As with many contemporary issues of its foreign and security policy, history influences Moscow’s attitudes towards Afghanistan. Since the 19th century, Afghanistan has been an object of competition between Russia and other global powers. A particularly interesting example is the mission of Maj. Gen. N.G. Stoletov of Russia’s general staff to Kabul in 1878, during the era of the “Great Game” between the Russian and British empires. The two empires and the other great powers of Europe were meeting at the time at the Berlin Congress, which followed the Russian-Turkish War of 1877 to 1878, and Stoletov’s visitto the Afghan capital was a means of exerting pressure on Britain half a world away at the Congress.
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