AFGHANISTAN SITUATION REPORT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90T00114R000700240001-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: T
• Document Page Count: 18
• Document Creation Date: December 27, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 29, 2012
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: May 12, 1987
• Content Type: REPORT

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Afghanistan Situation Report
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CONTENTS
Insurgent activity in and around Kabul picked up last
week, and heavy fighting continued near Khowst in
Paktia Province.
MARKET CONDITIONS IMPROVE IN KABULI 2 25X1
A market survey conducted in late April by the US
Embassy in Kabul indicates that prices for most
commodities have remained generally stable over the
last month.
MORE SOVIET-AFGHAN DIPLOMATIC SUCCESSESI 3 25X1
Efforts by the Soviets and Afghans to improve the
international image of the Kabul regime have had a few
successes recently.
POSSIBLE INSURGENT ELECTIONS 4 25X1
Although Gulbuddin Hekmatyar recently claimed to be
speaking for the resistance alliance when he announced
planned elections for a representative assembly, his
plans may not have the backing of the other leaders.
IN BRIEF 5
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AFGHANISTAN AND THE DEFENSE OF THE SOVIET FAR EAST 8 25X1
The USSR's occupation of Afghanistan could, over the
long run, provide Moscow with opportunities to reduce
the vulnerability of overland transportation links to
the Soviet Far East.
This document was prepared by the Office of Near
Eastern and South Asian Analysis and the Office of
Soviet Analysis.
12 May 1987
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12 May 1987
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According to the US Embassy in Kabul, insurgent
activity north, south, and southwest of the city
increased last week. The insurgents directed heavy
machinegun, automatic rifle, and rocket fire on Soviet
and Afghan installations. In addition, there were
several bomb explosions in Kabul's commercial and
residential areas that the US Embassy attributed to
supporters of former Afghan leader Karmal.
Heavy fighting continued in Paktia Province.
Combat operations resumed in Nangarhar Province last
week. Elements of the Soviet 66th Independent
Motorized Rifle Brigade at Jalalabad dted garrison
by 2 May, e ar Additional 25X1
MI-24 Hind and MI-8 Hip helicopters also deployed to
Jalalabad airfield on 11 May to support the operations.
A market survey conducted in late April by the US
Embassy in Kabul indicates that prices for most
commodities have remained generally stable over the
last month. In particular, wheat prices have plateaued
after a substantial rise earlier this year and a 25-
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percent decrease last month. Meat, sugar, and
petroleum products remain expensive and in short
supply.
COMMENT: The fall in grain prices partly reflects the
beneficial impact of heavy spring rains on agricultural
prospects. Nevertheless, this year's grain harvest may
be below normal in some parts of the country because of
shortages of labor and seed. Meat shortages probably
stem from a seasonal decline in the slaughter of stock
as herders fatten animals for sale later in the year.
Indian Foreign Minister Tiwari during his visit to
Kabul from 3 to 5 May publicly praised the Afghan
regime's national reconciliation program, echoed the
Soviet call for a "political settlement around
Afghanistan," and dismissed the Afghan threat to
Pakistan as "imaginary." Indian Minister of State
Singh told US officials in New Delhi that the visit was
important because India believes the PDPA--with or
without Najib--will have to be part of any political
settlement of the war.
In other diplomatically relevant developments, the
League of the Red Cross began operations--costing about
$600,000 per year--to aid medical facilities in and
around Kabu
COMMENT: Coming on the heels of the regime's official
recognition by Zimbabwe and Cyprus, Tiwari's visit--the
first by an Indian foreign minister since the Soviet
invasion of Afghanistan--and his public statements were
a diplomatic plus point for Kabul and Moscow. The
League of the Red Cross's decision
will boost Kabul's image. The Soviets almost certainly
are hoping that the Kabul regime's growing list of
diplomatic successes will produce more Third World
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abstentions on the Afghanistan resolution when the UN
General Assembly meets in October.
Afghan insurgent leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar announced
on 8 May that the seven resistance parties will soon
hold elections for a representative assembly. He said
refugees in Iran and Pakistan would elect 20 percent of
the assembly, while Afghans in Afghanistan would elect
the remainder. Gulbuddin also called for a cease-fire
during which an interim government would preside over a
Soviet withdrawal. Hizbi Islami factional leader
Khalis--recently appointed alliance spokeman for the
next six months--and Islamic Union party leader Sayyaf
subsequently said they would only support an interim
regime headed by one of the alliance leaders.
