Iran

Mohammed Mossadeq

Muhammad Reza-Shah Pahlavi

Ayatollah Khomeini

1979 Revolution – US Embassy

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

Afghanistan: A Soviet Vietnam

When?

1979-1989

Soviet-Afghan War

Why?

1. The new communist regime in Afghanistan was threatened with overthrow?

2. The Afghan mujahedin (muslim holy warriors) might spread their ideas to other Soviet Muslim republics.

3. Soviets wanted control of the Strait of Hormuz through which passes much of the world’s oil.

Similar to Vietnam

• 120,000 Soviet troops sent

• 15,000 died

• No end in sight

• Morale and drug problems

• Government told people little

• Afghans received arms from US

• Soviets pull out in 1989

Why did communism collapse?

• Doomed from the start? (No incentive for new ideas)

• Mikhail Gorbachev’s reforms– Last Soviet leader– Glasnost: greater freedom of speech– Perestroika: Economic restructuring– Soviet Union collapsed

Boris Yeltsin

• Won Russian election• 1st President of Russia• Brought democracy back to

Russia…for awhile

Vladimir Putin

Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS)