Excellent article on Afghanistan

[Anthony_Scott]

The main differance between the Red Army of 1979 and it's Western counterpart was the quality of it's training and the focus of the doctrine. The Red Army was never designed for COIN, it was a heavy army designed to bash through NATO defenses. It also had no NCO corps in the definition that we understand it, the lower officers were tasked with what should have been an NCO's job.