July 28: Sakharov wrote an open letter to Brezhnev about Afghanistan
On July 28, 1980, Academician Andrei Sakharov sent an open letter to Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev about Afghanistan. By that time, military operations there had already been ongoing for seven months, and Sakharov himself was writing the letter from exile in Gorky, where he had been sent without trial for publicly condemning the troop deployment.
What Sakharov wrote about
Sakharov noted that during the seven months of war, thousands of Soviet soldiers and tens of thousands of Afghans—mostly civilians: the elderly, women, children, farmers, and city dwellers—were killed or maimed. More than a million Afghans had become refugees by that time. Particularly alarming, the academic wrote, were reports of bombings of villages that had assisted the partisans.
Sakharov sent copies of the letter to the UN Secretary-General and the heads of state of the permanent members of the Security Council. He noted that the USSR's actions in Afghanistan had been condemned at the UN General Assembly by 104 states—including those that had previously unconditionally supported the Union. According to Sakharov, the events in Afghanistan had derailed the process of international "détente," made the ratification of the SALT II Treaty (signed by Brezhnev and Carter in the summer of 1979) impossible, and triggered a new round of the arms race.
Within the country, he wrote, ruinous over-militarization was intensifying—especially destructive against the backdrop of economic difficulties—while necessary economic and social reforms were not being implemented, and the role of repressive agencies was growing to such an extent that they risked spiraling out of control. Sakharov demanded a swift political settlement and listed seven conditions for this, primarily a cessation of hostilities, a ceasefire, and the withdrawal of Soviet troops, replaced by UN forces.
Six months in exile in Gorky
The letter was written from Gorky, where Sakharov had already spent six months by then. On January 22, 1980, the physicist, Nobel laureate, and human rights activist was detained by security forces on his way to work and, without trial or investigation, sent on a special KGB flight to Gorky, a city closed to foreigners. The academician himself believed the reason for this was his position on Afghanistan: immediately after the troop deployment, he publicly condemned it in the Western press.
How the Afghan War Began
Soviet troops entered Afghanistan on December 25, 1979. The decision was initiated by KGB Chairman Yuri Andropov, Defense Minister Dmitry Ustinov, and Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko. Gromyko, in response to the events in Afghanistan, spoke of the country's new authorities as follows: "We were such a good, obedient neighbor—just like Finland in the south. What can we expect from these madmen now?"
A year earlier, in 1978, a coup d'état occurred in Afghanistan: after the assassination of President Daoud, the People's Democratic Party, led by Taraki, came to power. It promised the people rights, land, and a better life, but lacked the funds for reform. Religious leaders and most of the military opposed the PDPA, and civil war erupted. The USSR was initially reluctant to become involved in the armed conflict, but feared losing its influence in the region.
On December 27, 1979, Soviet special forces stormed the palace of Amin, who had come to power after the assassination of his party comrade, Taraki. Amin was killed, and Moscow appointed its protege, Babrak Karmal, as the new ruler. But the lightning-fast "special operation" failed: Karmal lacked authority and was unable to ensure stability in the country. The war against the mujahideen continued until 1989, during which time at least 15 Soviet soldiers died on Afghan soil, and nearly 11 more were left disabled.
War in the memory of poets
The Afghan War also left its mark on Russian poetry—in particular, Yevgeny Yevtushenko addressed the topic in 1983: in his poem, a young Soviet soldier who died on Afghan soil mentally engages in a dialogue with a local ant about the cost and senselessness of this war for both sides.
A Russian guy is lying on Afghan soil.
A Muslim ant crawls on the cheekbone.
It's very difficult to crawl... The dead man is too unshaven,
and the ant quietly says to him:
“You don’t know exactly where you died from your wounds.
You only know one thing: Iran is somewhere nearby.
Why did you come to us with weapons?
Is this the first time you've heard the word "Islam"?
What will you give to our homeland - poor, barefoot,
if in your own - is there a queue for sausage?
Is it not enough for you to have been killed, that again
"Should we add more to the twenty million?"
(Yevgeny Yevtushenko, 1983)
