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The Combat Studies Institute (CSI) is pleased to present its latest publication in the Occasional Paper Series, We Have Not Learned How to Wage War There The Soviet Approach in Afghanistan,1979-1989, by Mr. Matt Matthews. For this work, Mr. Matthews collected a wide variety of sources on the subject, many of them of primary accounts, and used these materials to provide an overview of the evolution of the Soviet operational approach in Afghanistan between 1979 and 1989. This Soviet experience offers a number of useful insights for American military professionals who are, as of this writing, conducting operations in Afghanistan. Mr. Matthews begins his study by examining the Soviets' planning for its invasion of Afghanistan and initial goals for that campaign. The author then looks closely at how the Soviets adapted their tactics and organization to meet the committed and resilient insurgent threat that emerged to do battle against Soviet forces. Despite conventional interpretations of this campaign in Afghanistan which emphasize the rigidity of Soviet methods, Matthews' study suggests that the Soviets were flexible in their overall approach. The Soviet government did, for example, launch nation-building initiatives that would look familiar to American military officers who served in Afghanistan in the first decade of the 21st century. These efforts, however, were seriously hindered by a Soviet military culture that opposed a more comprehensive campaign to foster a popular central Afghan government. Matthews concludes his study by examining Soviet operations to extract their forces from Afghanistan while nonetheless leaving a viable, if not popular, Afghan government in place.

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Matt M. Matthews joined the Combat Studies Institute (CSI) in July 2005. For 16 years he was a member of the World Class Opposing Forces (OPFOR) of the Battle Command Training Program (BCPT) at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. Enlisting in the Army at age 17, he served in the light infantry from 1977 to 1981. Mr. Matthews also served as a Cavalry officer in the US Army Reserve from 1983 to 1986, and as an Armor Officer in the Kansas Army National Guard from 1986 to 1991. He graduated from Kansas State University in 1986 with a BS in History and continued his graduate studies there. Mr. Matthews is the author of several CSI Press publications including The Posse Comitatus Act and the United States Army: A Historical Perspective, Operation AL FAJR: A Study in Army and Marine Corps Joint Operations, The US Army on the Mexican Border: A Historical Perspective, and We Were Caught Unprepared: The 2006 Hezbollah-Israeli War. He also contributed the chapter titled Hard Lessons Learned A Comparison of the 2006 Hezbollah-Israeli War and Operation CAST LEAD: A Historical Overview in the CSI publication Back To Basics: A Study of the Second Lebanon War and Operation CAST LEAD. Mr. Matthews has coauthored numerous scholarly articles on the Civil War in the Trans-Mississippi with Kip Lindberg, including Shot All to Pieces: The Battle of Lone Jack, To Play a Bold Game: The Battle of Honey Springs, Better Off in Hell: The Evolution of the Kansas Red Legs as well as, It Haunts Me Night and Day: The Baxter Springs Massacre. Mr. Matthews is a frequent speaker at Civil War Roundtables, and recently appeared on the History Channel as a historian for Bill Kurtis' Investigating History. Mr. Matthews is a former mayor of Ottawa, Kansas. He is currently writing a biography of Kansas Civil War general James G. Blunt and a book on the Kansas Red Legs.

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