NEAR EAST AND SOUTH ASIA REVIEW

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP87T00289R000200840001-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: T
• Document Page Count: 16
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 9, 2011
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: April 11, 1986
• Content Type: REPORT

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n Sceret
Near East and
South Asia Review
Supplement
11 April 1986
Directorate of
Intelligence
rJ
1 -1
'u i~~ r` t 1 a 1 1
54
NESA NESAR 86-009C
11 April 1986
Copy 2 6 2
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Near East and
South Asia Review
11 April 1986
Articles Iran and the Afghan Resistance: Fostering Revolution in 1
Iran is increasing its influence in the Hazarehjat region of central
Afghanistan, but Iran's attempts to establish a Khomeini-style
government in the Hazarehjat have increased fighting among local
Shia insurgents and prevented them from concentrating on fighting
Soviet and Afghan regime forces.
Iraq: Managing the Effects of Al Faw
Iraq has suffered a serious setback at Al Faw, but the reverse is
unlikely to destabilize the regime. Iraq's leaders exercise tight
control over the populace and will see to it that the defeat does not
generate unrest that might threaten the government)
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Some articles are preliminary views of a subject or speculative, but
the contents normally will be coordinated as appropriate with other
offices within CIA. Occasionally an article will represent the views
of a single analyst; these items will be designated as noncoordinated
views. Comments may be directed to the authors,
Top Secret
NESA NESAR 86-009C
11 April 1986
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Near East and
South Asia Review
Iran and the Afghan Resistance:
Fostering Revolution
in the Hazarehjat
Iran is increasing its influence in the Hazarehjat
region of central Afghanistan, where Tehran-backed
Shia resistance groups are in ascendance. Iran's
attempts to establish a Khomeini-style government in
the Hazarehjat have increased fighting among local
Shia resistance groups, as well as between Shia
insurgents and Sunni groups that transit the region. If
the gains of pro-Iranian groups in the Hazarehjat can
be sustained, Shia groups could concentrate on
fighting Soviet and Afghan regime forces.
The Hazarehjat is one of the most backward and
isolated regions of Afghanistan. Because of their
Mongoloid features, separate dialect, and minority
(Shia) religion, the Hazaras have traditionally been
regarded by other Afghans as the lowest social class.
the social
structure of this poor rural area is based on a tenant-
farming peasantry cultivating land for large
Tehran Increasingly Active
Recent evidence suggests that Iran has been
consolidating its control in the Hazarehjat region,
where Afghanistan's Shia community lives.
as part of a more
aggressive Iranian policy on Afghanistan launched
last year, Iran organized all Tehran-based Afghan
resistance groups under the Sazman-i-Nasr group
(Nasr), which it controls, and proposed a joint
Pakistani-Iranian committee on Afghanistan to
coordinate and exchange information.
Iran has also been more active in proselytizing in
central Afghanistan, and pro-Khomeini cassettes and
posters are widespread
As evidence of Moscow's concern over Iranian
subversive efforts in the Hazarehjat, Kabul protested
Iranian behavior twice since the disappointing visit in
February of Soviet First Deputy Foreign Minister
Korniyenko to Tehran. A week after Korniyenko's
departure, Kabul issued a formal protest to Iran for
sending a delegation of Iranian clerics into
landowners
success
Members of all classes of Hazara society who have
lived in Kabul tend to become Marxists or Islamic
revolutionaries, Many,
especially the Islamists, have returned to the region
and provided the leadership for the most radical of
the fundamentalist insurgent organizations: Sazman-
i-Nasr and Sepah-e Pasdaran. With little affection
for the traditional social institutions of the
Hazarehjat, the Islamists are attempting to foster
Iranian-style revolution-in our view, with some
Afghanistan to promote Islamic revolution-a
demarche we believe Moscow inspired in light of
gloating Iranian press reports of the clerics' "secret
mission" during Korniyenko's visit. The Afghan
Foreign Ministry, in an unusually strong protest last
month, complained again about Iran's subversive
behavior, including interference in Afghanistan's
internal affairs, border violations, and adverse
propaganda.
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NESA NESAR 86-009C
I i April /986-'
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Selected Insurgent Groups and Insurgent Transport Routes in Afghanistan
Boundary repraeantat~an ~a
nor necaas. _ authontatrve
Afghan mullahs
trained in Iran enjoy support at the highest levels of
the Tehran government, including Ayatollah
Khomeini and his designated successor Ayatollah
Montazeri, who favors an activist policy on
"counterrevolutionaries."