COMMENT: Although Gulbuddin claimed to be speaking for
the resistance alliance, there is no conclusive
evidence that all of the insurgent party leaders
support the plan. Gulbuddin is a perennial
troublemaker and his remarks may be aimed at disrupting
alliance deliberations. He may also be trying to stem
slipping support among his commanders by appearing more
conciliatory on the question of an interim government.
The remarks by Khalis and Sayyaf suggest that
Gulbuddin's announcement was premature. In recent
weeks differences among the insurgent parties about the
composition of a potential interim government appear to
have widened. The seven leaders have also yet to reach
a consensus on voting procedures, a possible role for
former King Zahir Shah, or the participation of the
PDPA in the post-Soviet political system in
Afghanistan. In the near term, Gulbuddin's statements
may make it more difficult for the alliance to agree on
a program of political action.
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The US Embassy in Kabul reports that the
International Trade Center (ITC) office in
Kabul will close permanently in June. The
ITC, which serves as the local executing
agency for UNCTAD and GATT, has managed a
single $1.4 million project in Kabul since
1985. ITC officials argued the project aided
local businessmen in maintaining trade
contacts with non-East European countries,
but Western donors to the ITC claimed the
organization's presence in Kabul served
mainly to help legitimize the regime.
During an official visit to Pakistan last
week, French Foreign Minister Raimond
announced a bilateral donation of 6,000 tons
of wheat for the Afghan refugees, according
to press reports. Last year France provided
Islamabad with 5,000 tons of wheat for the
refugees, besides donating wheat through the
World Food Program.
Afghan Foreign Minister Wakil wrote to UN
Secretary General Cordovez in early May
asking him to arrange visits by Afghan regime
envoys to refugee camps in Iran and Pakistan.
Wakil charged that the two countries are
blocking repatriation and said his envoys
would try to persuade the refugees to return
home. Wakil's letter is another in a series
of Soviet-Afghan attempts to convince
international opinion that Tehran and
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Islamabad are preventing a political
settlement of the war.
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Abdul Wadud, the Hizbi Islami (Gulbuddin)
general commander for Badakhshan Province
who was recently killed, commanded 500 to 700
insurgents north of Keshem.
He is
the second major field commander that
Gulbuddin's group has lost in the past three
months.
elements of a
new Afghan regime border force unit at
Bayankhel in Paktia Province. The unit's
garrison area includes a fire-support base
and a network of nine security positions..
Each position has extensive trenchworks,
numerous bunkers and is occupied by tanks and
armored personnel carriers. These defenses
suggest the garrison was constructed to
withstand insurgent artillery and ground-
attacks.
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PERSPECTIVE
AFGHANISTAN AND THE DEFENSE OF THE SOVIET FAR EAST
Excerpts from an outside contractor's study
The military vulnerability of Soviet land routes to the
Far East creates a strong need for a year-round sea
route as a supplement or alternative. If Afghanistan
could be secured, the Soviets could build a rail line
connecting the USSR with future bases on the Indian
Ocean, thereby avoiding Mediterranean choke points that
hinder the Black Sea Fleet and substantially shortening
the distance their forces would have to cover.
The Strategic Requirement
Russia's predicament concerning the military support of
its far Eastern territories dates from the 19th
century. After gaining control of Port Arthur, its
first (and only) ice-free naval base on an open shore,
Russia concentrated there its largest and most advanced
battle fleet. The rapid military buildup required a
permanent modern rail link to safeguard the connection
with metropolitan Russia. But one of the chief reasons
Russia lost to Japan in 1905 was that all its supplies
had to go by land because of the Japanese naval
blockade.
The same difficulties exist today, while the stakes
have escalated. Soviet east-west land transportation
relies exclusively on the railway system. The Trans-
Siberian Railway remains the only proven land bridge
but is overloaded by its double tasks of carrying
military supplies and civilian goods. The heaviest
traffic is between Krasnoyarsk and Vladivostok, also
the stretch of track most vulnerable to Chinese cross-
border incursions.
To alleviate this burden on the eastern Trans-Siberian
Railway, Moscow decided in 1974 to build the 4,000-
kilometer Baikal-Amur Mainline (BAM) north of the
Trans-Siberian Railway. The line's 2,000 bridges and
30 kilometers of tunnels also make the BAM extremely
vulnerable to Chinese rocket attacks and sabotage.
