Newbie guide to Soviet-Afghan war reenactment

This is a short guide for anyone who wants to get into Soviet-Afghan war reenactment. This first part will be about the Soviet Army reenactment, and the part about the Mujahideen will be added later.

The point of this guide is to prevent a newcomer from experiencing following:

• overspending on useless stuff

• get in conflicts online because of appearance

• getting embarrassed at the events

Chances are, some of these things will still happen. But you will be better prepared for them!

If you are really serious into getting into the Soviet-Afghan reenactment, we offer you to check out our book on the subject:

Uniforms and history of the Soviet Airborne in Afghanistan

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How to begin

First of all, for reenactment purposes, your rank should depend on your age. Please read our article on the typical ages of Soviet soldiers and officers in the Soviet Army.

After that, it all depends on the events in your area - if they actually exist. I was lucky to live in a place where events were frequent, hence this guide will be based on such experience. And if you are all alone in your area and just starting the community there - you make the rules.

The very basic you need to feed yourself from the common pot

The most important part of the reenactment is to get your calories - you need proper gear for that. Nothing is as sad as seining well-dressed reenactors eating crisps or even authentic food from disposable plastic plates. Luckily, these items in the photo above are neither rare nor expensive. These are a mess tin with an aluminum spoon and a mug. This pretty much summarized all the cutlery Soviet soldiers would typically experience during his military service (though he would usually eat of an aluminum plate instead of the mess tin, when in barracks).

Second most important part of the reenactment is getting some sleep. But sleeping gear for the Soviet-Afghan war is quite tricky and will be discussed in a separate article. For beginners it is strongly advised to start with summer events where you can just sleep in the field like my friend here.

Sleeping on the event with no gear

Basic items for Soviet-Afghan war reenactment

To attend any decent event you need to have uniform to at least pose in a base camp. I will give the example of the airborne uniform as this is what I have photos for. However, it is the same for other branches of service, except the color of shoulder boards and the pins.

Soviet airborne uniform and underwear

On this photo you can see pretty much everything that was issued to a conscript on day one. These were personal belongings, which were given to a soldier for his personal use, unlike almost any other clothing and equipment which was assigned to the military unit.

Here is the list:

• underpants (blue)

• striped undershirt (white for other branches)

• boots (jackboots for winter or temperate regions)

• uniform (open collar M69 for tropical regions)

• belt with shiny buckle

• canvas trousers belt

• panama hat

• blue insignia

Now, getting all this stuff, especially originals and especially in right sizes can be a challenge. Boots and uniform are notably hard to get nowadays. So here is the quick advice on everything. Get original belts, insignia and preferably the panama hat, they are still around. Looks for a modern made underwear, there is usually someone producing them in post-soviet countries. Any full leather, not too tall short boots will do fine at first.

The uniform can easily be the most challenging here, but there are two main loopholes. First one is to get a regular, temperate weather M69 uniform. It comes with breeches so you really have to wear it with the jackboots - it was almost never worn with laced boots. Alternatively you may look for some Soviet workwear trousers of the similar material and make them into tropical M69 trousers, but that's another challenge and there will be a separate article about it.

Second option is to get M88 Afghanka uniform. Sure it is not as classy and certainly doesn't work for early war impressions. But it is still available at reasonable price and in good sizes. Make sure you get one set anyway, they are not produced anymore. Give it another 5-10 years and they will be as rare as it gets.

After you get all this and finally put it on, you will look like this:

Soviet Airborne recruit reenactment

Your first Soviet personal weapon

Now, for the best part!

Just like you would be advised to start WW2 reenactment with a standard bolt-rifle of your fraction, you are advised to start Soviet-Afghan War reenactment with AK(s)-74. Of course, no one can stop you from buying a BTR and install AGS-17 on top of it - pretty sure any team will accept you. Yet, you will still need a personal weapon!

AKS-74 and accessories

Here you can see a full set of equipment issued with an AKS-74. Well, the set is not full - we are missing an oil bottle and a cleaning kit. My bad.

But anyhow, the personal weapon of choice for Soviet-Afghan war reenactment is a regular AKS-74. Or AK-74, if you are reenacting non-airborne unit. There are exceptions, of course, and you can read about the if you go through the list of weapons or check out our book on Soviet Weapons of the Afghan War:

Soviet Weapons of the Afghan War

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Bayonet was issued along with the rifle. AKS-74 was supplied with 6X4 bayonet, which was worn on the belt, on the left hand side of the buckle. Every rifle would also be supplied with 4-cell magazine pouch and 4 magazines. Magazines were usually orange bakelite, but from 1983, the production of the plum magazines has started and they were supplied alongside each other. The ammo clips were not really used, thought in theory you would have 4 of them (with 15 rounds in each) in your pouch.

Now, depending on your country of residence, you would usually have a choice of getting a blank firing, deactivated or airsoft weapons. Or none of the above, if you are unlucky. Anyway, the point is - try to stick to 5.45mm caliber for Soviet-Afghan war reenactment. Even though AKM and AKMS were both used, they are not the best choice. You can ready about both in this blog.

At the end of the day, with your weapon, you will look something like this:

Soviet Infantry reenactor

Main equipment

The basic equipment is what a conscript would get for training at base camp or in mainland (non in Afghan) army. For a paratrooper it was pretty simple - backpack with attached pouches, water flask and entrenching tool. There is plenty of stuff which is supposed to go into the backpack, but it was never packed by manual in Afghan so it won't be covered here.

The pouches, flask and spade are all pretty straightforward and still easy to get to this day.

RD-54

And that's about it. At least for the begginer. There is, of course, more equipment you will eventually need for Soviet-Afghan war reenactment. But you will find out about it along the way, as you progress in collecting and reenacting. And by the way, here is how you are going to look like if you get all the clothing and equipment described in this article. Minus the cool night vision googles of course. This photo is from the book, by the way.

Soviet VDV reenactor

Uniform and equipment of the Afghan Army

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