The Soviet–Afghan War, 1978–1989: An Overview¹

1 The analysis, opinions and conclusions expressed or implied in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Joint Services Command and Staff College, the Defence Academy, Ministry of Defence or any other UK government agency.

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Notes

1 The analysis, opinions and conclusions expressed or implied in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Joint Services Command and Staff College, the Defence Academy, Ministry of Defence or any other UK government agency.

2 The first quote is taken from a translated version from the website of the National Security Archive 〈www.gwu.edu/∼nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB57/〉. The second quote is from Jan Goodwin, Caught in the Crossfire (London: Macdonald 1987) p.175.

3 Gilles Kepel, Jihad: Expansion et déclin de l'islamisme (Paris: Gallimard 2003) pp.233–8.

4 ‘The Rise of Jihadistan’, Newsweek, 2 Oct. 2006; Joanna Wright, ‘Taliban insurgency shows signs of enduring strength’, Jane's Intelligence Review (Oct. 2006) pp.24–31; ‘NATO General: We need one more year to defeat Taliban’, The Guardian, 22 Jan. 2007.

5 ‘You will be driven from Afghanistan just as we were, Russian generals warn’, Sunday Telegraph, 24 Sept. 2006. See also Noam Chomsky's interview with David Barsamian, ‘The United States is a Leading Terrorist State’, Monthly Review 53/6 (2001), accessible online at 〈www.monthlyreview.org/1101chomsky.htm〉.

6 Barnett R. Rubin, The Fragmentation of Afghanistan (New Haven, CT: Yale UP 2002) pp.23–32; Mark Galeotti, Afghanistan: The Soviet Union's Last War (London: Frank Cass 1995) p.4.

7 Leon B. Poullada, ‘Afghanistan and the United States: The Crucial Years’, Middle East Journal, 35/2 (1981) pp.178–90. On ‘Pashtunistan’, see Alvin Z. Rubinstein, ‘The Last Years of Peaceful Coexistence: Soviet–Afghan Relations 1963–1978’, Middle East Journal 36/2 (1982) pp.166–70.

8 Christopher Andrew and Vasili Mitrokhin, The World Was Going Our Way. The KGB and the Battle for the Third World (New York: Basic Books 2005) pp.386–7; William Maley, The Afghanistan Wars (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan 2002) pp.26–7.

9 Rubin, Afghanistan (note 6) pp.109–11; Henry S. Bradsher, Afghan Communism and Soviet Intervention (OUP 1999) pp.34–6; Oldrich Tuma, ‘Czechoslovakia and the War in Afghanistan, 1979–1989’, Cold War International History Project Bulletin (hereafter CWIHP) 14/15 (2003/4) pp.220–1.

10 For an exceptionally naive view of the Khalq's reforms, see William Blum, Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War Two (London: Zed Books 2003) pp.338–52.

11 Rubin, Afghanistan (note 6) pp.115–21; Steve Coll, Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10 2001 (London: Penguin 2004) p.41. Maley, Afghanistan Wars (note 8) pp.29–30.

12 Transcripts of Politburo meetings, 17–19 March 1979; conversation between Kosygin and Taraki on 18 March 1979; and meeting between Kosygin and Taraki on 20 March 1979, in Odd Arne Westad, ‘Situation in “A”: New Evidence on the Soviet Intervention in Afghanistan’, CWIHP Bulletin 8/9 (Winter 1996) pp.136–45, 145–50. See also meeting between Brezhnev and Taraki on 20 March 1979, CWIHP Bulletin 4 (1994) pp.73–4. As the General Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party (CPSU), Brezhnev was the leading figure within the Politburo, possessing far greater authority than the Premier, Kosygin.

13 Raymond Garthoff, Détente and Confrontation (Washington DC: Brookings Institute 1994) pp.1001–2, 1008; report by Deputy Defence Minister I.G. Pavlovskii, 5 Nov. 1979, ‘Soviet Intervention’ (note 12) p.158.

