Afgantsy

by Rodric Braithwaite

  Ustinov sidestepped the proposal. Amin, he said, had abandoned his earlier optimism and was now demanding that the Soviet Union should save the regime. But why had it come to that? Most of the soldiers in the Afghan army were devout Muslims and that was why they were deserting to the rebels. Why had the Afghan government not taken sufficient account of the religious factor earlier?

  Andropov added a devastatingly bleak analysis. The main problem was the weakness of the Afghan leadership. They were still busy shooting their opponents and then had the cheek to argue that in Lenin’s day the Soviets had also shot people. They had no idea what forces they could rely on. They had failed to explain their position either to the army or to the people at large. It was perfectly clear that Afghanistan was not ripe for socialism: religion was a tremendous force, the peasants were almost completely illiterate, the economy was backward. Lenin had set out the necessary elements of a revolutionary situation. None were present in Afghanistan. Tanks could not solve what was essentially a political problem. If the revolution in Afghanistan could only be sustained with Soviet bayonets, that was a route down which the Soviet Union should not go.

  Gromyko was beginning to boil over. The lack of seriousness with which the Afghan leaders treated complicated matters was like something out of a detective story. The mood of the Afghan army was still unclear. Suppose the Afghan army came out against the legitimate government and against any forces the Soviet Union might send in? Then, as he delicately put it, ‘the situation would become extremely complex’. Even if the Afghan army remained neutral, the Soviet forces would have to occupy the country. The impact on Soviet foreign policy would be disastrous. Everything the Soviet Union had done in recent years to reduce international tension and promote arms control would be undermined. It would be a splendid present for the Chinese. All the non-aligned countries would come out against the Soviet Union. The hoped-for meeting between Brezhnev and President Carter (1924–) and the forthcoming visit of the French President, Giscard d’Estaing, would be put in question. And all the Soviet Union would get in exchange was Afghanistan, with its inadequate and unpopular government, its backward economy, and its insignificant weight in international affairs.

  Moreover, Gromyko confessed, the legal basis for any Soviet military intervention was shaky. Under the UN Charter, a country could ask for external assistance if it had been the victim of aggression. But there had been no such aggression. What was going on was an internal struggle, a fight within the revolution, of one group of the population against another.

  Andropov weighed in forcefully. If Soviet forces went in, they would find themselves fighting against the people, suppressing the people, firing upon the people. The Soviet Union would look like aggressors. That was unacceptable. Kosygin and Ustinov agreed. Ustinov went on to report that the Soviet military were already doing some prudent contingency planning. Two divisions were being formed in the Turkestan Military District and another in the Central Asian Military District. Three regiments could be sent into Afghanistan at short notice. The 105th Airborne Division and a regiment of motorised infantry could be sent at twenty-four hours’ notice. Ustinov asked for permission to deploy troops to the Afghan frontier and carry out tactical exercises there to underline that Soviet forces were at high readiness. He was, he nevertheless reassured his listeners, as much against the idea of sending troops into Afghanistan as everyone else. Anyway, the Afghans had ten divisions of troops, and that should be quite enough to deal with the rebels.

  As for the Afghans’ demand for Soviet troops, the more the Soviet leaders thought about it, the less they liked it. No one had entirely ruled it out. But when they put the arguments to Brezhnev, he made it clear that he was opposed to intervention, remarking sourly that the Afghan army was falling to bits and that the Afghans expected the Soviets to fight their war for them. You

  And so the final conclusion was that the Soviet Union should send military supplies and some small units to ‘assist the Afghan army to overcome its difficulties’. Five hundred specialists from the Ministry of Defence and the KGB would reinforce the five hundred and fifty who were already in Afghanistan. The Russians would supply 100,000 tons of grain, increase the price paid for Afghan gas, and waive interest payments on existing loans. They would protest to the Pakistani government about its interference in Afghanistan’s internal affairs. Two divisions should go down to the border. But no Soviet troops should be sent to Afghanistan itself.17

  The next day Kosygin rang Taraki to tell him of the Politburo’s conclusions. By now the initial complacency of the Afghan leaders had given way to panic. Five thousand men of the Herat garrison, said Taraki, had gone over to the rebels with their weapons, ammunition, and supplies. The government forces now numbered only five hundred men, who were defending themselves at Herat airfield. If Soviet troops and weapons were not forthcoming, Herat would fall within twenty-four hours, and the rebels would march on Kandahar and on Kabul itself.