'ISLAMABAD 1 India
Fe
Adminl1hPraKI$tan
Tribal
Areas
Harakat-i-Islami
Sazman-i-Nasr
Shura- Ingilab - i - Itifaq-i-Islami
Area formerly controlled by Shura
a~N Selected insurgent transport route
Province boundary
Afghanistan. Moscow, for its part, recently publicly
charged Iran with operating 20 training camps for
How Important Is the Hazarehat?
The Hazarehjat has strategic value to the resistance.
Some insurgent groups active in western and northern
Afghanistan-such as Jamiat-i-Islami groups in
Herat, Balkh, and Kapisa Provinces-use supply
routes that pass through the area. The Hazarehjat's
terrain, moreover, provides the insurgents with a
natural redoubt from which to strike Soviet and
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Excerpts from Kabul's Foreign Ministry Statement
The Iranian Charge d Affaires in Kabul was
summoned to the Afghan Foreign Ministry on 3
March and handed an unusually strong protest.
Kabul complained that:
? During the current year (21 March 1985-20 March
1986) Afghan territory "has been violated 63 times
by the ground and airforces of the Islamic
Republic of Iran, as a result of which 20 people
have been killed, 245 people wounded, and 19
people abducted to Iran ... "
? "Despite repeated requests, the propaganda,
publicity, and organizational operations against the
Democratic Republic of Afghanistan have not been
reduced, but the hours of hostile broadcasting of
the Iranian radio and television against [us] have
been increased and ... are full of hostile articles
and concocted subjects against [us] ... "
? "The authorities and leaders of [Iran] have
expanded their interference in organizing,
provoking, and instigating the resident Afghans and
counterrevolutionary elements in Iran to such an
extent that religious leaders, instructed by the high
authorities, enter the territory of [Afghanistan] to
carry out unfriendly secret actions that the Iranian
media extensively publicize. Such actions are taken
at the instruction of such personalities as Ayatollah
Montazeri ... "
? "Some Iranian media ... admit that the Islamic
Republic of Iran gives broad material, financial,
political, and military assistance to the Afghan
counterrevolutionaries and exposes those persons
at the Presidency, the Prime Minister's Office, the
Ministry of Interior, and the Islamic
Revolutionary Guard who are in charge of and
oversee these actions. It is due to the involvement
of these authorities that the Afghan
counterrevolutionary bands have been organized in
Tehran, Qom, Mashhad, Yazd, Isfahan, and other
parts of Iran and are sent to Afghanistan for
murder, plunder, and subversion ... "
? "It has become necessary once again, in the light of
evidence and documents at hand, to state
[Afghanistan's] strongest protests to the Iranian
state [and to ask it to] reconsider its position and
method of approach ... and not allow, by
supporting reactionary and US-linked bands, to
take up positions within the ranks of US
imperialism and its collaborators ... "
? "The Democratic Republic of Afghanistan states
that, if the authorities in the Islamic Republic of
Iran do not cease, resolutely and effectively, the
course of their interference and aggressions in the
internal affairs of Afghanistan, conditions will be
imposed on us such that we shall defend our
national sovereignty and security at any cost. In
that case undoubtedly the responsibility for their
inevitable and dangerous consequences will rest
with the Islamic Republic of Iran. "
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Afghan convoys and installations on the highway
encircling the region. The Soviets would be at a
disadvantage during such assaults because the
region's mountainous terrain makes land transit
difficult and hampers effective helicopter support
operations.
To date, the resistance in central Afghanistan has not
played a significant role in the war effort. Attacks
against Soviet and Afghan Government forces have
been minimal. Much of the resistance's potential in
the Hazarehjat has not been fulfilled because of
fighting among the numerous Iranian-backed groups.
There also has been fighting between Shia groups and
the mainstream Sunni insurgents based in Pakistan
that seek to transit the region.
Major Resistance Groups
Four major Shia groups compete for power in the
Hazarehjat:
? Shura-Inqilabi-i-Itifaq-i-Islami (Shura) is a
traditionalist Hazara coalition of some 30 groups
that united during local uprisings in 1979 against
the Communist government. Once dominant in
central Afghanistan, its influence has declined
because of internal weaknesses that caused the
departure of many of its original member groups
and the growth of more revolutionary Iranian-
supported groups in the Hazarehjat.
