Soviet Troops Withdrawal from Afghanistan

December 08, 2011 0:00 AM

A Soviet soldier puts his arm on the tubes of a MI 24 helicopter's machine gun, at the Soviet military airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, 8 February 1989. Some Soviet troops still remain at Kabul Airport, their mission, apparently, to guard it until the Sovie

The last Soviet to leave Afghanistan, Lieutenant General Boris Gromov, left, with his son Maxin, at the bridge over the Amy Darya River, at Termez, Uzbekistan on February 15, 1989 . The Soviet Commander had crossed from the Afghan town of Khairaton. (AP P

A smile and a wave from a happy Soviet soldier, as his armored convoy makes its way back to the Soviet Union along a north Afghanistan highway in this Sunday, Feb. 7, 1989, file photo. The Soviet Union lost some 15,000 soldiers in the war, which began in

Afghanistan civilians bid farewell to departing Soviet troops in Shindand, Afghanistan October 17, 1986.

Soviet combat vehicles seen crossing Soviet-Afghan border as Soviet troops return home from Afghanistan. (AP Photo)

Larisa Ladutko, 68, grieves at the grave of her son Alexander, a Soviet Army Airborne forces soldier killed in 1984 during the fighting in Afghanistan, at Chizhovskoye cemetery outside Minsk, Belarus, on Sunday, Feb. 15, 2009. (AP Photo)

Two Soviet Army soldiers struggle to carry a heavy box full of ammunition past a Soviet military poster at a base in Kabul, Afghanistan, in Jan. 29, 1989. Preparations were underway at the base for the Soviet withdrawal from the region. (AP Photo)

Airborne forces veterans drink vodka in memory of their fellows near the graves of Soviet Army soldiers killed during the fighting in Afghanistan at Chizhovskoye cemetery outside Minsk, Belarus, on Sunday, Feb. 15, 2009. The annual tradition marks anniver

A destroyed tank left by the Soviet army, who occupied Afghanistan for a decade, is seen near the place where the Afghan National Army fire artillery during a military exercise in Kabul, Afghanistan. (AP Photo)