Afghanistan was on the Soviet border and the Soviets tried hard for ten years to subdue the Afghans. They decimated the Afghan population but in the end they lost. The war did indeed present an existential threat to the Soviet EVIL EMPIRE. It no longer exists. Russia shall meet the same fate because their leader looks back on the EVIL EMPIRE with nostalgic pride, and has refused to learn the lessons of the past.
I think you're still fighting the Cold War, Senator McCarthy. As you correctly stated, the "Soviet EVIL EMPIRE... no longer exists." Afghanistan does indeed border three former SSRs, though they were the distant frontiers of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan and a safe 2,000 miles from Moscow. Donetsk is near the heart of Russia and only 500 miles south of Moscow -- about the same distance as from Atlanta to Washington, DC. Why is NATO meddling there?