Rug makers in Afghanistan began to incorporate overt images of war into their work following the invasion of Afghanistan by the then Soviet Union in 1979. Subsequent conflicts have also been represented in rugs. The range of imagery created by these usually unnamed weavers, initially women and children but later also men, is vast. There remains a degree of uncertainty around the intended buyers for the first war, or anti-war, rugs produced in Afghanistan, but they soon made their way into markets in Pakistan where they appealed to international diplomats, aid workers and travellers. Some of these rugs were made in Afghanistan while others were created by Afghan refugees in Pakistan. By the late 1980s they had become popular with international art dealers and auction houses. Among the first Australian collectors of war rugs was James Mollison, founding director of the National Gallery of Australia.

Derived from interpretation of the largely indecipherable text on this rug, the late artist and art theorist Nigel Lendon (1944–2021) surmised that the imagery relates to the story of a man named Jahan Bahksh who was killed in war. He appears in the upper register while the lower section shows another person on horseback in battle with a kneeling figure. All around are symbols of war – machine guns, aeroplanes, helicopters – and figures who have suffered in battle.