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Efforts to complete the BAM.appear related to the
enormous military buildup in the Far Eastern zone in
the 1960s. Since 1979 the Far Eastern theater along
the Chinese frontier has been referred to as a
principal (glavnyi) theater, putting it on a par with
the theater facing NATO. The Pacific Fleet, the
largest of the four separate Soviet fleets in terms of
surface units, also covers the South China Sea and the
Indian Ocean.
As much as one-third of Soviet military manpower and
materiel is now deployed in the Far East. The
continuing buildup in the Far East suggests a Soviet
effort to prepare for the worst case: a simultaneous
outbreak of hostility against the United States in
Europe as well as the Pacific, with China hostile too.
The total military manpower in the Far Eastern theater
is at least one million, and possibly as high as 1.4
million. East of Lake Baikal there is one Soviet
soldier for every three male civilians.
Despite the very large numbers of troops and military
equipment and fuel stockpiled there, Far Eastern
theater forces could not function for longer than two
months following the interruption of the Trans-Siberian
Railway and imposition of an effective naval blockade.
Moreover, within a radius of 3,200 kilometers of
Khabarovsk, barely five million Soviet citizens face
one hundred times as many Chinese, Koreans, and
Japanese. In any conflict short of nuclear exchange,
the odds for Soviet forces in the Far East are poor.
Thus, a sea route, and the naval forces and facilities
to protect it, carry a high strategic priority.
Naval Ambitions and Constraints
During the last thirty years the Soviet Navy has been
transformed from a coastal force into a blue water navy
with global reach. Similarly, the Soviet merchant
marine, with its wide variety of supporting "fishing"
vessels, now exceeds US tonnage. The current
construction of the first Soviet nuclear aircraft
carrier further indicates that the Soviet Union aspires
to parity with the United States as a seapower. The
Soviet Navy already has more submarines, although many
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are still non-nuclear, and more minor combatants and
auxiliary vessels, than the US.
Despite this naval expansion, the Soviet Union remains
the second seapower. In large part, this reflects the
constraints of the geography of the northern Eurasian
land mass. Four separate Soviet fleets must be
maintained. Furthermore, the Baltic and Black Sea
Fleets are trapped behind narrow straits which could be
sealed in the event of a global war. Ships from
Vladivostok must pass through three narrow straits
controlled by Japan to gain access to the high sea.
The only existing Soviet base on the open sea,
Petropavlovsk, not only suffers from ice and fog, but
lacks a rail connection with the hinterland. All
Soviet mainland bases are located in shallow coastal
waters, rendering them highly vulnerable to mining.
This applies to the naval complexes in the Kola inlet,
as well as to the three major bases in the Pacific.
The Northern and Pacific Fleets, which comprise the
bulk of the Soviet Navy, are also subjected to the
vicissitudes of climate, especially ice and fog.
A second major problem of Soviet naval strategy
concerns the survival of the Far Eastern force in the
event of a Sino-Soviet war. Because of the possible
interdiction of the Trans-Siberian Railway, the USSR
needs a substantial capability to ship supplies from
metropolitan Russia by sea via the Indian Ocean. In
peacetime the most convenient starting points for the
southern sea lanes of communications are the Black Sea
ports, over 10,000 nautical miles from Vladivostok.
Soviet convoys would also have to negotiate the Turkish
Straits and Suez, which are in hostile hands.
Meanwhile, the Soviet Navy is expanding its new
facilities at Cam Ranh Bay to gain control over the
South China Sea and the Strait of Malacca. Without
these facilities, the Soviet Indian Ocean Squadron
would need about three weeks to reach its normal
operating area in the Gulf of Aden.
Were the starting point for the southern sea lanes of
communications established on the northern shores of
the Indian Ocean, anywhere between Bandar Abbas and
Karachi, the distance to Vladivostok would be reduced
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rail system.
and the two Mediterranean choke points would be
bypassed. It is only the Indo-Persian corridor, with
Afghanistan at its center, that can provide Moscow with
access to a year-round naval base, which could be
eventually connected with the heartland by rail. From
such a naval base, Soviet nuclear submarines and
surface vessels could be kept in optimal combat
readiness and responsive to alert throughout the year,
without the hindrance of geographical limitations or
adverse climate. But to be of substantial utility,
such a base would need to be connected with the Soviet
oil installations still seems highly unlikely.
to seize a naval strongpoint on the northern shore of
the Indian Ocean. As yet, there is no evidence that
the invasion of Afghanistan belies a Soviet blueprint
for further territorial expansion, and there is
insufficient evidence to suggest from the development
of military operations inside Afghanistan that Iran,
Pakistan, or Persian Gulf oil were the ultimate ends,
and Afghanistan simply a means thereto. An overt
Soviet airborne invasion or an air strike against Gulf
The Soviet Union today does not manifest any compulsion
Azerbaijan and Kurdistan).