14 Odd Arne Westad, ‘Prelude to Invasion: The Soviet Union and the Afghan Communists, 1978– 1979’, International History Review 16/1 (1994) pp.61–2.

15 Robert Service, A History of Twentieth Century Russia (London: Penguin 1999) p.404; Odd Arne Westad, The Global Cold War (Cambridge: CUP 2005) pp.316–20; Mark Galeotti, The Age of Anxiety (London: Longman 1995) pp.15–16.

16 Garthoff, Détente and Confrontation (note 13) pp.1012–13, 1035. Westad, ‘Situation in “A”’ (note 12) pp.130–1.

17 Richard Crockatt, The Fifty Years War: The United States and the Soviet Union in World Politics, 1941–1991 (Abingdon, UK: Routledge 2000) pp.264–7, 270–1. Westad, ‘Afghan Communists’ (note 14) pp.59, 63.

18 Geoffrey Roberts, The Soviet Union in World Politics: Coexistence, Revolution and Cold War, 1945–1991 (Abingdon, UK: Routledge 1999) pp.72, 82.

19 Garthoff, Détente and Confrontation (note 130) pp.1002, 1008–9, 1013. Maley, Afghanistan Wars (note 8) p.34.

20 Christopher Andrew and Vasili Mitrokhin, The Mitrokhin Archive (London: Allen Lane 1999), p.508. Memorandum from Andropov to Brezhnev (early Dec. 1979), in Westad ‘Soviet Intervention’ (note 12) p.159. Coll, Ghost Wars (note 11) pp.47–8.

21 This memorandum (P176/125) is in CWIHP Bulletin 4, p.76; Maley, Afghanistan Wars (note 8) p.33; Garthoff, Détente and Confrontation (note 13) pp.1016–18.

22 Galeotti, Afghanistan (note 6) p.221. For the UN General Assembly Emergency Session of Afghanistan (10–14 Jan. 1980), see 〈www.un.org/ga/documents/liemsps.htm/〉.

23 Garthoff, Détente and Confrontation (note 13) pp.1050–55; Crockatt, Fifty Years War (note 13) pp.287–8; Richard Clarke, Against All Enemies (Free Press 2004) pp.38–9.

24 The contrasting reactions over the ‘Second Cold War’ are described in Helene Sjursen, The United States, Western Europe and the Polish Crisis (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave 2002).

25 Leslie Holmes, ‘Afghanistan and Sino‐Soviet Relations’, in Amin Saikal and William Maley (ed.), The Soviet Withdrawal from Afghanistan (Cambridge: CUP 1990) pp.122–41.

26 Tuma, ‘Czechoslovakia’ (note 9) pp.221–2; Csaba Bekes, ‘Why Was There No “Second Cold War” in Europe ?’ CWIHP Bulletin 14/15 (2003/4) pp.204–5.

27 Oles Smolansky and Bettie Smolansky, The USSR and Iraq (Durham, NC: Duke UP 1991) p.217; Coll, Ghost Wars (note 11) pp.61–74;. Mark Adkin and Mohammed Yousaf, Afghanistan, the Bear Trap: Defeat of a Superpower (London: Leo Cooper 2001).

28 Galeotti, Afghanistan (note 6) p.18. John Prados, Presidents' Secret Wars (Chicago, IL: Ivan R. Dee 1996) pp.359–66. See also George Crile, Charlie Wilson's War (New York: Atlantic Monthly Press 2003).

29 Peter Bergen, Holy War Inc.: Inside the Secret World of Osama bin Laden (New York: Free Press 2001) pp.42–56. Rohan Gunaratna, Inside Al Qaeda: Global Network of Terror (New York: Columbia UP 2002) pp.18–23.

