On 24 December 1979, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in order to prop up the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan's communist government against a growing insurgency of Mujahideen. Mujahideen is the plural form of mujahid which is Arabic for one engaged in jihad (struggle). This meant that the Soviets were fighting Islamic-led guerrilla type militant groups! Sadly, the war was a 10-year expensive disaster and in the end, Mikhail Gorbachev had Soviet forces withdraw from Afghanistan and while this war would end in February 1989, there was no peace for Afghanistan which began with a communist coup in 1978 and continues to this day in many forms like the Afghan Civil Wars from 1989 to 2001 only to be followed by the War in Afghanistan which kicked off in 2001 after the September 11 Attacks. The Soviet-Afghan War played a contributing factor in the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.