? Harakat-i-Islami (Harakat). operates on the
periphery of the Hazarehjat region. It is the most
active in fighting the Soviets in the Qandahar
region. Shaykh Asif Mohseni, the head of Harakat,
is based in Qom but gets no arms from Iran. He is
highly suspicious of revolutionary Islamic doctrine,
and Harakat's relations with Iran have often been
strained because it has rebuffed Tehran's
"guidance,' The
group's members are mainly Tajik, Pushtun, and
Turkmen, with some Hazaras.
? Sazman-i-Nasr (Nasr), an Iranian-backed group,
seeks the establishment of a Khomeini-style society
in the Hazarehjat. Formed in 1972 by Shia students
in Kabul, it moved to Iran in 1979 and became
active in the Hazarehjat in 1980. We believe most
Hazaras who are attracted to Nasr view it as more
nationalist than pro-Iranian.
? Sepah-e Pasdaran (Pasdaran), the most
revolutionary of the Hazara resistance groups, is a
direct instrument of the Iranian Revolutionary
Guard, Its recruits
are young Hazaras, uprooted from the r villages,
often without family ties, and dissatisfied with the
traditional social structure in the Hazarehjat.
Relations With Other Resistance Groups
The Pakistan-based insurgent alliance has a history of
troublesome relations with Shia groups in the
Hazarehjat, partly because of Iranian meddling.
Iran instructed
Nasr to confiscate weapons and supplies from the
Hizbi Islami-Khalis faction and the Islamic Union for
the Liberation of Afghanistan in 1983-84.
Even Hizbi Islami faction leader Gulbuddin-whose
staunchly fundamentalist and anti-Western values
most closely mirror Iran's-is unhappy with Iran. He
objects to the low level of Iranian support for the
Pakistan-based resistance groups. Moreover, his
faction closed its offices in Iran last summer over
alleged Iranian mistreatment of Afghan refugees in
Mashhad
Individual Nasr commanders make ad hoc transit
arrangements with local Sunni commanders because
the Shias are not adequately supplied by Iran. The
arrangements often include the collection of "tolls"
from comparatively better supplied Sunni groups.
Nasr, for example, began cooperating with Jamiat
groups in Balkh Province under a 1984 agreement
with their now deceased commander Zabiullah Khan,
The
agreement provided for safe passage for Jamiat
convoys to Balkh and Jowzjan Provinces, in exchange
for a percentage of ammunition, medicine, and money
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for Shia commanders along the convoy route. The
system appeared to be working well in late 1985,
according to press reports
Revolutionary Groups Take the Lead
revolutionary groups backed by Iran-Nasr and
Pasdaran-have displaced those in the Hazarehjat
that are more traditionalist-a development we
believe will give Iran an important foothold in the
country.
Harakat groups from most of the region last year. The
pro-Iranian groups were well
discipline an were concentrating their attacks on
Afghan Government offices and military outposts.
The contest among the resistance groups for the
Hazarehjat is not over.
the Harakat still holds positions on the
outskirts the region, such as southern Balkh
Province. Jamiat leaders, moreover, increasingly
concerned about growing Iranian influence in eastern
Hazarehjat because of the potential threat to their
supply routes, were considering collaborating with
Shura forces last fall to regain control of the region,
Implications
For the Mainstream Resistance. We do not expect the
movement of resistance forces and supplies through
the Hazarehjat-which has always depended on local
and somewhat fragile arrangements-to become
significantly more difficult. Because Iranian materiel
support is minimal, we believe Shia insurgents have
come to rely on Sunni groups that transit the area for
supplies and weapons. Only a major breakthrough in
the Iran-Iraq war, which would allow a significant
increase in Iranian materiel support for Shia groups in
groups will probably not make a substantial difference
to the course of the war until Nasr and Pasdaran can
consolidate their position. Shia groups could then
concentrate on fighting Soviet and regime forces-a
development we believe would be a major step toward
opening a front west of Kabul. Soviet-Afghan forces
now have only two outposts in the region-at
Chaghcharan and Bamian-but a significant increase
of antiregime activity would force them to increase
more garrisons
For a Peace Settlement. Growing Iranian control and
intervention in Afghanistan would further complicate
progress toward a settlement, in our view. Fear of
rising pro-Iranian fundamentalism in Afghanistan
was one of the reasons for the Soviet invasion and
remains an important Soviet motivation.F_
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Afghanistan, would alter this assessment.
