NAJIBULLAH. I repeat the idea I told you, that the present economic difficulties of the Soviet Union are the problems of a transitional period and problems of growth. I am confident that the efforts of the Soviet leadership in the very near fu- | ture will turn the development of the situation around in the direction of an improvement. As regards Afghanistan, then we are already prepared for mutually beneficial collaboration with the Soviet Union, although in insignificant amounts for the time being. In no way are we interested in the Afghan people being perceived simply as a consumer and nothing more. And, all the same, for the next two-three years the development of the situation in Afghanistan will as before depend to a large degree on your policy. Some words about Pakistan. As is well known, Pakistan is an artificially created country within whose boundaries they have tried to create a single nation on a common religious basis. M. S. GORBACHEV. R. Gandhi, too, gave such an assess ment. NAJIBULLAH. Pakistan can be compared to a boiling kettle which is full of various contradictions and antagonisms religious, national, and ethnic. In order to keep this "kettle” from exploding Pakistani leaders are trying to let off the "steam" of public dissatisfaction, diverting the attention of their people to problems of an external nature. At one time it seized upon the Afghan problem eagerly and actively heated it up. At the present time the Kashmir issue has become a safety valve. For decades the military has decided and dictated the policy of Pakistan. And even after B. Bhutto came to power the policy of the Pakistani administration regarding Afghanistan remained unchanged: it was only sort of dressed "in civilian clothes." Nevertheless, right now when Pakistan is allied [zaangazhirovan] with Saudi Arabia in connection with the conflict in the Persian Gulf and when Pakistani-Indian relations have sharply heated up, it's evidently possible to expect some slackening of attention by Pakistan toward the Afghan problem. In conclusion, I would like to thank you, Mikhail Sergeyevich, for the constant attention to Afghanistan and the support and aid which the Soviet leadership and all the Soviet people are giving us in our efforts to achieve peace and stop the war in Afghanistan. Everything that I said about the importance of Soviet assistance to those Afghan forces which have tied their fate to Afghan-Soviet friendship in no way means that I am concerned about my personal well-being. I assure you that I am ready to sacrifice not only my post but even my life in the interests of Afghanistan and the interests of our friendship. M. S. GORBACHEV. The truth is that neither President Najibullah nor Gorbachev need much. The main thing are the interests of our peoples and governments. I thank you for the interesting and well-reasoned analy sis of the military and political situation in Afghanistan. I follow the development of events in Afghanistan closely but I consider it quite useful to supplement and deepen my impressions with the view of the Afghan leadership. I completely share your ideas about the interests of Afghanistan and the Soviet Union coinciding in strategic terms. I add to this that during the ten years of close collaboration our countries have experienced a drama together and sealed the bonds connecting the peoples of the two countries with blood. The duty of the Afghan and Soviet leaderships is to protect and develop the good traditions of relations between the Soviet Union and Afghanistan based on the coinciding interests and existing foundations of friendship. These should determine the specific content of our policy and its application. Indeed, in present conditions the aid of the Soviet Union to your country can and should have another nature and be implemented in a different scale. In this context we note your statements about the possibilities of giving bilateral collaboration a mutually beneficial character. Obviously we need to move forward in this direction. In a word, there are all the prerequisites for continuing collaboration between our countries, helping Afghanistan finish the great cause it has begun there and preserve the long-standing friendship between the Soviet and Afghan peoples in the future. I stress again - we are not in favor of a discontinuance but in a normal development of relations. In this connection I welcome your desire to meet with I. S. Belousov with whom you can discuss specific issues of Soviet-Afghan collaboration. We will also continue our support in terms of advancing a peaceful settlement of the situation in and around Afghanistan. This is urgently needed so that the cause to which we have given so much is successfully concluded in the interests of our countries. EH.A. SHEVARDNADZE. Cde. Najibullah, we would like to suggest to you that you speak on national television or meet with representatives of the Soviet press. I think that such a speech of yours would be useful, considering the great interest in Afghanistan in our country. NAJIBULLAH. I will use this opportunity with pleasure. EH.A. SHEVARDNADZE. Cde. Najibullah, in connection with your upcoming visit to India we think it important that you try to bring the Indians to some specific agreements, for example, in the area of economics. NAJIBULLAH. I agree with your ideas, although to be sure, I think that it will be difficult to do this. The Indian side, proceeding from their own interests in connection with Kashmir, is stubbornly trying to involve Afghanistan in opposing Pakistan but it is not trying very eagerly to give specific support to settling the Afghan problem. M. S. GORBACHEV. Concluding our conversation I would like to note that the exchange of opinions was exceptionally useful, in my view. The main thing is that we wound our political clocks, figuratively speaking. I wish you success in your work for the good of the Afghan people. NOTES 1 Editor's note: Excerpts from this meeting have been previously published in CWIHP Bulletin 8/9 (Winter 1996/1997), pp. 178-181; and Anatoly Chernyaev, My Six Years with Gorbachev, translated and edited by Robert English and Elizabeth Tucker (University Park, PA: Penn State University Press, 2000), pp. 89-90. 