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Thank you for this valuable information. I don't rebut your statement, but I'm interested in a finer detail not stated.

The USSR obviously deployed troops around the world. Is there information as to the number of troops? Considering the size of both USSR and the USA, I would be interested in comparing populations to the number of deployed troops.

When Soviet forces did go beyond their satellite states, what was the normal troop strength? I consider submariners in a different class of strategy (nuclear deterrence) from a unit more comparable to what Americans had and still has: Marine Expeditionary Unit, and Carrier Task Force.

I know that there were countless skirmishes between the Chinese and Soviet borders. But, when comparing the distance and size of America's level of commitment to Korea and/or Vietnam, how did the Soviets fair (exclude Cuba since Soviet involvement happened after Castro did most of the work). Were there MEU sized troops deployed to those "local wars" mentioned?

That a Russian site calls these "Forgotten" must imply that whatever Soviet involvement was invested in those foreign wars, the Soviet troops that suffered were largely abandoned. Since many nations have operated like this, this might be the reason why they accuse us, the U.S., of abandoning our own troops. Considering some the Vietnam Vets I've worked with, our nation shares a little of this blame (but probably not as much as other "empire builders").

The last detail I wonder about is the secrecy of troops deployments. How many operations are kept so much in the dark as to avoid a security breech, that exposing the operations gives evidence against the Soviet regimes true nature? Compare this to US Marines protecting American investments in foreign lands (like "Chesty" Puller fighting the Banana Wars), protecting investments from being "nationalized" by illegitimate powers with no democratically derived authority.

I don't consider America's diplomacy a record of perfection. Far from it, I wonder about America's actions comparable to competing factions around the world. All politics being put aside, the value of a young soldier's life, especially a patriot filled with such a willing spirit, is a precious value indeed and should never be ill-spent.

I don't know, I only translated it. The site shows the wars and dates as extracted from a Russian law declaring participants in the above actions as 'official war veterans', and I thought it was interesting.

It caught my eye because when I was in Omsk awhile ago, there was a little park across the street from my apartment on Vatutina street, alongside a community center called 'Dvorets Molodezhi' (Palace of Youth). It had a nice little grove of birch trees and a monument like a low wall enscribed in gold "Here are the remains of an unidentified soldier, together with the soil from his grave in Afghanistan."

At that monument there always seemed to be fresh flowers, even in the winter. Behind the wall, on a raised platform was a circular structure like a gazebo, open at the top, with a lot of plaques bearing places and dates which I wrote down:

Algiers, 1962-1964
Egypt, 1962-3, 1967-75
Syria, 1967-70, 1972-73
Yemen, 1962-63, 1967-1969
Syria/Lebanon, 1982
Laos, 1960-3, 1964-68, 1969-70
Vietnam, 1961-1974
Cambodia, 1970
China, 1924-27, 1937-44, 1945, 1946-1949, 1950
Ozero Khasan, 1938
Khalan Gol, 1939
Japan, 1945
North Korea, 1950-53
Ozero Damanskiy and Ozero Zhalansh Kol, 1969
Finland, 1939-40
Hungary, 1956
Czechslovakia, 1968
Yugoslavia, 1993-95
Cuba, 1962
Mozambique, 1967-69, 1970-75
Bangladesh, 1972-73
Angola, 1975-1979
Ethiopia, 1977-1979
Afghanistan, 1979-1989

The website roughtly corresponds to the monument I found in Omsk, FWIW. I always wondered how many lost and fallen soldiers those dates and places represent.

I don't have a picture of it, but here's one from Kyiv's Afghanistan monument that captures the mood.