Soviet–Afghan War
The USSR fights the mujahideen for nearly a decade
In December 1979 Soviet troops entered Afghanistan to support its pro-Soviet government and fought the mujahideen. The withdrawal was completed in February 1989; Soviet losses were about 15,000 killed.
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Meanwhile around the world (±25 years)
Whole world
- 1980 Smallpox declared eradicated — 1 year later
Europe
- 1968 May 1968 in France — 11 years earlier
- 1989 Invention of the World Wide Web — 10 years later
- 1989 Fall of the Berlin Wall — 10 years later
- 1990 German reunification — 11 years later
- 1991–2001 Yugoslav Wars — 12 years later
Middle East
- 1979 Iranian Revolution — same year
- 1980–1988 Iran–Iraq War — 1 year later
- 1990–1991 Gulf War — 11 years later
Africa
- 1967 First human heart transplant — 12 years earlier
- 1967–1970 Nigerian Civil War and Biafra — 12 years earlier
- 1974 Lucy is discovered — 5 years earlier
- 1983–1985 The Ethiopian famine — 4 years later
- 1994 End of apartheid in South Africa — 15 years later
Asia
- 1975–1979 The Khmer Rouge and the Cambodian genocide — 4 years earlier
- 1976 Tangshan earthquake — 3 years earlier
- 1978 Deng Xiaoping's reform and opening-up — 1 year earlier
- 1984 Bhopal disaster — 5 years later
- 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami — 25 years later
Americas
- 1969 Moon landing — 10 years earlier
- c. 1970 Mass deforestation of the Amazon begins — 9 years earlier
- 1980 Eruption of Mount St. Helens — 1 year later
- 1983 Birth of the Internet: ARPANET adopts TCP/IP — 4 years later
- 2001 September 11 attacks — 22 years later
Oceania
- 1954 The Castle Bravo test at Bikini — 25 years earlier
- 1959 The Antarctic Treaty — 20 years earlier
- 1992 The Mabo decision — 13 years later
Alive at the time
- Nelson Mandela (aged 61)
- Neil Armstrong (aged 49)
- Jorge Luis Borges (aged 80)
- Hirohito (Emperor Shōwa) (aged 78)
- Leonid Brezhnev (aged 73)
- Mother Teresa (aged 69)
- Ronald Reagan (aged 68)
- Richard Nixon (aged 66)
- Indira Gandhi (aged 62)
- Edmund Hillary (aged 60)