-Caveat Lector- THE TELEGRAPH http://portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2001/09/15/wbin215.xml Russia warns of unwinnable conflict By Carey Schofield (Filed: 15/09/2001) WHEN the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in Christmas 1979, its army questioned the wisdom of the move. The politicians foresaw no great difficulty. By the end of December, an entire airborne regiment was installed at Bagram, north of the capital Kabul, with GRU military intelligence and KGB specialists, many in civilian clothes, swarming all over the country. The 80,000 Soviet troops who poured across the border from Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan in the first few days after the takeover believed that the operation would be over in weeks. But the war lasted 10 years and cost the Soviet Union the lives of 14,000 soldiers. In that time the Soviet-backed Kabul government was never able to subdue more than one fifth of the country. The limited success the army enjoyed owed more to exploiting Afghan internecine rivalries than to the exercise of military power. The army's greatest asset was the inability of the mujahideen to put aside personal differences for the common good. The war in Afghanistan was punctuated by a rolling series of local ceasefires, brokered by Russian officers who commanded the respect of warlords. These deals were fragile and they were perilous: an officer who drove into the mountains to meet a rebel chieftain was more likely to end up dead than wearing the Gold Star of the Hero of the Soviet Union. But this was the only way to secure any agreement in a country where the stab in the back is a way of life. Russian commanders knew that the mujahideen used these ceasefires to regroup and re-arm. But, unlike the old men in Moscow, they realised early on that war in Afghanistan was unwinnable and that they should simply aim to get their own men back home in one piece. Russian officers commented at the time that the war they found themselves fighting reminded them more of Tolstoy stories of 19th century campaigns in the Caucasus than of anything they had learnt at military college. The Afghan rebels' greatest assets were their suicidal bravery and their endurance. "Their assessment of the cost of an operation, in time, manpower and blood was beyond our comprehension," a Russian officer said after the war. "There is an old Pashtun saying to the effect that an Afghan might wait 100 years for vengeance and curse himself for his impatience." When eventually the Soviet army had to withdraw from Afghanistan the parallels with the experience of the British empire, in its Afghan wars, were unmissable. Again a superpower had been humiliated by bands of supposedly primitive tribesmen. Experienced Russians caution the United States against any attempt to subdue Afghanistan. A battle-scarred Spetsnaz colonel told The Telegraph yesterday that despite current widespread sympathy for the US, an invasion would unleash unprecedented ferocity. He said: "There is no doubt that the military could do the job. But would the politicians be prepared to allow them to do it? "At the moment global sympathy is with New Yorkers. But this would change as soon as the Americans start killing Afghan women and children. "If the Army then back off, the terrorists will have won. If the US continues its operation it will spawn an entirely new wave of fundamentalist terrorism that will threaten us all." <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'�with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds�is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector. ======================================================================== Archives Available at: http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html <A HREF="http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html";>Archives of [EMAIL PROTECTED]</A> http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ <A HREF="http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/";>ctrl</A> ======================================================================== To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Om
