The relationship between the army and politics in Afghanistan

Afghanistan is a country which has been prominently known by the fact that the army is influential over the politics strongly and plays very significant role in shaping the political implementations and decisions severely. From the historical perspective, the political power of the army depends upon the period of period when the Ahmad Shah Abdali has established Afghanistan in 1747. Ahmad Shah Abdali who served as the court guardian under the authority of Nadir Afshar, after his death in June 1747, has been elected as the first king of the Afghanistan by some nobles and governing elites. Since then, the army became directly relevant with the current policy because Ahmad Shah Abdali had military aspect and personality. As a matter of fact, the Afghan army had intervened directly into the politics between 1960 and 1990 and overthrown the royalty system of Mohamed Zahir Shah by means of the bloodless coup under the leadership of Mohamed Davud Han in 1973. As a result of this intervention, that is the first time in Afghan history a kind of modern republican regime had been established. Later on, in 1978, the army overthrown the existing Davud regime by killing him and put the Democratic People Party into the power. In similar way, the armed forces have played very important role in suppressing the civil insurrections and in tackling with the external threats and in empowering the existing political body. In this context, this study has been focused on the factors, motivations and the level/frequency of the military interventions in Afghanistan historically in line with the historical development process of the Afghan army. Keywords: Afghan Army, Military Coup D'état, Politics, Republican Regime, Tribes