The Road to Afghanistan - George Washington University

The general called Bogdanov and asked him to join the group. Leonid Pavlovicharrived immediately, smiling and exuding optimism.“Please sit down, you should listen to this.”Bubnov began his report for the third time:According to his agent, in late winter/early spring of this year, the head of AGSA,Assadullah Sarwari, began to inquire about in whose interests the repressive activities ofthe Afghan special services had been conducted. Until then, Sarwari had been fulfilling all ofAmin’s orders without hesitation. Amin would say, “It’s necessary to ‘clean up’ here andthere—these should be jailed, and those should be ‘sent off to Pakistan’”—which meantthey should be executed. Sarwari was doing as he was ordered, and there was no doubtabout his recognition of Amin’s authority.Sarwari owed everything in his career—becoming a member of the PDPA,promotion in the party, appointment as head of AGSA—to Amin. However, recently, heavydoubts had begun to plague the soul of the AGSA head. Amin would give orders for arrestsor executions, but no one blamed him of being excessively cruel. Amin appeared clean. Inhis position, he was in charge of issues of foreign policy, economics, and the armed forces,while he, Sarwari, was fulfilling the secret orders of Amin. The whole country consideredhim to be a bloodied executioner. It particularly hurt Sarwari that because of thatreputation, some of his close friends and relatives stopped dealing with him.The more Sarwari thought about it, the worse the situation appeared to him.Pondering what had happened after the revolution, the former pilot concluded that Amin’sorders to use repressive tactics against various people, families, and clans not only failed toenhance stability in the country, but had the opposite effect of fostering unrest. For431