In the 1980 s and early 1990 s,Afghanistan was a Proxy battleground for the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union.america and the Soviet Union brought two other neighbours into that Cold War fight:Pakistan and India.India stood by the Soviet Union as it quietly did in many other areas.Pakistan and its intelligence service became the middleman between the United States and the mujahedeen(later to form the Taliban).
The Soviet Union intervened in Afghanistan on december 24,1979.After deployment into Afghanistan, Soviet forces along with the governemnt forces would begin to engage in a protracted counter-insurgency war with mujahideen fighters.
The United States sought to remove the Taliban from power as they were hosting al-Qaeda terrorists and camps, who were the main suspects of the September 11 attacks.The United States fought the Taliban from the air and provided support the Northern Alliance ground troops, who successfully drove the Taliban away from the most of the country by December 2001.The invasion also marked the start of the United States War on Terror.