Western Interference In Afghanistan: Part 1

Western Interference In Afghanistan: Part 1

[NOTE: THIS WASN'T WRITTEN BY ME, BUT BY A  FRIEND]

The unjust “War on Terror” was declared just over ten years ago, and it has been clear that the invasion of Iraq was over oil, as Saddam Hussein planned to export Iraqi oil in Euro’s and not dollars, giving them more economic power over the United States. What followed were sanctions and then invasion under a false pre-text and removal of Saddam Hussein and his Baath Party, and a humanitarian cost of about 100,000-110,000 civilian deaths from violence, and more from inadequate healthcare or malnutrition. Incidents of senseless slaughter as shown in the footage released by Wikileaks Collateral Murder, torture and other human rights abuses became common and the Iraq has now been destabilised by insurgency. Similar events have taken place in Afghanistan, but what are not as well-known are the true reasons for the invasion Afghanistan by NATO forces, but like with the reasons for the invasion of Iraq is based on energy reserves of oil and gas, but also geopolitical influence. This two part article will describe US complicity in events such as the start of a rebellion against Afghanistan’s communist PDPA to the rise of the Taliban.
 

The destruction of the Afghan civil war

On April 17th 1978, Mohammed Khaibar, a prominent member of Afghanistan’s communist party the PDPA (Peoples Democratic Party of Afghanistan), was assassinated allegedly by the government of Mohammad Daoud. Many others were arrested, but a number of active members of the PDPA’s military wing, most importantly Nur Mohammad Taraki, Babrak Karmal and Hafizullah Amin, managed to remain organised. These three men led a successful military coup d’état and overthrew Khaibar, and the following day, he and his family were executed. The overthrow was known as the Great Saur revolution and the country was renamed the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. Its social reforms, including promotion of state atheism and restriction of tribal traditions – considered feudal in nature by the party - received backlash from religious and tribal leaders; this combined with the government’s use of a coup to secure power left them without much popular support. Rebellion amongst the citizens was inspired by repression and as a result, attracted the attention of the Soviet Union who subsequently invaded to stabilise Afghanistan in 1979. 

Six months prior to the Soviet Invasion, the US had launched a covert operation in Afghanistan to exploit the potential of social conflict, fostering unrest and rebellion among Afghan factions who were led by a feudal-based clergy to destabilise the PDPA and as a result provoke Soviet intervention. The resulting conflict would debilitate the Soviet Union. By exploiting the sentiments of the wealthy and powerful religious leaders, the US actively recruited warlords to form rebel groups. This reckless programme aggravated conflict between the rebels and government. The PDPA response was to arrest and execute any suspected rebels, instigating the first of major refugee flows to Pakistan. The detention and execution of innocent civilians seemed to give credence to the claims of the religious leaders, that the PDPA was a direct challenge to the Islamic traditions of the Afghan people. Subsequently, revolts broke out, against the perceived government repression, led by traditionalist leaders who wanted the feudal system preserved.

In December 1979, under the Brezhnev Doctrine which stated that the USSR would intervene to protect its socialist interests across the globe, the USSR conducted a full-scale invasion of Afghanistan to end the destabilisation. This was an act aimed to prevent a domino theory in which Islamic fundamentalism could spread to other Middle Eastern countries and create an Islamic Bloc that could rival the Soviet Bloc. Brezhnev wished to stop fundamentalism spreading across to the Soviet States in central Asia and causing destabilisation. There were also oil interests in the Persian Gulf region, and destabilisation would threaten the supply of oil to the USSR.

President Jimmy Carter announced that military aid would be given to Afghan guerrillas, resisting the Soviet invasion, under the newly created Carter Doctrine, which stated that the USA would use military means if necessary to protect its interests in the Persian Gulf, given that the area supplied oil to the USA, for which there has been a great deal of retrospective criticism, as this aid is still in use in the current conflict.

The US also escalated its destabilisation program, now that the Soviet Union was drawn in to the “Afghan Trap”, and central to this escalation was the manufacturing of extreme Islamic fundamentalism. Predominate themes were that “Islam was a complete socio-political ideology, that holy Islam was being violated by the atheistic Soviet troops, and that the Islamic people of Afghanistan should reassert their independence by overthrowing the leftist Afghan regime propped up by Moscow.”

