Afghanistan and the end of detente

1978 as a moment of truth

In January Deng Xiaoping set China on a new economic course by visiting the United States and seeing for himself what the free market could achieve.

In January Iranians ushered in a new era of clashing civilisations by overthrowing the Shah and proclaiming an Islamic Republic.

• In may the British started the revival of free-market economics in the West by electing Margaret Thatcher.

• In December the Soviets began their policy of self-destruction by intervening in Afghanistan.

The prospects for detente in 1979

Leonid Brezhnev was by now quite ill, and bordering on senility. The Soviets seemed bent on a military build-up- Warsaw pact forces were modernised and the Soviets had increased numbers of short- and medium- range missiles pointing at NATO countries. Cuban troops and military advisors had stayed on in Angola. US criticisms of Soviet human rights abuses meant that some in the Soviet leadership were becoming less keen on detente.

The problem of the SS-20 system

By placing the quantitative limits on long-range missiles, SALT had encouraged the Soviets to place more emphasis on transportable medium-range missiles, which were not covered by the agreement. The SS-20 was part of an attempt on the part of the Soviet miltiary to develop a more sophisticated nuclear strategy that did not call for an all-out nuclear first strike as soon as the war began by giving the Soviets a second-strike capability that they had previously lacked.

• The missile, which could not reach as far as London from Soviet territory, worried West European and US leaders when it was deployed from 1976.

The prospects for detente in 1979 #2

Jimmy Carter, a Southern Democrat, was President from 1977-81. Carter was committed to human rights and supported Soviet dissidents such as Dr Andrei Sakharov and the rights of Jewish emigrants who wanted to leave the USSR. The SALT II talks were bogged down, and facing growing opposition in the US- detente was now under pressure.

• For Carter, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979 killed off the SALT II treaty for good- and led him to launch the Second Cold War.

1979: the prospects for detente (US vs USSR)

The USA:

• Carter (a Southern Democrat) was President from 1977-81.

• Carter was committed to human rights and supported Soviet dissidents and the rights of Jewish emigrants who wanted to leave the USSR.

• Rise of neoconservatism

The USSR:

• Brezhnev was ill, Cuban troops and military advisors had stayed on in Angola, USSR leadership became less keen on detente- due to US criticism of Soviet abuses of human rights.

The Iranian Revolution

On the 19th August 1953 the CIA and MI6 had arranged a coup that placed the Shah in control of Iran. Mohammed Reza Shah Pahlavi remained Shah until 16th January 1979, when he went into exile following the outbreak of revolution. Until this point, he had run a secular but brutal and deeply repressive pro-Western regime and had furnished his family with immense wealth.

Responses to the Iranian Revolution

The Shah’s government was replaced by a radical, theocratic proponent of Shi’ite Islamic fundamentalism. In January 1980 Carter anxiously tried to redefine American strategy in the Middle East (Carter Doctrine). This would lead to Carter giving backing to Saddam Hussein in the Iran-Iraq War which began in September 1980.

• The Soviets were deeply worried by developments in Iran. With Muslims making up 20% of the Soviet population, Brezhnev was deeply afraid that Islamic fundamentalism might spread to the Soviet republics of Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan.

Setbacks for US foreign policy

16th Jan 1979: the Shah was forced into exile following the outbreak of revolution, and was replaced by a radical, theocratic proponent of Shi’ite fundamentalism, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

Nov 1979: US embassy in Tehran was stormed (in protest of the dying Shah given cancer treatment in the US), holding 52 US diplomats and citizens hostage.

Jan 1980: Carter tried to define American strategy in the Middle East (the Carter Doctrine).

24th April 1980: Carter’s demonstration failed to rescue the hostages, bunglign Operation Eagle Claw which resulted in the accidental deaths of 8 US servicemen after a helicopter crashed. The hostages would be held for 444 days, released minutes after Reagan was sworn in.

Afghanistan: the background

In 1973 Mohammed Daoud Khan had overthrown his cousin the King and made himself President. He invited communists, the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA), into his government. In April 1978 he attempted to remove them from government but was himself overthrown and killed as a result of the army siding with the PDPA. The new government introduced land reforms and measures to improve the status of women. In December 1978 it signed a Treaty of Friendship with the USSR and began to receive help from Soviet political and military advisers to help defeat Islamist risings in the rural areas of the west.

• Brezhnev felt that the reforms had been botched and caused unnecessary divisions, but he hesitated to intervene. What convinced him was the murder of the PDPA leader Nur Muhammed Taraki.

The intervention

Nur Muhammad Taraki, PDPA leader killed by his deputy, Hafizullah Amin, on 8th October 1979.

Hafizullah Amin, PDPA leader killed by the Soviets on the 27th December 1979.

Tensions rise

New ‘socialist’ government attacked by Afghan tribal resistance and the Islamic Mujahideen- (they controlled rural areas).

• 3rd July 1979: Operation Cyclone- the CIA programme to arm and finance the Mujahideen began. Brzezinski admitted it was to provoke Soviet response.

• Britain’s MI6 also conducted covert operations in Afghanistan and were also supporting Zia’s regime in neighbouring Pakistan.

For the USSR, Afghanistan was strategically important- close to Central Asian Republics which shared a 2500km border with the USSR.

• After the Iranian Revolution Jan-Feb 1979, the Soviets were afraid of Islamic fundamentalism spreading to the USSR. Brezhnev was concerned that the Soviets were in danger of losing their strategic, ideological, political and economic influence in Afghanistan, which would consequently strengthen the USA’s geo-strategic power in the region.

The Brezhnev Doctrine

The Brezhnev Doctrine was a Soviet foreign policy, first and most clearly outlined by S.Kovalev in a September 26th, 1968 in a Pravda article, entitled ‘Sovereignty and the International Obligations of Socialist Countries’. Leonid Brezhnev reiterated in a speech at the Fifth Congress of the Polish United Workers’ Party on November 13, 1968, which stated:

“When forces that are hostile to socialism.. it becomes a common problem and concern for all socialist countries”.