Aleksandr Antonovich Lyakhovskiy Working Paper pp

while coming in for a landing at Kabul (the crew commander was Captain Golovchin); 37 paratroopers were on board. 

All the paratroopers and seven crew members died. 

 

 

A meeting of chiefs of advisory bodies was held on 25 December. In the course of the briefing all the advisers 

received orders – do not allow Afghan units to act against our troops in Kabul. Military advisers and specialists who 

had worked in the DRA Air Defense Forces established control over all anti-aircraft equipment and ammunition 

storage locations in order to prevent possible hostile actions by Afghan servicemen during the airlift of the airborne 

troops. They even took several anti-aircraft installations out of service temporarily (they removed sights and [firing] 

locks). Thus, the unhindered landing of aircraft with paratroopers was ensured. 

 

 

A group of officers worked around in the clock in the USSR Armed Forces General Staff which followed the 

situation and the fulfillment of the measures to deploy Soviet troops, prepared reports, and made suggestions to 

Varennikov; the latter, in turn, reported to the leadership of the Defense Ministry and the CC CPSU. 

 

 

The Defense Minister was vitally interested in the progress of the fulfillment of the assigned mission. Ustinov 

summoned the deputy chief of the lead directorate of the Main Operations Directorate Gen. German Burutin to his 

office and studied the situation for an hour, asking for clarifications: “Why are troops going across the pontoon bridge 

so slowly? They reported to me that they would be going much faster…How much time can the paratroopers hold out 

in Kabul if there is active resistance on the part of Afghan troops loyal to Amin?” 

 

 

Improvised meetings arose in the course of the march of the combat columns (when they stopped at 

population centers). Many residents greeted Soviet soldiers with flowers. Soldiers of the DRA army and members of 

the Committees to Defend the Revolution were especially friendly to us. 

 

 

On 26 December a combat collaboration meeting was held in Pul-e Khomri where our troops and the troops 

of the [Afghan] 10

th

 Infantry Regiment of the 20

th

 Infantry Division were present. In their speeches the Afghan 

servicemen expressed gratitude for the international aid and readiness for collaboration. They chanted slogans of 

Soviet-Afghan friendship. 

 

 

But it was not so everywhere. Some Afghans regarded the appearance of Soviet troops with suspicion and did 

not enter into contact with them. There were also displays of hostility. Our troops began to come under fire from 

individual detachments of the armed opposition. But the General Staff Directive did not specify the procedure and 

conditions for the use of weapons and they were forced to return fire. 

 

 

For example, on the morning of 26 December at the Salang Pass a group of rebels attacked subunits of the 

airborne assault battalion of Capt. Khabarov. The commander of a reconnaissance patrol, Lt. Nikolay Krotov, died 

while repelling this attack. A motorized rifle regiment under the command of Lt. Col. Viktor Kudlay en route from 

Khorog to Fayzabad was constantly subjected to attack by small groups of rebels who destroyed the only road in the 

mountains and obstructed traffic. As a result [the regiment] made only 10 km a day. 

 

 

On 26 December the CC CPSU General Secretary held a meeting at his dacha in which Andropov, Ustinov, 

Gromyko, and Chernenko participated. They discussed the progress of implementation of CC CPSU Decree Nº 

P176/125 of 12 December. Chernenko made the record of this meeting. 

 

 

DOCUMENT   

 

 

 

 

 

Top Secret 

 

Ref Nº P176/125 of 12 December 1979 

 

 

On 26 December (Cdes. L. I. Brezhnev, D. F. Ustinov, A. A. Gromyko, Yu. V. Andropov, and K. U. 

Chernenko were present at the dacha) the progress of implementation of CC CPSU Decree Nº P 176/125 of 12.12.79 

was reported by Cdes. Ustinov, Gromyko, and Andropov. 

 

 

Cde. L. I. Brezhnev, having approved the plan of action in this matter scheduled for the time being by the 

comrades, expressed a number of wishes. 

