Afghan Politics Falling Apart, 1970s
How the Soviets Were Able to Enter the Scene in Afghanistan
May 8, 2009
According to Charles Cogan, the monarchy was little more than a “thin, anachronistic veneer holding Afghanistan together,” and tribal elders and regional leaders were accustomed to having a weak power in Kabul. Mohammed Zahir Shah (r. 1933-1973) thus faced many obstacles when he began his modernization and democratization processes in the 1960s and 1970s. Exploiting nation-wide dissatisfaction with centralization masked as modernization, the king’s brother-in-law, Prime Minister Mohammed Daoud, staged a bloodless coup on 17 July 1973 while the king was in Rome.
Traditional Opposition
Once in power, however, Daoud (r. 1973-1978) began his own centralization projects at odds with long-held political and social traditions. In foreign affairs, Daoud drifted from the Soviet orbit. Even though he accepted aid money and military support and training, he no longer followed Moscow’s directives. Instead, he forged a more independent path towards non-alignment, building close economic ties with Iran and even going so far as to recognize the Durand Line for the sake of improved relations with Pakistan.
Internally, Daoud tried to do too much too fast. By imposing reforms beneficial to the bourgeoisie, peasantry, and his own central authority, Daoud alienated the traditional Islamic establishment and lost control over the state bureaucracy and army to the Parcham and Khalq, which, under the stress of Daoud’s power grabbing, briefly reconciled as the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) in 1977. Daoud’s recognition of the Durand Line with Pakistan was a volte-face with respect to Pushtun nationalism, causing a furor among his Pushtun base.
The Downfall of Daoud & Power Sharing
Then, on 17 April 1978, the assassination of PDPA party leader Mir Akbar Khaibar triggered massive demonstrations that led to the arrest of PDPA leaders and supporters. Attempting to centralize and impose communism on a people accustomed to tribalism and regionalism left Daoud juggling too many balls at once. In a homegrown PDPA coup, Daoud and his family were assassinated and the Durrani dynasty was purged. Khalq leaders Nur Mohammed Taraki and Hafizullah Amin were then belatedly released from prison to eventually share power.
But the sharing of power between Taraki and Amin did not last long. According to Howard Hart, CIA Station Chief in Pakistan after May 1981, any two Afghans will give rise to three factions: “Every man will be king.” This is most aptly applied to the Taraki-Amin power balance, especially in the precarious political context caused by the absence of a legitimate monarch. For the first time since the reign of Abdur Rahman Khan, violence emerged as the determining factor in state-society relations.
New Masters of Kabul
The new masters of Kabul had to resort to the patronage of a single foreign power in order to subordinate the recalcitrant micro-societies. However, the ‘fraternal ties’ with a ‘great and selfless northern neighbor' - the USSR - turned out to be insufficient to guarantee success and ultimately led to innumerable victims, dramatic shifts in the make-up of Afghan society, and the disintegration of Afghanistan as a governable sovereign state.
Sources:
Charles G. Cogan, “Partners in Time: The CIA and Afghanistan since 1979,” World Policy Journal 10, no. 2 (Summer 1993)
Steve Coll, Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001, New York: Penguin Press, 2004
Amin Saikal, Modern Afghanistan: History of Struggle and Survival, New York: I.B. Tauris, 2004
