Located in the prolongation of the Himalayas, Afghanistan (647 ' 500 km2) is a country the high ones and medium mountainss. It constitutes nevertheless an old crossroads of civilizations. True turntable in Central Asia, Afghanistan always was very coveted. This country indeed constituted the way of passage towards China, on the Silk route, before becoming a Buffer state between the Russian Empire and the British colony of the Indies.
First invasions
The first invaders were Persia Darius I to the VI E front century J. - C., the Greek Alexandre the Large one in 328 av. J. - C., the Scythians, Parthes and Kouchans Buddhists to the II E and I er front centuries J. - C. and finally Huns Hephthalites, or Huns Blancs, with the O C and VI E centuries apr. J. - C.
The Arabs introduce the Islamic religion to the VII E century, and the Turks, under the reign of the sultan Mahmoud de Ghazni, temporarily make of Islamic Afghanistan the center of hegemony and civilization at the beginning of the XI E century.
The Mongols of Gengis Khan invade Afghanistan at the beginning of the XIII E century, and Timour Lang (or Tamerlan) the appendix at the end of the XIV E century. At the beginning of the XVI E century, Baber (or Aldine Zahir Mohammad) establishes an empire in India starting from its bases of Kabul.
In 1747, Pachtous, under the reign of Ahmad Khan, found the first independent Afghan dynasty. Dost Mohammad (emir de Kaboul of 1834 to 1863) establishes one second of it. However, it is rear-Rahman Abd Khan (1880-1901) which succeeds in the first exerting a true control on the totality of the country. Haunted by the possibility of a Russian offensive in India, the British twice occupied the country to the XIX E century. In 1842, the British army was decimated by a popular revolt and withdrew country in 1878.
Independence
Aman Allah Khan, who reigns of 1919 to 1929, declares the independence of the country in 1919 and puts an end to the British interference in the Afghan business. The English recognize Afghan independence at the time of the treaty of Kabul in 1921. Taking as a starting point Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the new king sets up all a series of ambitious modernization programs policy and social, but the opposition of the tribes forces it to abdicate in 1929.
The country knows disorders and bloody convulsions. Mohammed Zaher Chah reigns on Afghanistan of 1933 to 1973. In 1964, he encourages the creation of a constitutional monarchy. This attempt at democratization failing, the cousin of the king, Mohammad Daoud Khan, seizes the power in 1973, reverses monarchy and becomes president of the Republic until 1978. But the country is prisoner of a feudal structure, increasingly disputed by young officers often trained in Moscow. Daoud Khan is reversed in April 1978.
The Soviet intervention
The PDPA (Democratic party of the Afghan people), of communist inspiration, arrives at the power with, at its head, Nur Mohammad Taraki. Its reforms of teaching, agriculture and the family are rejected by the population. The mode is threatened of a general revolt.
To support it, the USSR intervenes militarily in December 1979 and place in charge of the government Babrak Karmal. The Soviet interference pokes a resistance movement in all the country. After about ten years of war, the mujaheddin (Islamic warriors) control most campaigns. In 1986, Mohammed Najibullah succeeds Karmal.
In November 1987, a new Constitution is voted to support a policy of “reconciliation”, but no political leader or soldier of Resistance joined the mode. The signed agreements on on April 15th, 1988 in Geneva between the government of Kabul, Pakistan, the USSR and the United States had fixed the withdrawal calendar of the Soviet forces, which was completed on on February 15th, 1989.
Continuation of the civil war
After the Soviet withdrawal, the mujaheddin, politically divided, did not manage to conquer the cities. After three years a military dead end, the commander Ahmed Chah Massoud seizes in March 1992 the provinces of the North then of Kabul (April 28th).
The dismissal of Nadjibollah is followed by the introduction of a temporary Islamic government, chaired by Sibghatollah Mojaddedi. The lords of the war shared the territory according to ethnic criteria, however that main characters, president Burhanuddin Rabbani and the commander Ahmed Chah Massoud, in charge of the units tadjikes, on a side, and the pachtou chief, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, other, fought for the control of the capital.
In four years, the engagements opposing the troops of the commander Massoud to the integrist Moslems, supported by Pakistan, cost the life several thousands of Afghans and caused the exodus of more than two hundred and thousand civilians. On the diplomatic level, the country is the subject of sanctions on the part of the Safety advice of UNO, since he refused to extradite the islamist one, Usama Bin Laden, suspected by the United Nations, to be in the beginning many terrorist acts abroad.
The American intervention after September 11th
This chapter must be added.