Political Games: The 1980 Moscow Olympics

The opening ceremony in Moscow’s Lenin Stadium on July 24, 1980. A few months before the games opened, the Soviet Union had invaded Afghanistan.

Young Soviet troops demining a road in Afghanistan.
The U.S.S.R.’s military invasion of Afghanistan was launched in a bid to prop up an embattled communist regime in Kabul. 

U.S. President Jimmy Carter addresses athletes scheduled to compete in the Moscow Olympics on March 21, 1980. Carter asked them to support a proposed boycott of the competition as retaliation for the Soviet invasion.

Rehearsals under way in Moscow for the opening ceremony. Some 65 countries, including most of the world’s predominantly Muslim states, boycotted, while 80 countries sent athletes to compete. Twenty-five U.S. athletes sued their government over the boycott but lost their case.
 

Servicemen working on construction of the Olympic facilities in May 1980. The boycott was a huge blow to the Kremlin, which was already grappling with deep financial strife and had spent some $1.35 billion to stage the prestigious event.

The Moscow Olympics’ mascot was Misha the bear, pictured here with his creator, children’s book illustrator Victor Chizhikov.
 

A woman running with the Olympic torch ahead of the opening of the games.
 
 
 
 

A bear applauds the opening of the Olympic swimming pool in Moscow.
 
 
 

Olympic minibuses in Riga, Latvia. The 1980 games held events in various Soviet cities besides Moscow, including Minsk, Tallinn, and Kyiv.
 

Romania’s Nadia Comaneci flipping toward another in her string of perfect 10s, this time on the balance beam. Her first perfect 10s were awarded at the Olympics in Montreal in 1976. She was the first gymnast ever to receive a perfect score.

Armed guards patrol the Olympic Village. The 1980 games came eight years after Palestinian terrorists targeted the Munich Olympics, killing 11 Israeli athletes and coaches.
 

French weightlifter Nicolas Lasorsa grimaces through a 125-kilogram snatch.
 
 

An unidentified Soviet volleyball coach is tossed into the air after his team beat Bulgaria to win gold.
 

New Yorkers Maxim and Frida Sira in front of St. Basil’s Cathedral in central Moscow. The pair had traveled to the Soviet Union for the games.
 
 

Istvan Grozner of Hungary and his horse Biloros stumble during the equestrian event.
 
 

A mysterious fire that broke out on Red Square during the games on August 2.

“Witnesses said they saw a human body in the midst of the flames, which police quickly carried away,” AP reported.  A Washington Post reporter who witnessed the incident wrote that shortly afterward “a naive Japanese tourist innocently clicked a few long-distance shots of [Lenin’s] tomb. Immediately, three goons in white uniform jackets leaped toward him and intimidated him into surrendering the camera. They ripped it open, grabbed the film, and tore it to shreds.”
 

East Germany’s Jurgen Straub (right) and Sebastian Coe of Britain after Coe won gold in the 1,500 meters.
 
 

Weightlifters (left to right) Valentin Khristov from Bulgaria, Leonid Taranenko of the Soviet Union, and Hungary's Gyorgy Szalai on the medal podium.
 

Fireworks burst above Moscow’s Lenin Stadium during the 1980 Summer Olympics’ closing ceremony on August 3.
 

A giant image of Misha, made up of “human pixels,” sheds a tear during the closing ceremony.
 
Four years after the boycott-affected Moscow games, the Soviet Union and several other communist nations boycotted the 1984 Summer Olympics, held in Los Angeles.