30 Mark Urban, UK Eyes Alpha: The Inside Story of British Intelligence (London: Faber 1996) pp.36–7; Ken Connor, Ghost Force: The Secret History of the SAS (London: Weidenfeld 1998) pp.275–82. Rubin, Afghanistan (note 6) pp.233–46.

31 Diego Cordovez and Selig Harrison, Out of Afghanistan: The Inside Story of the Soviet Withdrawal (Oxford: OUP 1995); transcript from Politburo meeting, 10 March 1983, in Westad, ‘Soviet Intervention’ (note 12) pp.177–8; Maley, Afghanistan Wars (note 8) pp.136–8.

32 Galeotti, Afghanistan (note 6) p.189; Leo J. Daugherty III, ‘The Bear and the Scimitar. Soviet Central Asians and the War in Afghanistan 1979–1989’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies 8/1 (March 1995) pp.74–7.

33 Scott McMichael, ‘The Soviet–Afghan War’, in Robin Higham and Frederick W. Kagan (eds.), A Military History of the Soviet Union (Palgrave 2002) pp.267–8.

34 McMichael, ‘Soviet–Afghan War’ (note 33) pp.263–5; Galeotti, Afghanistan (note 6) pp.15–19; Mark Urban, ‘Soviet Operations in Afghanistan – Some Conclusions’, Jane's Soviet Intelligence Review, 2/8 (1990) pp.366–70.

35 Mark Urban, War in Afghanistan (London: Macmillan 1998) pp.118–19; Rubin, Afghanistan (note 6) pp.233, 235–6.

36 Carl Van Dyke, ‘Kabul to Grozny: A Critique of Soviet (Russian) Counter‐Insurgency Doctrine’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies 9/4 (Dec. 1996) pp.693–4; Urban, Afghanistan (note 35) pp.297– 8; McMichael, ‘Soviet–Afghan War’ (note 33) pp.268–9.

37 Galeotti, Afghanistan (note 6) pp.32–7; Scott McMichael, Stumbling Bear: Soviet Military Performance in Afghanistan (London: Brassey's 1991), p.65. For a candid assessment of Soviet operations, based on 40th Army's own reports, see Lester Grau (ed.), The Bear Went Over the Mountain: Soviet Combat Tactics in Afghanistan (London: Frank Cass 1998).

38 Alex Marshall, Phased Withdrawal, Conflict Resolution and State Reconstruction, CSRC Paper No.06/29 (Shrivenham, UK: Conflict Studies Research Centre, Defence Academy June 2006) p.2.

39 McMichael, Stumbling Bear (note 37) p.51; Ian Beckett, Modern Insurgencies and Counterinsurgencies (Abingdon, UK: Routledge 2001) pp.209–13.

40 AFM1/10, Counter Insurgency Operations (Strategic and Operational Guidelines) (UK MOD: July 2001) B3 8–12; FM3‐24, Counterinsurgency (Washington DC: Dept. of the Army, Dec. 2001) 1‐ 14‐29, 1, pp.24–39.

41 Anthony Tucker, ‘Armed Forces of the Afghan Conflict’, Jane's Soviet Intelligence Review 2/3 (1990) pp.114–18; Richard J. Aldrich, ‘Intelligence and Covert Operations’, in Saki Dockrill and Geraint Hughes (eds.), Advances in Cold War History (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave 2006) p.218.

42 Tucker, ‘Armed Forces’ (note 41) pp.116–17. Stephen D. Pomper, ‘Don't Follow the Bear: The Soviet Attempt to Build Afghanistan's Military’, Military Review (Sept./Oct. 2005) pp.26–9.

43 McMichael, ‘Soviet–Afghan War’ (note 33) pp.271–2. Daugherty, ‘Bear and Scimitar’ (note 32) pp.78–86. See also Artyom Borovik, The Hidden War: A Russian Journalist's Account of the Soviet War in Afghanistan (New York: Grove Press 1990); William Odom, The Collapse of the Soviet Military (New Haven, CT: Yale UP 1998).