2 King Mohammad Zahir Shah abdicated in August 1973 and had since lived in Italy. Also spelled mujahedin, mujahedeen, or mujahidin. Editor's note: A slightly different version of these notes have appeared in Anatoly Chernyaev, My Six Years with Gorbachev, translated and edited by Robert English and Elizabeth Tucker (University Park, PA: Penn State University Press, 2000), pp. 89-90. 5 Editor's note: a waqf is a religious endowment Also spelled Hikmatyar. 7 On 18 October 1987, Yunus Khalis [Khales] was elected spokesman of the seven-party mujaheddin alliance. Several rounds of UN-sponsored talks on Afghanistan between Pakistani and Afghan officials had taken place in Geneva since June 1982. The tenth round of the negotiations opened in Geneva on 26 February 1987. 'George P. Shultz visited Moscow (as well as Kiev, and Tbilisi) on 21-24 April 1988 to discuss preparations for the U.S.-Soviet summit meeting in May. 10 On 8 February 1988, in a statement that was read by a broadcaster over national television interrupting regular broadcasting, Gorbachev announced that Soviet troops would begin pulling out of Afghanistan on 15 May if a settlement could be reached two months before that date, and that a withdrawal would be complete no more than ten months after it started. See Philip Taubman, “Soviet Sets May 15 as Goal to Start Afghanistan Exit," New York Times, 9 February 1988, pg. A1. For the full text of Gorbachev's statement, see ibid., pg. A14. 11 On 12 November 1893 Sir Henry Mortimer Durand, foreign secretary to the government of India, and Amir Abdur (Abdul) Rahman signed an agreement in Kabul that defined the borderline between Afghanistan and then British India. In 1979 the Afghan parliament repudiated the Durand Agreement. 12 In early 1988, ethnic disturbances and unrest occurred in Armenia and Azerbaijan. 13 The Nineteenth Party Congress took place in Moscow from 28 June to 1 July 1988. On the importance of the Congress, see Archive Brown, The Gorbachev Factor (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), chapter 6. 14 Najibullah addressed the UN General Assembly on 7 June 1988. Najibullah warned that continued violations by Pakistan of the Geneva accord on Afghanistan could force a delay in the agreed timetable for Soviet troop withdrawal. See The Washington Post, 8 June 1988, p. A22. 15 Gilani [Gailani] became spokesman for the seven-member mujaheddin alliance on 15 June 1988. 16 Muhammad Hassan Sharq was appointed Prime Minister on 26 May 1988, replacing Sultan Ali Keshtmand, who became secretary of the PDPA Central Committee. See Ludwig A. Adamec, Dictionary of Afghan Wars, Revolutions and Insurgencies (London: the Scarecrow Press, 1996), p. 305. 17 Gorbachev gave a speech in the Odessa military district on 17 August 1990. 18 The meeting between Shevardnadze and Baker took place from 31 July-2 August 1990 in Irkutsk. 19 Benazir Bhutto was forced to resign in August 1990. 20 In 6 March 1990 Defense Minister Lt. Gen. Shahnawaz Tanay, with the alleged support of the air force and some divisions of the army, leads an unsuccessful coup attempt against Najibullah's government. 21 Basmachestvo" is the term for the anti-Soviet nationalist movement against Soviet rule in Central Asia during this period. New Documents Released: "China and the Warsaw Pact in the 1970-1980s" Document Reader for the International Seminar 24-26 March 2004, Beijing/China D archives, and cw ocuments have been obtained by Parallel History Project (PHP) associates Oldrich Tuma from former Czechoslovak archives, and Mihail Ionescu from Romanian archives, and Senior CWIHP Scholar Bernd Schäfer from former East German archives, in preparation for the International Seminar on "China and the Warsaw Pact in the 1970-1980s," to be hosted on 24-26 March 2004 in Beijing. The seminar will be co-sponsored by the Modern History Research Center and Archives and the School of International Relations, both at Peking University, and the Center for Archival Studies of the Institute for the Study of the History of the Communist Party of China. The documents are available in facsimile on the Parallel History Project website, (http://www.isn.ethz.ch/ php) and the Cold War International History Project website (http://cwihp.si.edu). English translations of some of the documents have been provided by Karen Riechert, through the CWIHP, and by Viorel Nicolae Buta through the PHP. KGB Active Measures in Southwest Asia in 1980-82 By Vasiliy Mitrokhin [Editor's Note: The following materials were presented by former KGB archivist Vasiliy Mitrokhin to the participants of the April 2002 CWIHP conference "Towards an International History of the War in Afghanistan, 1979-1989." (See Section introduction above.) Mitrokhin, who became known in the West in 1999 when he coauthored with Christopher Andrew The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB,1 brought with him six cases of notes when he defected to Britain in 1992. In these cases were the details of the operations of the KGB and other Soviet intelligence gathering organizations going back to 1918. The 1999 volume provided an overview of some of these materials as regarding operations in the United States and Western Europe. In early 2002, CWIHP published Mitrokhin's The KGB in Afghanistan (edited by Christian Ostermann and Odd Arne Westad) as Working Paper No. 40, written after he retired from the KGB in 1984.2 (Mitrokhin revised and rewrote the Afghanistan manuscript in 1986-87; then destroyed the original notes.) Mitrokhin's compilation on Soviet "active measures” in South and Southwest Asia is based on other smuggled-out notes and was prepared especially for the Afghanistan conference. Most of the materials Mitrokhin brought to the West consist of notes which he had carefully assembled over several years while working in the archives of the KGB First Chief Directorate (FCD) in Yasenovo outside Moscow. Mitrokhin had moved from the operational side of the FCD to its archives in late 1956, where it was his job to respond to requests by other departments. Influenced by the harsh suppression of the Prague Spring in 1968 and the dissident movement-all of which he could follow through the files he administered as well as Western records-Mitrokhin became increasingly disaffected with the KGB. By the early seventies he had decided to compile his own account of the KGB's foreign operations, a project that became feasible when he was put in charge in 1972 of the movement of the FCD archives from the KGB's headquarters at Lubyanka in central Moscow to Yasenevo southwest of the capital Moscow.3 In charge of checking, compiling, and indexing the records in the process of the transfer, which began in 1974, Mitrokhin soon conceived of the idea to create his own archive. Starting in 1977, he used every opportunity to take notes of the documents he saw. Proceeding in complete secrecy, he first took these notes in longhand while working in the archives and later, once safely in his dacha, sorted and transcribed them.^ Vasiliy Mitrokhin, who passed away in January 2004, would be the first to point out that his notes captured only a small part of the totality of documents; his decade-long work in the archive was a "massive filtering exercise," with a flood of documents coming through his hands on a daily basis. The documents he saw were mostly informational cables from the First Directorate to the Politburo and Foreign Ministry, a copy of which went to the archives after a month. By no means is this manuscript therefore a complete record. Though the materials provided earlier by Mitrokhin seem to fit with available documents from other archives, historians and others will continue to assess the significance and authenticity of these materials until the original notes become fully accessible. Mitrokhin's notes on the original documents are clearly not the same as original documents (or copies thereof), but, short of full access to the the archives of the former KGB and other Soviet intelligence agencies, they will remain one of our most intriguing and valuable sources on Soviet intelligence operations.-Christian F. Ostermann] A The intervention of Soviet forces in Afghanistan in December 1979 provoked sharp protests from the world community. The KGB took various measures, including some involving disinformation, to neutralize the negative response and distract attention from the activities of the USSR and its forces in Afghanistan. The KGB devised a doctrine according to which the choice of means to combat the adversary did not depend on the KGB but was dictated by necessity, by the adversary's conduct; therefore any KGB activities were supposedly legitimate and justified. ["]Disinformation is regarded as one of the instruments of CPSU policy; it is an integral, indispensable, and secret element of intelligence work. It not only serves the interests of our own people but also those of working people throughout the world; it represents one of the forms of international assistance to progressive mankind and is radically different in essence from the disinformation to which Western agencies resort in order to deceive public opinion. KGB disinformation operations are progressive; they are designed to mislead, not the working people but their enemies - the ruling circles of capitalism, in order to induce them to act in a certain way, or abstain from actions contrary to the interests of the USSR; they promote peace and social progress; they serve international détente; they are humane, creating the conditions for the noble struggle for humanity's bright fu ture.["] ["]The main value of all Active Measures lies in the fact that it is difficult to check the veracity of the information conveyed and to identify the real source. Their effectiveness is expressed as a coefficient of utility, when minimum expenditure and effort achieves maximum end results. Forms of disinformation basically fall into three groups-documentary (written); non-documentary (oral); demonstrative.["] ["]In KGB Residencies, the Residents are personally responsible for work relating to Active Measures. In large residencies, Active Measures constitute an autonomous direction of intelligence work; specialists in this kind of work are assigned to it. The KGB Chairman's Order No 0066 of 12 April 1982 required all FCD [First Chief Directorate] departments and personnel to participate in devising and carrying out Active Measures; young officers were to be given a taste for such work; Active Measures were to be regarded as one of the basic forms of intelligence activity. Officers of Service A were to display initiative and ability to act independently when solving both simple and complex questions. Anyone who had to be told day by day what he was to do was unsuitable for this kind of work.["] B In February 1980, Andropov approved a KGB plan of action relating to Pakistan which specified the following: 1. Through KGB SCD [Second Chief Directorate] assets, a warning is to be conveyed to the Pakistan Mission in Moscow to the effect that if a sensible line does not prevail in [Pakistani leader] Zia-ul Haq's political course, and Pakistan agrees under pressure from the US and China to turn its territory into a base for permanent armed struggle against Afghanistan, the Oriental Studies Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences will be instructed to study ways of exploiting the Baluchi and Pushtun movements in Pakistan, as well as internal opposition to the country's military regime, in the interests of the security of the frontiers of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan (DRA). 2. Using operational-technical means, 500 copies of leaflets produced at the Center are to be disseminated in Islamabad and Karachi; some of these, issued in the name of a group of Pakistani Army officers, sharply criticize the government's internal and external policy, which is leading to a constant deterioration of the country's material situation. 3. Three hundred leaflets codenamed 'SARDAR' are to be produced, demonstrating to the administration that there is extreme dissatisfaction with its policy in public and military circles. 4. Information is to be planted in the local press in Pakistan to the effect that the ruling regime is artificially whipping up the atmosphere relating to events in Afghanistan with the object of building up the Pakistani Army, further increasing its influence in the country, and maintaining the ban on the activities of political parties and organisation for an indefinite period. 5. In Bangkok, information is to be conveyed to the Pakistan Mission to the effect that within the Carter Administration there are doubts about the utility of further increases in military assistance to Pakistan, given the Ziaul Haq regime's unpopularity in the country. [US] Secretary of State [Cyrus] Vance and his assistants consider that, in order to avert another major failure of US foreign policy, it is imperative to seek to replace the dictatorship with another regime which would guarantee stability in Pakistan. 6. In India, information is to be conveyed to Prime Minister Gandhi to the effect that Pakistan is not satisfied with the insignificant scope of American military assistance and the condition imposed on it to abstain from exploding a nuclear device while the American assistance program is in force. The leaders of Pakistan intend to continue to whip up hysteria over the events in Afghanistan in order to obtain a significant increase in military assistance from the US and the lifting of restrictions on the development of the nuclear program. 7. Through the UN leadership, information is to be conveyed to representatives of Iran to the effect that, in return for growing military assistance to Pakistan, the US is seeking to be granted military bases on Pakistani territory, including in Baluchistan, in close proximity to the Iranian frontier. The leaders of Pakistan are inclined to make concessions to the Americans on this issue. 8. In various circles in member countries of the Nonaligned Movement steps are to be taken to discredit Pakistan's foreign policy, emphasizing that it has breached the basic principles of the Non-aligned Movement, as the leaders of Pakistan have allowed the US and China, two of the great powers, to turn the country into an instrument of their policy in Asia. 9. In India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal, Indonesia, Jordan, Italy and France, there is to be continued publication of materials about the direct involvement of the Pakistani special services and military servicemen in organizing armed interference in the internal affairs of Afghanistan.["] On 2 September 1980, [KGB chief Vladimir] Kryuchkov approved an extension of the above plan. A Working Group was set up under the Deputy Head of the KGB FCD, V.A. Chukhrov, with representatives from Directorates K and RT, Service 1 and Service A, and Departments 8, 17 and 20. The Group was tasked to devise complex agent measures, coordinate the joint actions of all FCD Sections, and monitor implementation. The Head of the Third Department of Service A, Colonel Yu. V Rykhlov, coordinated and concerted the implementation of Active Measures, as a member of the Chukhrov Working Group. In February 1981, the Working Group devised a wideranging operational plan code-named 'TORKHAM.' This was to be carried out in various countries, in accordance with individual plans which included the following elements: compromise the Zia-ul Haq regime; weaken the positions of the US and China in Pakistan; exacerbate relations with Iran; intensify and deepen disagreements between India and Pakistan on existing disputed issues; inspire new irritants in IndoPakistan relations; reinforce the antipathy and suspicion felt by Indira Gandhi and other Indian leaders towards Zia-ul Haq personally; compromise him in the eyes of the Muslims of India and other countries in the world; induce the government of India to seek to secure the end of Pakistan's support for the Afghan rebels; step up the activities of Pakistani émigrés and of the nationalist movement, particularly in Baluchistan; disrupt Afghan émigré organizations; intensify the local population's hostility towards Afghan refugees. Information was to be conveyed to India and Iran to the effect that by building up its military potential Pakistan was in fact preparing for aggression not only against Afghanistan, but also against India and Iran. India was to be told that Zia-ul Haq was giving Afghan refugees an anti-Indian outlook and using Afghan emissaries to conduct activities favorable to Pakistan in India. The plan also provided for intensified anti-Pakistan propaganda directed at India and other countries abroad, and the setting up of a Committee for the return to India of the Pakistan-occupied part of Kashmir. Disinformation was to be conveyed to Gandhi on joint operations by the US, Pakistan and the People's Republic of China to destabilize the situation in Jammu and Kashmir. In Bangladesh, the aim was to impede actions by the Zia-ur Rakhman regime in support of the Afghan counterrevolution, and to intensify disagreements between Bangladesh and Pakistan on such disputed issues as the repatriation of Pakistani citizens, the division of banking assets and so on, and the responsibility of Pakistan's ruling circles for the economic backwardness of Bangladesh. The aim was to impede the activities of the US, Pakistan and the People's Republic of China relating to the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan.In 1981-82, the following Active Measures were envisaged within the framework of the 'TORKHAM' operation: [“] I • Produce a leaflet in Urdu sharply criticizing the Pakistan regime and its cooperation with the US, from the standpoint of local religious (Shiite) circles. Implicate the Iranian authorities in the production of the leaflet by including in the text appropriate comments by Khomeini about Zia-ul Haq. Implementation: posting the leaflet to various establishments, newspapers and foreign missions in Islamabad, and scattering copies in Karachi. • In the name of a fictitious grouping in the Pakistani armed forces, disseminate leaflets (in English, as part of the 'SARDAR' series) from which it could be concluded that there is growing dissatisfaction among the military about Zia-ul Haq's policy of redirecting Pakistan towards conflict with the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan [“] II and India, and subordinating the country to foreign interests- those of the US and China. These leaflets to be disseminated in Islamabad and Karachi. Using available models, produce a 'personal letter' from Pakistan's Home Affairs Minister, Mahmud Harun, who represents the Shiite minority in the government, to the Iranian leader, Imam Khomeini. Indicate in the letter that Zia-ul Haq intends to take severe new measures to restrict the activity of Shiites in Pakistan, and that they [the Shiites] appeal to their Iranian brethren for help to avert this threat. Send a photocopy of the letter, with a covering note from 'a well wisher' to one of the leaders of Pakistan's military special service. • Complete the elaboration of proposals for exploiting the separatist movement of Pakistani Baluchis and Pakistani opposition forces located in the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. • Place compromising material in the press of various countries.["] • Promote by all means an intensification of the Pakistani population's hostility towards Afghan refugees and the disruption of the Afghan emigration in Pakistan. • Disseminate disinformation in the Pakistani community to the effect that in reality the Zia-ul Haq regime is not seeking to solve the Afghan refugee problem and would like to turn it into a permanent feature. The presence of refugees from the DRA gives the government the possibility of obtaining substantial material assistance, isolating the Baluchi and Pushtun nationalist movement and increasing the severity of the central authorities' control in districts where they mainly located. • Convey information to Pakistani government and journalistic circles to the effect that some leaders of the Afghan emigration, such as [radical Islamist mujaheddin (Hizb-i Islami) leader] G[ulbuddin] Hekmatyar and N. Mohammad, who seek to keep Pushtun tribes under their influence, are promising to help them to set up an independent Pushtunistan on the territory of Pakistan and Afghanistan. • Convey information to the Pakistani special services to the effect that a significant portion of the weapons reaching the Afghan refugees is sold on to activists and officials of opposition political parties who have established permanent undeclared contact with leading personalities within the Afghan counter-revolutionary emigration in Pakistan. • Through the country's press, disseminate information about growing disagreements among the leaders of Afghan emigration in Pakistan, their dissatisfaction with the Zia-ul Haq administration, and their attempts to develop cooperation with the special services of the US, the People's Republic of China, Saudi Arabia, out of the Pakistani authorities' control. |