  Naively arguing from Marxist first principles, Kosygin suggested that the government should arm the workers, the petty bourgeoisie, and the white-collar workers in Herat. They should emulate the Iranians, who had thrown out the Americans with no outside help. Could the Afghan government not raise, say, fifty thousand students, peasants, and workers in Kabul, and arm them with additional weapons supplied by Moscow?

  Taraki pointed out drily that there were very few workers even in Kabul. The rest were under the influence of Islamic propaganda, which denounced the government as heathen. The Afghan army simply did not have enough trained crews to man more tanks and aircraft, even if the Soviets supplied them. He suggested that the Soviets place Afghan markings on their own tanks and aircraft, man them with Central Asian soldiers who could speak Afghan languages, airlift them to Kabul, and advance from there on Herat. Kosygin said the subterfuge would become known immediately; the Politburo would have to discuss all this. Taraki responded that, while the Politburo talked, Herat would fall.

  Taraki was summoned to Moscow for talks and arrived on Monday 20 March. That morning Afghan government forces recaptured Herat, so the immediate pressure was off. His first meeting was with Kosygin, Ustinov, Gromyko, and Ponomarev, the long-standing head of the International Department of the Central Committee. Kosygin emphasised the deep, continuing, and unconditional nature of the relationship between the Soviet Union and Afghanistan. But the Afghan government should not give the impression that it could only solve its problems by calling in Soviet troops. That would undermine its authority in the eyes of the people, spoil relations between Afghanistan and neighbouring countries, and injure the country’s international prestige. If Soviet soldiers came to Afghanistan, they would find themselves fighting Afghans, and the Afghan people would never forgive them. The Vietnamese had defended their country against the Americans and the Chinese without relying on foreign soldiers; Afghanistan could do the same. The Russians would help by providing military supplies and massive political support against the country’s foreign enemies: Pakistan, Iran, China, and the United States.

  Taraki agreed that politics were key. He claimed—against the evidence—that the mass of the people supported the government and its reforms. But this had incensed the reactionaries in Iran and Pakistan, who had accused the Kabul government of betraying Islam, and had stirred up a campaign of subversion against it.

  What the Afghan army needed urgently, said Taraki, was armoured helicopters, armoured vehicles, communications equipment, and the people to operate and maintain them. Ustinov replied that the Russians would supply twelve helicopters. But they would not supply pilots and crews. Kosygin pointed out that the Vietnamese had managed to operate the equipment they received on their own. Unfortunately, countered Taraki, many of the Soviet-trained officers were politically unreliable: ‘Muslim brothers’ or Chinese sympathisers.

  That, said Kosygin, was something Taraki would have to sort out for himself. He gave Taraki a word of friendly advice: the Afghan government should broaden its political
base. In a coded reference to the massive shootings and torture which had so exercised the Politburo, he added, ‘In Stalin’s time, many of our officers were put in jail. And when the war broke out, Stalin was forced to send them to the front. These people showed themselves to be true heroes. Many of them rose to high rank. We are not interfering in your internal affairs, but we want to express our opinion regarding the necessity of behaving solicitously toward cadres.’

