During the war, the Azeri armed forces were also aided by Turkish military advisers, and Russian, Ukrainian, Chechen and Afghan mercenaries.

While Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, an Islamist extremist enjoying the backing of neighboring Pakistan, pushed for continued violent struggle against the Afghan government, Massoud and Rabbani advocated for a peaceful political campaign lobbying officials working for the government and armed forces.

From the start of the war, Massoud's mujahideen proved to be a thorn in the side for the occupying Soviet forces by ambushing Soviet and Afghan communist convoys travelling through the Salang Pass, resulting in fuel shortages in Kabul .< ref name =" Iyer ">

British and Afghan National Army | allied forces at Kandahar after the 1880 Battle of Kandahar.

After battling Afghan forces in the spring of 1885, the Russians seized the oasis.

Afghan forces achieved success in the initial days of the war, taking the British and Indians by surprise in two main thrusts as the Afghan regular army was joined by large numbers of Pashtun tribesmen from both sides of the border.

" Around four days later, an army of well-trained Georgian troops arrived to the town after hearing of Gurgīn's death but Mirwais and his Afghan forces successfully held off the town.

From 1710 to 1713, the Afghan forces defeated several large and powerful Persian armies that were dispatched from Isfahan ( capital of the Safavids ), which included Qizilbash and Georgian troops.

In 1837, the Afghan army descended through the Khyber Pass on Sikh forces at Jamrud.

Most of the government's new policies clashed directly with the traditional Afghan understanding of Islam, making religion one of the only forces capable of unifying the tribally and ethnically divided population against the unpopular new government, and ushering in the advent of Islamist participation in Afghan politics.

" In February 1979, U. S. Ambassador Adolph " Spike " Dubs was murdered in Kabul after Afghan security forces burst in on his kidnappers.

Of roughly 45, 000 Pakistani, Taliban and Al Qaeda soldiers fighting against the forces of Massoud only 14, 000 were Afghan.

NATO is training the Afghan armed forces as well its national police.

On October 16, 2011, " Operation Knife Edge " was launched by NATO and Afghan forces against the Haqqani network in south-eastern Afghanistan.

After Sher Shah's death, his son Islam Shah Suri and the Hindu king Samrat Hem Chandra Vikramaditya, who had won 22 battles against Afghan rebels and forces of Akbar, from Punjab to Bengal and had established a secular Hindu rule in North India from Delhi till 1556.

It was said that this was in preparation for a tour of duty in Afghanistan, where Canadian and British forces were participating in the NATO led Afghan War ; rumours that were confirmed in February the following year, when the British Ministry of Defence revealed that Harry had secretly been deployed as a Forward Air Controller to Helmand Province in the Asian country.

However, the conflict was stopped with the intervention of International Security Assistance Force forces and soldiers of the Afghan National Army, freezing the conflict in its tracks.

Ismail Khan's forces even fought skirmishes with the Afghan National Army, in which his son, Mirwais Sadiq was killed.

* 1880 – Second Anglo-Afghan War: Battle of Maiwand – Afghan forces led by Mohammad Ayub Khan defeat the British Army in battle near Maiwand, Afghanistan.

The city was invaded by Ranjit Singh and his Sikh army in the early 19th century but was quickly chased out a few days later by Afghan forces of Durrani Empire.

During Operation Enduring Freedom after the September 11 attacks in the United States, the city was invaded and fell to US-backed Afghan forces.

Aged 20, he decided to travel to Afghanistan to fight for the Afghan Taliban government forces against Northern Alliance fighters.

The main reason though that the Afghan soldiers were so ineffective was their lack of morale as many of them were not truly loyal to the communist government but simply collecting a paycheck.

Operation Eagle Fury was a military operation led by the United States in Afghanistan involving Bravo Company, 2nd BN, 7th SFG ( A ) US Army Special Forces, and USN SEALs, members of the QRF 82nd Airborne Division, and loyal Afghan fighters from 9-28 February 2003.

Other places of interest include Kabul City Center, which is Kabul's first shopping mall, the shops around Flower Street and Chicken Street, Wazir Akbar Khan district, Kabul Golf Club, Kabul Zoo, Abdul Rahman Mosque, Shah-Do Shamshira and other famous mosques, the National Gallery of Afghanistan, the National Archives of Afghanistan, Afghan Royal Family Mausoleum, the OMAR Mine Museum, Bibi Mahro Hill, Kabul Cemetery, and Paghman Gardens.

* December 23 – First Anglo-Afghan War: At a meeting with the Afghan general Akbar Khan, the British diplomat Sir William Hay Macnaghten is shot dead at close quarters.