 

 

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It was recognized as advisable that the CC Politburo Commission is to act with the same membership and 

direction of the reported plan, carefully weighing each step of its actions. Proposals are to be submitted to the CC 

CPSU in a timely manner. 

 

[signature] K. Chernenko 

 

 

Nº 13-op (1 page) 

 27.12.79 

 

 

At that time much was not clear about what plan they were implementing. If it had consisted solely of 

removing H. Amin from power then the deployment of troops would have been sufficient but if they were to stick to 

the official version then they were obviously too few to repel external interference. 

 

 

The units of the 108

th

 Motorized Rifle Division were to have occupied temporary bases in the areas of Doshi, 

Pul-e Khomri, Kunduz, and Taloqan. But in the process of the march the mission was changed and the division was 

sent to an area northeast of Kabul where they had formed up by the morning of 28 December. 

 

The Operation in Kabul 

 

 

The operations plan in Kabul provided for the seizure of the most important facilities: the Taj-Bek Palace, the 

CC PDPA buildings, the DRA Ministries of Defense, Internal Affairs (tsarandoy), Foreign Affairs, and 

Communications, the General Staff, the HQ of the Air Forces and the HQ of the Central Army Corps, military 

counterintelligence, the political prison in Pol-e Charki, the radiotelevision center, the post and telegraph office, …It 

was planned to blockade Afghan units and DRA Armed Forces formations located in the capital at the same time. 

 

 

What happened then in Kabul has long remained a secret to the world. Many various opinions have been 

expressed and the most improbable rumors and conjecture have been floated. Soviet leaders categorically denied their 

participation in this action, saying that it was done at the hands of “healthy” forces of the PDPA. And only after the 

Soviet Union was no longer was much made clear. But not everything. 

 

 

For history is a prediction of the past and even documents do not always give a true picture. Moreover, many 

documents written by hand in single copy have already been destroyed. Only the people who participated in those 

events know in fact what and how it was there. One can draw a general picture of those events from the accounts of 

the leaders and participants of the operation to seize the important facilities in Kabul, although they interpret them 

differently even now. It has been said for a long time they did not have the right to say anything about the operation in 

Kabul and that for many years they were weighed down by a psychological burden. Some who have something to 

conceal do not want to recall it and are silent. Others at times give accounts which, to put it politely, are far from 

reality. Everything is washed in memory and sometimes all that is left is what was said many times when it was 

impossible to tell the truth. Telling either a half-truth or generally a fabrication some believe it themselves. When it 

became possible to tell the truth it became somehow uncomfortable for them to reject their previous words and for 

many, disadvantageous. For their accounts are subjective, often contradict one another, and are based on conjecture 

and unverified facts. Much has been said incompletely or generally omitted. Several participants of those events are no 

longer alive. In the memoirs of soldiers there is the personal perception of what occurred, their view of the picture of 

battle, also an evaluation of the role of each in this operation. Not having information and not knowing the overall 

situation many thought that there were only a small handful of soldiers, who were actually suicide soldiers.  Strange as 

it may seem, but among some such a feeling has remained until now, although it is now known, that there were 

considerable forces in the Afghan capital by the start of the operation: an airborne division, the “Muslim” battalion, 

subunits of the 345

th

 Independent Parachute Regiment, and military advisers. Of all the officers and soldiers practically 

none of them knew the entire operations plan but each operated in his own narrow sector, actually in the role of an 

ordinary soldier. Therefore each of them had his own “target”, his own “bit” of the battle, his own “window”, his own 

“door”, his own “breastwork”, his own “stage [prolet]”, his own “ladder”, and his own “episode”. For a majority of 

them this was their “baptism of fire”, the first battle in their lives. Hence the gush of emotions in memories, the 

“clustering” of colors. Having ended up in an extreme situation each of them showed what he was worth and what he 

had done. Many performed their combat mission with honor, displaying heroism and courage. 

 

 

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