  Taraki did not pick up this point, but concluded sourly that it looked as if the Russians would give his government every assistance, short of a guarantee against aggression. If an armed invasion of Afghanistan took place, Kosygin countered, a completely different situation would arise. He then hurried Taraki off to his meeting with Brezhnev.18

  Brezhnev described that meeting to his colleagues two days later. Taraki had arrived in Moscow ‘in a somewhat excited condition, but during the discussion he gradually cheered up and towards the end he behaved calmly and sensibly’. Brezhnev had told him firmly that the government must broaden its political base and stop shooting people. He had emphasised yet again that in the present circumstances the Soviets would send no troops. So far, the Politburo agreed, so good.19

  On 1 April Gromyko, Andropov, Ustinov and Ponomarev submitted a policy document. For the most part it simply summarised the arguments and conclusions which had already been adopted. Although it was overlaid with a heavy dose of orthodox Marxist jargon, the analysis was sober and realistic enough. The problem, it said, was primarily political. Afghanistan had not been ripe for a full-blown socialist revolution in the first place. The leaders of the new regime were not up to their tasks. They were inexperienced and prone to excess. They were bloodily divided among themselves; they had alienated the Islamic clergy, the party, the army, and the administration by their ruthless repression of real and imagined dissent; and they had pressed ahead too fast with half-baked socialist reforms which had backfired among the very people they were supposed to benefit. They should now broaden their political base: they should allow religious freedom except to those who worked against the government; they should observe the rule of law even when suppressing subversion; they should draw up a constitution to strengthen democratic rights and regulate the activities of the state organs. These thoughts remained a consistent part of Soviet policy. Gorbachev picked them up in 1985, and the last Communist leader of Afghanistan, Najibullah (1947–96), tried to implement them with the Policy of National Reconciliation which he launched in January 1987. By then it was too late.

  The paper recommended that the Soviets should continue to supply military weapons and equipment, and train the Afghan army and security organs to use them properly. They should help the Afghans to develop a viable economy. But the government should remain firm in its refusal to send Soviet military units to Afghanistan—even if there were further unrest in Afghanistan, which could not be ruled out.

  This was not a bad policy as far as it went. But it came under increasing pressure throughout the summer of 1979. The Kabul government entirely failed to mend its ways. Internecine strife festered on within the PDPA, and arbitrary arrests and executions continued on a massive scale. In June Taraki and Amin moved decisively against Parcham, a number of whose leaders were sent into honourable exile as ambassadors: Nur to Washington, Wakil to London, Anakhita Ratebzad to Belgrade, Najibullah to Tehran. Lesser figures such as Keshtmand, Rafi, and Kadyr were arrested, tortured, and sentenced to death, though the sentences were commuted to imprisonment when the Soviets protested.20

  And though there was nothing on the scale of the Herat rising, unrest continued to spread throughout the country. At the end of April, Afghan soldiers loyal to the government massacred hundreds of men in the village of Kerala in Kunar province following guerrilla attacks in the area. Unconvincing rumours said that the soldiers were under the command of Soviet advisers in Afghan uniform. On 9 May there were massive risings in six provinces, including the province of Kabul. On 23 June there was a rising for the first time in the capital. Several thousand people demonstrated against the regime, many from the minority group of Hazaras armed with knives, rifles, and machine guns. On 20 July rebels attempted to occupy Gardez, the capital of the province of Paktia: two Soviet advisers were killed. On 5 August, a commando battalion mutinied at Bala Hissar, the ancient fortress on the outskirts of Kabul. The rebels were stopped in their tracks by forces loyal to the government.21 On 11 August a government infantry division suffered heavy losses when it was attacked; some of the survivors went over to the rebels.

  These rebellions were put down more or less successfully by government forces. But by midsummer the government controlled perhaps no more than half the country.22

  Taraki had barely got back to Kabul after his meeting with the Politburo in March before the stream of requests from the Afghan government started up again: requests for attack helicopters, requests for fighting vehicles, requests for guns and ammunition. These all fell within the limits of agreed policy and the Soviets did their best to meet them.