* January 6 – 13 – First Anglo-Afghan War: Massacre of Elphinstone's army ( Battle of Gandamak ): British East India Company troops destroyed by Afghan forces on the road from Kabul to Jalalabad, Afghanistan, by Akbar Khan, son of Dost Mohammed Khan.

The Afghan constitution that came into force on January 4, 2004, required that Allahu Akbar be inscribed on Afghanistan's national flag.

Macnaghten tried to save the situation by negotiating with the Afghan chiefs and, independently of them, with Dost Mohammad's son, Akbar Khan, by whom he was captured and, on 23 December 1841, assassinated by Khan placing a pistol in Macnaghten's mouth.

Akbar succeeded his father, Humayun whose rule was interrupted by the Afghan Sur Dynasty, which rebelled against him.

Between April and October 1841, disaffected Afghan tribes were flocking to support Dost Mohammad's son, Akbar Khan, in Bamiyan and other areas north of the Hindu Kush mountains, organised into an effective resistance by chiefs such as Mir Masjidi Khan and others.

Raja Todar Mal was also a warrior who assisted Akbar in controlling the Afghan rebels in Bengal.

In April of the following year the garrison, under the command of Sir Robert Sale of the 13th broke the siege and defeated the Afghan forces under Akbar Khan.

He fought Afghan rebels across North India from the Punjab to Bengal and the Mughal forces of Akbar and Humayun in Agra and Delhi, winning 22 consecutive battles.

Amir Akbar Khan ( 1816 – 1845 ; ), born as Mohammad Akbar Khan () and famously known as Wazir Akbar Khan, was an Afghan prince, general, and emir for about three years until his death.

The heads of the Afghan leaders killed were thrown into a boat and brought to Akbar who forwarded them to Daud as a hint of the fate which awaited and in due course befell him.

Mughal emperor Akbar came to Patna in 1574 to crush the Afghan Chief Daud Khan.

* Volume V: End of the Afghan Dynasty and the First Thirty-Eight Years of the Reign of Akbar

In 1973, Mohammed Daoud Khan was brought to power in a coup d ' état against the Afghan King and the Republic of Afghanistan was established.

Abdur Rahman Khan was considered a strong ruler who re-established the writ of the Afghan government after the disarray that followed the second Anglo-Afghan war.

After the May 2011 death of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan, many prominent Afghan figures began being assassinated, including Mohammed Daud Daud, Ahmad Wali Karzai, Jan Mohammad Khan, Ghulam Haider Hamidi, Burhanuddin Rabbani and others.

In early 1979 Ismail Khan was a Captain in the Afghan National Army based in the western city of Herat.

However, during his tenure as Governor, Ismail Khan was accused of ruling his province like a private fiefdom, leading to increasing tensions with the Afghan Transitional Administration.

Ismail Khan was ultimately removed from power in March 2004 due to pressure by neighbouring warlords and the central Afghan government.

Because Ismail Khan was contained by the Afghan National Army, the warlords who opposed him were quickly able to occupy strategic locations unopposed.

Ismail Khan, like Afghan Minister of Defense Rahim Wardak, was one of the high profile Afghans that those conducting the Tribunals ruled were " not reasonably available " to give a statement on a captive's behalf because they could not be located.

* 1909 – Mohammed Daoud Khan, Afghan politician, 1st President of Afghanistan ( d. 1978 )

After King Zahir Shah's exile in 1973, President Daoud Khan made attempts to create a strong Afghan military in the Greater Middle East-South Asia region.

In the late 1870s, Afghan Emir Sher Ali Khan escaped from Kabul to take refuge in Mazar-e Sharif, which was un-affected by the Anglo-Afghan wars of the 19th century between Afghanistan and then British India.

He was the son of Mohammed Nadir Shah, a senior member of the Barakzai royal family and commander in chief of the Afghan army under former king Amanullah Khan.

* 1934 – Ahmad Shah Khan, Afghan prince

** Khushal Khan Khattak, Afghan poet ( d. 1690 )

During the Soviet-Afghan War, the accommodation of Afghan refugees into Pakistan was controlled in Pakistan's largest province, Balochistan, under General Rahimuddin Khan, by making the refugees stay for controlled durations in barbed wire camps ( see Controlling Soviet-Afghan War Refugees ).

The Afghan pride of Sher Ali was however inflamed and he informed his father and brothers of the insulting desire of Nasrullah Khan.

During World War I, the Afghan government was contacted by the Ottoman Turkey and Germany, through the Niedermayer-Hentig Mission, to join the Central Allies on behalf of the Caliph in a Jihad ; some revolutionaries and Afghan leaders including a brother of the Amir named Nasrullah Khan were in favour of the delegation and wanted the Amir to declare Jihad.

However the efforts failed and the Afghan Amir Habibullah Khan maintained Afghanistan's neutrality throughout World War I ( for more information see ).