For the War. The growing capabilities of Iranian-
trained forces operating in the Hazarehjat are likely
to increase military pressure on the Soviets, but Shia
llthough Kabul and Moscow appear to
have softened their demand that an Iranian-Afghan
mutual noninterference agreement be part of a
settlement, Kabul still insists that Iran assent to any
peace agreement.
Iran, which has consistently called for Soviet
withdrawal from Afghanistan followed by the
creation of an Islamic state in Kabul, has not backed
down from its demands. Although we do not believe
Tehran could torpedo a peace agreement-the level of
military activity in the Hazarehjat is only a nuisance
to the Soviets-a substantial increase in Iranian-
sponsored attacks would make Moscow more
reluctant to make concessions.
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Iraq: Managing the
Effects of Al Faw
Iraq has suffered a serious setback at Al Faw, but the
reverse is unlikely to destabilize the regime. Iraq's
leaders exercise tight control over the populace and
will see to it that the defeat does not generate unrest
that might threaten the government. The regime,
however, cannot prevent news about the setback from
circulating widely, and this will have a dampening
effect on morale. Public knowledge will also cause
some Iraqis to question the effectiveness of President
Saddam Husayn. Faced with these adverse
developments, the regime will probably escalate
attacks on Iranian economic targets.
Background
Iraq is an authoritarian state that is ruled by a single
party, the Bath. The mainstays of the regime are the
party cadres and the secret police, the latter reputed
to be among the most brutally efficient in the Middle
East. Oppressive control by the Bath Party extends
into every sector of Iraqi society. In the armed forces,
political "commissars" check on the loyalty of
commanders and men. On college campuses, youthful
Ba'thists have taken control of the student
organizations. Ba'thists also control Iraq's labor
unions, professional societies, peasant cooperatives,
and women's groups. The Bath Party even controls
the Iraqi equivalent of the Boy Scouts, the so-called
Pioneers.
Government control of public life has produced
extraordinary conformity, according to US diplomats.
Iraqis rarely express opinions on politics, and, when
they do, they generally repeat the officially approved
line
Currently, according to the diplomats, Iraqi
propagandists are carrying on an "unprecedented"
campaign to convince the public that the war is going
well. Government-controlled television is showing
extensive footage of Al Faw, often focusing on
seemingly continuous Iraqi artillery firing against
Iranian positions. The television also conducts "man-
in-the-street" interviews in which Iraqis express faith
in the armed forces, the diplomats report.
It is unlikely that Iraqis will openly challenge the
government's propaganda, but the regime cannot
completely suppress news of the defeat. As the word
leaks out, popular morale, which already is low,
will sag
The government is powerless to prevent the families of
soldiers slain at Al Faw from talking about their
losses. As the bereaved families share their grief, the
word will spread that the fighting at Al Faw has taken
a greater than usual toll.
Military personnel on home leave from the front also
will spread accounts of the setback. The survivors'
firsthand descriptions of the battle will expose Iraq's
tactical errors during the first days of the fighting.
The soldiers also can testify to the difficulty in
recapturing Al Faw. All this will reflect adversely on
Iraq's President Saddam Husayn, who plays a direct
role in military planning.
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Upping the Ante
Saddam probably will not adopt more aggressive
tactics on the battlefield to recoup his prestige.
According to US diplomats, a sharp-and
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dodging and desertion already are major problems in
Iraq.
Instead, the regime is likely to launch an aggressive
air campaign against Iran's economy. Last fall, Iraq
began bombing Khark Island and other important
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NESA NESAR 86-009C
11 April
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economic targets but never tried to wipe them out.
Rather it sought to use the threat of destruction to
press Iran to negotiate a settlement.
The Iraqis apparently believed that a peace party
existed in Tehran that would end the fighting rather
than risk major damage to its industrial plant. The
Iraqis obviously were mistaken. Having been shown
that its calculations were wrong, the regime almost
certainly will carry out its original threat and step up
Outlook
If Iraq, as we anticipate, begins bombing civilian
targets in Iran, the Iranians probably will retaliate by
firing missiles against Iraqi cities.
Iranian Scud attacks on Baghdad in 1984 convinced
the Iraqi regime to call off its bombing of Iranian
civilian targets. This time, however, we do not believe
the Scuds will prove so effective. We believe that the
Iraqi regime has been sobered by the defeat at Al Faw
and views it as possibly opening the way for ultimate
Iranian victory. To reduce the chances for such a
development, we believe the Iraqis will escalate the air
war. l
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