Among the many US initiated policies to generate the desired intensity of religious extremism, was the funding of millions of dollars to produce and distribute textbooks in Afghan schools promoting and glorifying the war-values of murder and fanaticism, examining jihad along with drawings of firearms, bullets, soldiers and mines. These American-produced textbooks were still used in the Taliban regime’s core curriculum. The Washington Post cited anonymous US officials confessing that these text books “steeped a generation in violence”. Central Asia expert Selig Harrison warned the US government that they were “creating a monster”, but his warnings were not heeded and he was told that “they were fanatical, and the more fierce they were, the more fiercely they would fight the Soviets”. Examples of this extreme religious ideology that the US had cultivated were Mujahedeen commanders who were known to have thrown acid in the faces of women after they had refused to wear a veil, and committed horrific human rights violations in their war against the invading Red Army. Thus the US was aware of the nature of the virulent and dangerous fanaticism they had created.

Mujahedeen fighters in a gunbattle against communist governement forces

The invasion took its toll on the Soviet Union and the Afghan people. The total number of refugees that had fled stood at around 3.3 million. There are estimates of at least 600,000 Afghan civilians killed, with nearly 3 million wounded. The Red Army had more than 14,000 personnel killed and more than 50,000 wounded, and the Mujahedeen suffered one million deaths.

The Soviet Union lost billions of rubels on an unaffordable war due to stagflation in the economy, thus the debilitation that the US government desired, using the Afghanistan as a trap and using the Mujahedeen as proxy soldiers, had destroyed the lives of millions. Crucial irrigation systems for farming in Afghanistan’s arid climate were destroyed in aerial bombings and strafing by the Red Army of government forces, more than half the farmers had their fields bombed, and a quarter had their irrigation systems destroyed or livestock shot. The population of Afghanistan’s largest city, Kandahar went from 200,000 to 25,000 due to carpet bombing and bulldozing by the Afghan government and the Red Army, and 10-15 million land mines were scattered across the countryside. The Red Cross estimated that to remove all these would take 4,300 years. After Soviet withdrawal, child mortality was at 31%, and 67% of those that survived were severely malnourished.

After the withdrawal of Soviet forces in 1989, the conflict between the communist regime and the militant forces resisting the regime continued, and the PDPA survived for three more years until it collapsed when Kabul fell. In 1992, Afghanistan’s Mujahedeen factions agreed on the Peshawar Accords, which formed the Islamic State of Afghanistan. However this did not stop the conflict. In a secret agreement in 1991, the US, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan were active in making attempts to manipulate and exploit the conflict to their own ends, including the sponsoring of the warring factions, often with Pakistan being a middle-man. For example, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who was opposed to the Peshawar Accords and whose forces were sponsored by Pakistan and the US, started rocket bombardments of Kabul which drove half a million civilians from the capital Kabul and killed another 20,000. Gulbuddin’s intensification of terror was carried out with weaponry financed by the US and Pakistan, while at the same time of inter-factional fighting was beginning to re-start when three militia groups took control over parts of Kabul and the second phase of the Afghan Civil War began, and all international interest in the conflict then disappeared and Afghanistan was on the brink of a total humanitarian catastrophe.

The Taliban was originally formed as a number of factions such as Harakat-e Islami and Mohammad Nabi Mohammadi, and without a centralized command centre. In mid-1994, the factions formed the Taliban movement and conquered Kabul in 1996. At the time of its creation it was fighting the Northern Alliance, an umbrella organisation of terrorists, murderers, rapists and warlords who were responsible for a horrific record of systematic atrocities, controlling a strip of land in Northern Afghanistan. 

The Taliban were later recognised as the legitimate ruling body of Afghanistan by several key governments: Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and the UAE, and clients of US/Western states. The Taliban’s record of atrocious policies was known about, and although the US openly condemned these, it contradicted itself by consistently ignoring support of the Taliban by its allies, and when the State Department did condemn interference in Afghanistan by other governments, they never mentioned who specifically did so. The US also contradicted itself by supporting the UN as a way to achieve peace in Afghanistan and then refused to allocate funds for the UN dues or US peacekeeping policies. The reason for these and other contradictory policies can be explained, with evidence, as sponsorship. The Taliban were known for the massacres of civilians, fanatical religious ideology, tortures and executions. But the Taliban took control of Kabul in 1996, ending the civil war, although there were still other insurgent groups which the Taliban militia were engaged in fighting with. The next article concluding this one will explain why the Taliban were sponsored by the US and explain the reason Afghanistan was invaded as a result of the declaration of the “War on Terror”: oil and power.

Kristian Smith