  But other requests certainly did not. The Afghans began yet again to plead with the Soviet government to send its own troops, disguised if necessary in Afghan uniforms. On 14 April they asked for up to twenty helicopters with crews. On 16 June they asked for armoured troops to guard government buildings and the airports at Bagram and Shindand. On 11 July they asked for Soviet special forces battalions to come to Kabul. On 19 July they asked for a couple of divisions. The requests continued and multiplied throughout August.23

  During these months the Soviet military were divided. Some senior officers were opposed to intervention. But others, including Ustinov, were not. In the circumstances the general staff did what general staffs do: they made plans, they raised troops, they began training appropriate to the conditions that the troops would face if they were ever sent to Afghanistan, and they started to deploy resources to the border. In May General Bogdanov, a senior staff officer, tried his hand at a plan for the introduction of Soviet forces into Afghanistan. He concluded that six divisions would be needed. A colleague who saw his plan advised him to lock it away: ‘Otherwise we’ll be accused of violating the sovereignty of a neighbouring state.’ The plan was brought out of the safe at the beginning of December. But instead of six divisions, the Russians at first sent three, then later added one more.24

  The first troops had already arrived. In February 1979 the American Ambassador, Adolph Dubs, was kidnapped by terrorists, imprisoned in a Kabul hotel, and killed in a botched attempt by government forces to release him. The Russians sent KGB protection squads to Kabul to protect their own senior officials there.25

  Following the Politburo’s decisions in April, elements of the 5th Guards Motor-rifle Division and the 108th Motor-rifle Division began moving towards the Afghan frontier under the guise of training exercises. General Yepishev, the Chief of the Main Political Administration of the Soviet Defence Ministry, who had helped prepare the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, visited Kabul to give advice and promise military supplies. Taraki and Amin again asked for Soviet troops and were again turned down. The numbers of Soviet transport aircraft flying in and out of Bagram sharply increased. Soviet military and civilian advisers continued to pour into Afghanistan. Rumours persisted that Soviet servicemen were flying helicopters and operating tanks on combat missions. Soviet frontier troops were increasingly involved in clashes with rebel groups along the Afghan border.26

  Another military delegation followed in August under General Pavlovski, who had commanded the force which invaded Czechoslovakia. Pavlovski’s main task was to review the state of the Afghan army and its operation against the rebels, and to make recommendations to Amin. On the eve of his departure Pavlovski asked Defence Minister Ustinov if it was planned to introduce Soviet forces into Afghanistan. ‘In no circumstances!’ the minister answered categorically.27 Pavlovski remained in Kabul until 22 October and was a close witness of the events which led to the overthrow of Taraki by Amin.


  Many of the Afghan requests for troops came through the Soviet representatives in Kabul—the ambassador, Puzanov; the Chief Soviet Military Adviser, Gorelov; and the KGB representative, Ivanov. As often happens, the people on the spot were sometimes more sympathetic to their clients’ predicament than to the views of their principals, and often supported the Afghan requests, or at least forwarded them without comment. Within a week of Yepishev’s visit, Amin asked Gorelov to forward a request for helicopters with crews. Ogarkov, the Chief of Staff, minuted on Gorelov’s report: ‘That should not be done.’ The Politburo agreed, and Gorelov was told to remind the Afghans of the reasons why the request had been turned down. When Pavlovski arrived, Amin asked him if the Russians could send a division to Kabul. It would not be expected to take part in combat, but it would free an Afghan division to tackle the rebels on the ground. This request, too, was turned down. A month later Gorelov, Puzanov, and Ivanov came up with an idea of their own. The Soviets should set up a military training centre near Kabul on the lines of the one they had in Cuba—a somewhat disingenuous proposal, since everyone knew that the ‘training centre’ in Cuba consisted of a brigade of combat troops.28

  Military Preparations

  For its part the Soviet Ministry of Defence had already quietly begun to take measures directly related to the possibility of combat in Afghanistan. In April 1979 its Main Intelligence Directorate (Glavnoe Razvedyvatelnoe Upravlenie, or GRU) ordered the creation of a special battalion, based in Tashkent in Turkmenistan, to consist of Tajik, Uzbek, and Turkmen soldiers from the Central Asian republics who spoke the same languages as the people on the other side of the Afghan frontier. Major Khalbaev was appointed to command the battalion and given two months to complete its formation.