is attempting to do. Although the author and some reviewers decry tribalism, one must remember that it is a peoples' right to live as they wish -- under tribalism if that is their choice. Although the religion and culture are different, the Muslim Afghans have much in common with the Presbyterian Scotch-Irish in America. All government is an abridgement on personal freedom, and in all matters not subject to Islamic Law, the Afghans demanded freedom under local (tribal and family) control. For whatever reason, much of the American citizenry has forgotten (if it ever knew) that our Founding Fathers recognized much the same problem (excepting the substitution of Christian culture and the 10 Commandments for Islam) and our current Federal Government now sees such concepts as backward and obstacles to progressivism.
I, for one, was swept up by the author's narrative to a point of sympathy for the Soviet soldier and officer on the ground, trying his best but not comprehending the reasons for or the futility of the struggle. They were often unable to understand Afghan culture and failed to see that liberating women from their subservient status was hardly a winning strategy (some male Americans might now agree after seeing American women voting for Obama en masse due to his sexual attraction.) Money poured into buildings, roads, medical facilities and all the trappings of a modern society was simply wasted. Gee, are we now doing the same thing?
Ultimately, the power politics that drew the Soviets reluctantly into Afghanistan to control Central Asia for their own strategic purposes helped doom the Soviet Union. This should be a lesson for all, even though the U.S. went into Afghanistan to punish a regime that harbored and trained terrorists who were/are at war with the U.S. OK, so if bin Laden is killed or captured, will we leave Afghanistan? And if not, why not? What are/will be the reasons for staying? Are those reasons the same as those for the Soviets? As this book points out, the Soviets finally realized that withdrawing from Afghanistan would not fatally damage their position in the world (although it encouraged the Chechens) and staying served no useful purpose. Frankly, it is time for Obama to read this book, particularly since he has no military experience and can hardly be expected to understand the difficulties facing American and Soviet soldiers and commanders in Afghanistan.
In short, this is a valuable book in which one learns that the more things change, the more they stay the same. The Soviet war in Afghanistan was fought to the best of the Red Army's ability, and even today Soviet veterans have much the same feelings of being let down by their government as American veterans of Vietnam have.
Although some say that Afghanistan was devastated by the Soviets, I note that the Afghan census recorded 13 million in 1979 while the current population estimate (2009) is over 28 million. Obviously all this warfare has not impeded a astounding fecundity in the Afghan people.
This is an important work and I recommend it to all. There are some errors, notably in geography and narrative continuity, but please read past these problems. There is much to learn here, not only for the individual American citizen but also for the Federal Government. Sooner or later people desire the ability to control their own lives rather than being told by a government what is good for them. The desire for freedom will trump progressivism in the end when the central government over-reaches into the private lives of the citizens. The alien Soviets did that almost simply by their presence in Afghanistan -- our increasingly remote and elitist Federal Government and its ruling bureaucracy may well be fast approaching the same point.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 17
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