Afghanistan: The Soviet Invasion and the Afghan Response, 1979-1982 [Paperback]

Mohammed Kakar (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 3, 1997

Few people are more respected or better positioned to speak on the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan than M. Hassan Kakar. A professor at Kabul University and scholar of Afghanistan affairs at the time of the 1978 coup d'état, Kakar vividly describes the events surrounding the Soviet invasion in 1979 and the encounter between the military superpower and the poorly armed Afghans. The events that followed are carefully detailed, with eyewitness accounts and authoritative documentation that provide an unparalleled view of this historical moment.
Because of his prominence Kakar was at first treated with deference by the Marxist government and was not imprisoned, although he openly criticized the regime. When he was put behind bars the outcry from scholars all over the world possibly saved his life. In prison for five years, he continued collecting information, much of it from prominent Afghans of varying political persuasions who were themselves prisoners.
Kakar brings firsthand knowledge and a historian's sensibility to his account of the invasion and its aftermath. This is both a personal document and a historical one--Kakar lived through the events he describes, and his concern for human rights rather than party politics infuses his writing. As Afghans and the rest of the world try to make sense of Afghanistan's recent past, Kakar's voice will be one of those most listened to.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

The Soviet ten-year debacle (1979-89) in Afghanistan has generated a growing literature represented recently by Diego Cordovez and Selig Harrison's Out of Afghanistan (LJ 5/15/95) and now by Kakar's sophisticated analysis. The author is a well-respected Afghan historian who has published several volumes detailing Afghan history and who spent five years in a Kabul prison for his outspoken opposition to the Soviet occupation. From someone who has for years lived and studied Afghan society, culture, and politics, readers gain a deeper understanding of the complex issues that led to this conflict. Especially useful is the author's appendix, which contains short biographies of all the major Afghan participants. Kakar sadly relates that by the time the Soviets withdrew in 1989, "every ninth Afghan had died, every seventh (or eighth) has been disabled, every third had fled abroad." How much of this episode contributed to the ultimate demise of the Soviet Union is open to debate. What remains clear, however, is that it was a tragedy in every sense of the word. From Kakar the true horror of this unfortunate conflict is revealed. Recommended for all collections.?Ed Goedeken, Iowa State Univ. Lib., Ames
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From the Inside Flap

"The times Kakar writes about have . . . pervasively influenced every life in Afghanistan. . . . He was continuously faced with different versions of the Afghan experience as his country went through one of the great cataclysms of its history. We are fortunate to have his account."--Robert Canfield, editor of Turko-Persia in Historical Perspective

"This is the first history of recent events in Afghanistan by a native historian trained in London. Kakar writes objectively about the Soviets, the Afghan government, and the Mujahideen. With personal observations, including years spent in Kabul's notorious Pul-i Charkhi prison, this book is unique in revealing many events hitherto not known or recorded. It will remain a standard work on . . . contemporary Afghanistan."--Richard N. Frye, Harvard University

"Kakar, one of Afghanistan's most distinguished scholars, has provided an outstanding account of a complex and interesting phase of modern Afghanistan history. . . . A fascinating and absorbing analysis . . . exhaustive and most valuable."--Vartan Gregorian, President, Brown University

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 392 pages
• Publisher: University of California Press (March 3, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0520208935
• ISBN-13: 978-0520208933
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #463,592 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Afghanistan: The Soviet Invasion and the Afghan Response, 1, July 27, 2001

By 

Daniel Pipes, Middle East Forum, Philadelphia (Philadelphia, PA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Afghanistan: The Soviet Invasion and the Afghan Response, 1979-1982 (Hardcover)

Kakar is that rare and unhappy intellectual fated to an eventful life. An Afghan who studied and published in the West, then became a prominent professor of history at Kabul University, his opposition to the Soviet invasion got him arrested by the communist regime in 1982. Kakar spent the next five years in the notorious Pul-e-Charkhi prison, during which he had horrible experiences and witnessed even worse ones. Kakars own life was spared, perhaps because of the interest in his case generated by American colleagues and Amnesty International. Upon release, he fled to Pakistan; and in 1989 he immigrated to the United States, where he now lives (in San Diego).

Afghanistan is a monument of scholarship by an individual who lived closely through the events described (he tells of going onto his roof, for example, to watch the Soviet troops storm the presidential palace in 1979). Kakar kept a journal over the three years 1979-82 that exceeds one thousand pages; he also used his time in prison to interview a wide range of inmates. Much of his information is new and his interpretations fresh. At the same time, his is a work of unabashed passion. The author presents a fiercely partisan history of his country, for example justifying the increasingly close contacts with the Soviet Union from the 1950s on, while presenting the Russian invasion as a bitter act of betrayal. As for the United States, he believes Americans have a moral responsibility to the Afghans, and it is now time for them to assist in transforming the poisonous culture into a healthy one. Indeed, this is more a threat than an appeal, for Kakar ends his tome with a warning that the poisonous culture . . . may grow too great to ignore: in addition to the British graveyard in Afghanistan and the Soviet one, he warns there may also one day be an American one....

14 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The story of Afghan genocide at the hands of the Soviets., December 26, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Afghanistan: The Soviet Invasion and the Afghan Response, 1979-1982 (Paperback)

A professor of history at the University of California at San Diego, Hassan Kakar's scholarly work on the dark days of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan reveals the horrors of the war for those not present to experience it first hand. Meticulously documented, the book provides a detailed account of genocide by the Soviets, and the unspeakable torture of Afghans by KhAD, the Afghan government's agency of terror. While the Soviets killed over one million Afghans one village at a time, KhAD tried to break the will of the resistance in Kabul, brutalizing the proud Afghans in the overcrowded dungeons of Pul-e-Charkhi prison. Kakar speaks from personal experience, since he spent many years there as a prisoner of conscience.

The author reviews the period prior to the Soviet invasion, recounts the events and forces at work immediately prior to it, and provides an analysis of why the invasion occurred. That Brezhnev and a handful of Kremlin leaders erred is indisputably a contributing factor to the Soviet implosion which was to follow little more than a decade later. The Afghan resistence to communist rule began on a small scale shortly after the April 1978 coup by Taraki. Nationalist resistance organizations and Islamic resistence efforts gathered momentum in the years after, succeeding eventually - to the astonishment of the world. Kakar documents the "scorched earth" military policy of the Soviet invaders throughout rural Afghanistan and in the areas around Kabul.

The Afghan tragedy continued after the last US-supplied Stinger missile had been fired by the uncommonly brave Afghan mujahideen. As the Soviets withdrew, political machinations within the Pakistan based resistence groups intensified, exacerbated by foreign interference. Kakar's epilogue examines the fratricidal period following the Soviet withdrawal, and creates the context for understanding the emergence of the Taliban movement of today.Political organizations, biographical sketches, data on refugees, and the text of a 1979 telephone conversation between Kosygin and Taraki are provided in the appendices. Detailed notes and bibliography provide writers and researchers tools for further elaboration of the Afghan tragedy, the holocaust of the 1980s.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Clinical and Concise Read, December 31, 2005

By 

James Mone (Los Angeles, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Afghanistan: The Soviet Invasion and the Afghan Response, 1979-1982 (Paperback)

This book is a wonderful a study of the soviet-afghan conflict from 1979 to 1982. Those looking for a shoot-em up tactical non-fiction novel like some of the products of the US involvement in Afghanistan need look elsewhere. This is a thorough academic study by an author with vast and first hand knowledge.

However, taken in the historical context, it provides some interesting perspective of the history of Afghanistan and it's state of near constant conflict.