Two snippets taken from one newspaper – spot the difference:

KABUL, Afghanistan — […] Three men wearing camouflage fatigues that are frequently worn by Afghan soldiers stormed a police station near the presidential palace, with one of them detonating an explosives vest just outside the gates as two others rushed inside and began firing, an Interior Ministry statement said.

The crackle of gunfire echoed through the usually bustling streets for about two hours before security forces killed the two remaining attackers. Insurgents killed three police officers, one intelligence agent and five civilians in the attack, according to the ministry statement.

—

New Delhi (AP) – Moslem rebels killed five Kabul policemen and wounded 11 others during a two hour battle this week after the rebels slipped into the Soviet-guarded city, a reliable Afghan source reported yesterday.

One rebel was killed during the Tuesday night engagement in the Wazirabad district of Kabul and the others escaped, leaving the body behind, the source said.

The only real difference here are 31 years in which little changed. The second quote is from the Palm Beach Post, June 14 1980: Rebels Kill Five Policemen in Kabul. The first quote is also from the Palm Beach Post. But it is the June 19 2011 edition: Afghan leader confirms peace talks; Kabul attacked.

After the sure to come retreat of "western" troops from Afghanistan someone will write a book about all the parallels of the Soviet war and the U.S. war there. The opening sentence of that book could itself be a historic repeat. It might reuse the opening sentences from Marx' Eighteenth Brumaire:

Hegel remarks somewhere that all great world-historic facts and personages appear, so to speak, twice. He forgot to add: the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce.