The story of US manipulation in 1964-1973 is in the US PLUSD cables that we wouldn’t have if it weren’t for Julian Assange – who is imprisoned by these same empires at the moment so take a moment to do whatever you can to
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What was the 1839 British war on Afghanistan about? Basically the British Empire, whose primary goal was squeezing what would eventually be $45 trillion out of India, destroyed Afghanistan to make it a “buffer zone” against any kind of incursion.
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They said they were worried about Russia but that’s nonsense – they were more worried about Iran and other Asian powers allying with those they were still working on completely dispossessing on the subcontinent itself.
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Dispossessing the whole of India was a job they completed in 1857, at the cost of 10 million lives in India (covered in episodes 20a and 20b of Civilizations).
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Once they decided that Afghanistan was a “buffer zone”, they then had to ensure its compliance through more wars. The Second Anglo-Afghan War in 1878-9, another round of atrocities, and Britain imposed a humiliating treaty of Gandamak on Afghanistan.
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Like other humiliating treaties the imperialists were imposing across North America and Asia at the time, the Gandamak Treaty basically gave Britain control over Afghanistan’s foreign policy.
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In 1893, Durand goes to Kabul and divides the Pashtun lands of Asia into the British India side and the Afghanistan side ("The Durand Line"), setting up centuries of conflict.
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In 1919, the Third Anglo Afghan War. Modernizer Amanullah Khan wins the war and wins back control of foreign policy.
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From 1919-1929, Amanullah tries to modernize and develop independently. He’s overthrown in a British backed regime-change operation and a series of short-lived rulers follow, until king Zahir Shah takes the throne in 1933.
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Zahir Shah is also a modernizer type, who rules from 1933-1973. All the European powers are present, in various development aid capacities, including the USSR.
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From 1964-1973, there’s a famous “democratic opening”, which the US takes advantage of to exercise influence over pro-US Afghan politicians and try to exclude left-wing politicians.
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Zahir Shah’s cousin Daud Khan was one of the modernizing leaders holding various portfolios including defense minister and prime minister. He opposed the Durand line and wanted Pashtunistan, which upset Pakistan.
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Pakistan, which has a bigger Pashtun population than Afghanistan does, came to associate Afghan nationalism with the Pashtunistan proposal (which would take away a big chunk of Pakistan’s land and tens of millions of people).
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So Pakistan from the 1970s on found it useful to sponsor the Islamic tendencies in Afghan politics as an alternative.
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During the “democratic opening” of 1964-1973, Daud was excluded from political office because the constitution barred the royal family from participating.
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The constitution also didn’t allow political parties, but a strong left-wing political party did form (People’s Democratic Party), and had to operate more or less clandestinely.
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In 1973, Daud overthrew the constitution in a coup. There is evidence in the cables that the US were themselves planning a coup to counter the growing influence of left-wing politics.
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In 1978, Daud himself was overthrown by the left-wing, and Muhammad Taraki became president.
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Co-founder of this Saur Revolution was Hafizullah Amin. I’ve read two diametrically opposed views of Amin in two books. One by Phil Bonosky, and the other by Beverly Male. Bonosky says Amin was a CIA asset; Male says he was a good revolutionary.
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Here’s the timeline: Taraki is president from April 1978-September 1979. Then he’s killed (maybe by Amin). Then Amin takes over from September 1979-December 1979, when he is also killed (maybe by Soviet troops, who invade).
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During the Taraki year and a half, there was a land reform, which was very popular with farmers and very unpopular with landlords.
Continuity: Taraki, like Daud Khan, kept up the "modernizing" efforts that Amanullah and Zahir Shah had made.
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The US began to organize the landlords straight away, in exile, in a familiar pattern if you know Central America, Cuba, Haiti, in these decades.
You can read about it in Steve Coll, and the like.
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Basically it’s a violent regime change campaign, which Pakistan is happy to sponsor and which the other US allies also sponsor. The Afghan government calls for Soviet help, and the Soviets are in a position to aid the regime (unlike in the Americas).
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From 1979-1989, Afghanistan becomes the epicenter of a US-supported insurgency against the Afghan government and its Russian ally.
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You know this part of the story from US pop culture, but as usual, what you know is full of myths. It wasn’t the magic of stinger missiles, for example. How could it be? The Afghan government that was just overthrown had more advanced weaponry than stinger missiles.
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Myths of magic weaponry aside, there's 10 years of lavishly US-supported insurgency, unlimited support from the open border with Pakistan, the organization and reorganization of an international fighting force of "mujahadeen" under various commanders.
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The commanders later came to be known as warlords, each with one or more external sponsor, and their war on the government took an immense toll.
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When the USSR collapsed in 1989, its troops also left. The Afghan government held on, though, until 1992, when Yeltsin basically made a deal with the Americans to stop all supply to Russia’s ally, Afghanistan.
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Had Putin made such a deal over Syria in 2015, Syria would be owned by the Islamic State today.
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So it was that in 1992 the US-sponsored insurgents finally toppled the Afghan government (“communists”) and proceeded to cleanse the country of “communism” and also nationalism of the Daud-variety.
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Then the mujahadeen applied their expertise at sabotage, atocity, and state destruction on the areas of the country that they hadn’t controlled. Did you think the warlords created to destroy the state were going to build one?
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Many warlords were content to control their areas – these are names you have been hearing recently of people fleeing or being captured like Ismail Khan (Herat), Rashid Dostum & Atta Mohammad Noor (Mazar).
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But in 1992 two warlords in particular wanted control of Kabul and couldn’t agree – one was Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and the other was Burnuhuddin Rabbani (and Ahmad Shah Massoud). They fought over Kabul.
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Hekmatyar was kicked out and proceeded to shell Kabul from outside. The fight over Kabul destroyed the city and whatever was left undestroyed by the 1979-1992 phase of the war between 1992-1996.
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This is where the Taliban start. The Taliban were the next generation, raised entirely during war and by the Islamists with no influence from nationalism or communism (which had been cleansed from public memory).
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Backed by Pakistan, the Taliban positioned themselves against the atrocities and chaos of the warlords as austere proponents of law and order.
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Starting in Pakistan, they took Kandahar, and advanced from 1992-1996 until they took Kabul. It was only after they took Kabul in 1996 that the communist president until 1992, Najibullah, was killed (publicly hanged in an awful photograph you’ll see around the web).
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In 2001, the US invaded and re-organized the warlords into the Northern Alliance. The Taliban retreated to Pakistan.
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The US put the warlords back into power in Kabul and imposed their own candidate, Hamid Karzai, under an Afghan-American viceroy, Zalmay Khalilzad.
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For the next 20 years, Karzai and then his successor, Ghani, ruled over the warlords, and the US, through Khalilzad, over them.
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The US treated Afghanistan as a video gameworld for practicing drone warfare, protected the opium trade, and committed continuous atrocities, including hunting Afghans for sport, while making it a playground for private contractors and NGOs.
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