On April 27, 1978, Afghanistan witnessed a bloody change of power, which came to be known as the Saur or the April Revolution. Noor Muhammad Tarakai of the Khalq faction became the president and the prime minister. Afghanistan was declared the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. The Soviet Union was suspected of helping the PDPA into power. There were many reasons that led the Soviet Union to support the PDPA to overthrow President Daud Khan, once known as the Red Prince due to his excessive reliance on the Soviet Union.
Before his death and the April coup, Daud Khan had started improving relations with Pakistan and forged strong ties with Iran. He had also visited Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. Most importantly, the then US president, Jimmy Carter, had invited him to visit the US. In 1977, Khan paid a visit to Moscow where Leonid Brezhnev rebuked him for allowing western spies to work in Afghanistan under the guise of technical experts. But Khan dismissed those strictures and insisted that he would not allow ‘unacceptable interference’ in the domestic affairs of his country. He marched out of the remaining meeting, thereby signing his own death warrant.
The casus belli in the end was the killing of an Afghan leftist scholar and Parcham stalwart, Ustaz Mir Akbar Khyber on April 16, 1978. It led to widespread violent protests, at times directed at state and government. Many Afghans suspected the regime’s complicity in the killing. Khan strongly reacted to politicisation of the issue, and ordered the arrest of the PDPA leaders including Noor Muhammad Tarakai, Babrak and Suliaman Laiq. Worried about their safety, party members and sympathisers immediately staged a coup against Khan on April 27, 1977.
The US has been at war with the Taliban for 17 years but the problems and miseries of the Afghan people are not yet over
According to Azmat Hayat, there is no evidence of a Soviet connection in the killing. Tarakai also denied any outsiders’ role. He called the coup a revolution following an ‘Afghan model’.
Soon after coming into power, the PDPA regime initiated a drastic reform package. It included social, economic and education reforms. Kuldeep Nayar writes in Report on Afghanistan that the new regime started teaching Darwinism in schools and colleges. A Russian scholar had warned the revolutionaries that the reforms they wanted to implement in five years might take Soviet Union 25 years. Frédéric Grare writes in his book that changing the flag of Afghanistan was their big mistake. Their land reforms were also criticised by the clergy. Tarakai was painted in dark colours.
The clergy-landlord alliance rose up with petro dollars pouring in from the West and its allies including Pakistan, much to the dismay and chagrin of Afghan and Soviet leaders. The PDPA leaders had failed to learn from history. The conservative class in Afghanistan had opposed King Amanullah Khan’s reforms in the same way. Like the Great Game, the Cold War was now to be fought out on Afghan soil. Russophobia had led the British Empire to attack Afghanistan twice in the 19th century.
On December 25, 1979, the Soviet Union repeated the mistake, sending troops to Afghanistan to help the weak PDPA regime to withstand the rising onslaught of the West-funded fundamentalists. The Cold War and the ensuing proxy war opened the floodgate of misery and civil war. In 1992, the last PDPA president resigned after trying in futility to bring peace to his war-torn country. Americans damaged Kabul more than Russians and the PDPA. The situation in Afghanistan led to the emergence of the Taliban.
The Taliban ruled Afghanistan in their own style. The Taliban government was not recognised by any country other than Pakistan, the UAE and Saudi Arabia.
To aggravate things for the Afghan people, the Al Qaeda got a foothold in Afghanistan and became a Taliban ally. The gruesome events of 9/11 proved fatal for the Taliban government. They were ousted from power but not entirely subdued. The US has been at war with the Taliban for 17 years but the problems and miseries of the Afghan people are not yet over.
Peace in Afghanistan has been an elusive dream since the Saur Revolution. The Soviet Union withdrew its forces from Afghanistan in 1989. With the disintegration of the USSR, the West took a sigh of relief considering breaking down of the Evil Empire the ‘final Waterloo’.
However, the end of history is nowhere in sight. The triumph of liberalism over communism proved to be a hollow victory for Afghanistan, and the world at large. The Taliban phenomenon is a direct result of the Saur Revolution and the Cold War politics.
The writer teaches history at the University of Peshawar