44 Ali Ahmed Jalali and Lester Grau, Afghan Guerrilla Warfare in the Words of the Mujahidin Fighters (London: Compendium Publishing 2001); Coll, Ghost Wars (note 11) pp.104–6, 161–2.

45 Coll, Ghost Wars (note 11) pp.149–51; Urban, ‘Operations in Afghanistan’ (note 34) p.367.

46 Maley, Afghanistan Wars (note 8) pp.58–66, 74–6; Rubin, Afghanistan (note 6) pp.196–225.

47 Borovik, Hidden War (note 43) pp.14–15; Galeotti, Afghanistan (note 6) p.27; Service, Russia (note 15) p.443.

48 CIA Directorate of Intelligence Assessment, The Costs of Soviet Involvement in Afghanistan, dated Feb. 1987, on 〈www.gwu.edu/∼nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB57/〉. Maley, Afghanistan Wars (note 8) p.54.

49 Transcript of Politburo meetings, 13 Nov. 1986, in Westad, ‘Soviet Intervention’ (note 12) pp.178– 81, and ‘Gorbachev and Afghanistan’, CWIHP Bulletin 14/15 (2003/4) pp.143–5; Roberts, Soviet Union (note 18) pp.92–5; Service, Russia (note 15) pp.442–3.

50 Rubin, Afghanistan (note 6) pp.146–7. Conversation between Gorbachev and Najibullah at Kremlin, 20 July 1987, ‘Gorbachev and Afghanistan’ (note 49) pp.149–50. Marshall, Phased Withdrawal (note 38) pp.2–3.

51 Cordovez and Harrison, Out of Afghanistan (note 31) p.193; CIA, Costs of Soviet Involvement, (note 48) passim; Maley, Afghanistan Wars (note 8) pp.134–9.

52 Bradsher, Afghan Communists (note 9) p.309; Borovik, Hidden War (note 43) pp.252–78; Maley, Afghanistan Wars (note 8) pp.140–2.

53 SNIE 11/37‐88, USSR: Withdrawal from Afghanistan, dated March 1988, on 〈www.gwu.edu/∼nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB57/〉; David Isby, ‘Soviet Arms Deliveries and Aid to Afghanistan 1989–91’, Jane's Intelligence Review 3/8 (1991) pp.348–53.

54 Marshall, Phased Withdrawal (note 38) pp.7–9; Neamatollah Nojumi, The Rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan (Basingstoke: Palgrave 2002) pp.95–6.

55 Galeotti, Afghanistan (note 6) pp.210–20; Ahmed Rashid, Jihad: The Rise of Militant Islam in Central Asia (Newhaven, CT: Yale UP 2002) p.43.

56 Andrew Bennett, ‘The Guns That Didn't Smoke: Ideas and the Soviet Non‐Use of Force in 1989’, Journal of Cold War Studies 7/2 (2005) pp.81–109; Richard J. Crampton, Eastern Europe in the Twentieth Century (London: Routledge 1994) p.408.

57 Pavel Baev, The Russian Army in a Time of Troubles (London/Oslo: Sage Publications/PRIO 1996) pp.22–5, 103–49; Anatol Lieven, Chechnya. Tombstone of Russian Power (Newhaven, CT: Yale UP 1998) pp.274–9.

58 Galeotti, Afghanistan (note 6) pp.153–4. Urban, Afghanistan (note 35) pp.292, 296–8; Rubin, Afghanistan (note 6) pp.125–30.

59 Nojumi, Taliban (note 54) pp.97–151; Ahmed Rashid, Taliban. Islam, Oil and the New Great Game in Central Asia (London: I.B. Tauris 2001) pp.17–80, 183–206.

60 Bergen, Holy War Inc. (note 29) pp.65, 72. Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon, The Age of Sacred Terror: Radical Islam's War Against America (New York: Random House 2003) pp.101, 119–20, 138–9.