A Lesson from the Soviet War in Afghanistan
I stumbled across Artyom Borovik’s The Hidden War in a Santa Monica used bookstore on Thursday. Not knowing much about the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, I quickly placed in my stack of must haves. Though I’ve only gotten through the introduction, Hidden War looks to be an excellent read.
Borovik was one of the Soviet Union’s best investigative journalists. Thanks to perestroika he was able to practice his craft to the fullest. In post-Soviet Russia he was an outspoken critic of the Chechen War and ultimately of Putin. He was killed in a plane crash in 2000 while accompanying oil executive Ziya Bazayev. The Guardian wrote of the crash:
‘I don’t think oil magnates use unreliable aircraft,” said Vsevolod Bogdanov, head of the Russian journalists’ union.
