Malaysia is a success story. Of course, it took forty two years (1948 - 1990) and Gurkhas on hand to chop Communist heads off but they were eventually put down by the Brits and then the Malaysian government. Afghanistan? I’m not sure anyone has succeeded long term there since Alexander the Great and his men left behind blonde hair and blue eyes in the Afghan gene pool.
That's what they say. But most of the rebels or insurgents or Communists were ethnic Chinese and didn't get support from the ethnic Malays, so defeating them wasn't as difficult as winning in Vietnam would have been.