At the same time, the Soviet position in Afghanistan
offers wide opportunity for Soviet-sponsored
subversion, combined with a low keyed but systematic
penetration of the strategic infrastructure in the
region. Such penetration had been pursued in
Afghanistan years before the invasion. The
exploitation of separatist movements in the region
could make Soviet involvement almost irresistible. The
coup de theater could come in the form of an invitation
to Soviet experts and advisers, not necessarily troops,
to assist in the construction of perhaps a new
"People's Republic of Baluchistan" (with parallel
developments possible in "Pashtunistan," Iranian
The Central Asian Alternative
Russia's so-called drive to warm water ports and the
systematic buildup of the transportation infrastructure
south of the heartland have gone hand in hand for many
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years. A modern transport infrastructure is being
expanded from the Soviet Union into Afghanistan, the
country which until recently was the last hiatus
between the railway systems in Central Asia and Iran
and the vast network in India. Thanks to modern
technology, hitherto impassable mountains, such as the
Hindu Kush and the Karakoram, are no longer insuperable
obstacles.
It is not known whether the present Soviet rail spurs
being extended south from Kushka, and from Termez
across the new Amu Darya bridge, will eventually link
up with the yet incomplete Iranian and Pakistani rail
systems, both of which operate on a different gauge.
When the answer to this becomes clear, it could be an
event of major geostrategic importance.
There are three options for reaching the warm waters of
the Indian Ocean which the Soviet Union might exploit.
--The most convenient overland access, because
it is already available, is from Azerbaijan
along the old Julfa-Tabriz railway, connected
since 1958 with Tehran and electrified in
1982 with Soviet assistance. In Tehran it
joins the Trans-Iranian Railway, which
connects the Caspian port of Bandar Shah with
Bandar Shahpur (now Bandar Khomeini) at the
head of the Persian Gulf. During World War
II it served as a major lend-lease supply
route for the Red Army; almost 8 million tons
of supplies were ferried through between 1942
and 1945. A major strategic drawback of this
option, however, is that a future Soviet
naval base would be located at the head of
the Persian Gulf, far from the open sea.
--Another means would be to control the Gulf's
bottleneck, the Strait of Hormuz, from Bandar
Abbas and Chah Bahar in Baluchistan. These
ports are less than 800 kilometers away from
the nearest Soviet air base in Afghanistan.
Neither harbor, however, has good
communications with the hinterland, and it
would take years before a modern highway or
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railway could reach them from the USSR. Even
if the Soviets decide to proceed via sparsely
populated Khorasan and Seistan, the distance
and terrain are forbidding; it is almost 1300
kilometers by road from Ashkhabad to Bandar
Abbas and 1450 kilometers from Kushka to Chah
Bahar.
--Finally, if the Soviets are serious about
expanding railways in Afghanistan--assuming
they can subdue the resistance--they could
establish within ten years a main line from
north to south (as they did across Mongolia)
linking Kushka-Herat-Qandahar-Chaman. This
would allow heavy trains to pass via the
Pakistani broad-gauge network through Quetta,
the Bolan Pass, down to Karachi on the Indian
Ocean.
All of these possible routes, of course, involve
political as much as geographical obstacles. The first
would require Iranian agreement to open its rail lines
to Soviet military shipments and to allow the
construction of Soviet naval facilities at the Bandar
Shahpur terminus. This is not presently obtainable
and, if it became so owing to a radical change in
Iranian policy, it would still remain vulnerable to
further vicissitudes in Iranian politics. The second
and third require the ratification by Afghanistan and
action against Pakistan. Nevertheless, in the long
view--which Moscow habitually takes--none can be
considered beyond the USSR's reach. Should the Soviets
ever acquire direct access to a second Port Arthur in
the Indian Ocean, situated at the end of a railway line
connected with its Eurasian heartland, Moscow will have
overcome a major geostrategic disadvantage and put the
West in a grave position. The possible gains may well
contribute significantly to Soviet determination to
prevail in Afghanistan.
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