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After holding elections in 1985, General Ziaul Haq appointed Mohammed Khan Junejo as the civilian prime minister. This was a time when the Afghan war was in full swing and realising the gravity of the situation, Junejo decided to handle it himself. He wanted to bring the defence and foreign ministries together under him and work according to his political ideology.
On the other hand, with the world’s attention on Pakistan, Gen Zia was trying to push the Soviets out of Afghanistan as early as possible, but on certain conditions. Since he had undertaken the mission from the very beginning in 1978, he wanted to keep the controls to himself.
As Pakistan made efforts in the diplomatic and operational sectors, there were two important players in the campaign: the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and the American CIA. When the actual operation began, the ISI Chief General Akhtar Abdur Rehman handled everything from acquiring armaments to imparting guerrilla training and providing logistics to the Mujahideen.
When Prime Minister Junejo took charge of Afghan affairs, Gen Zia was not very pleased. He believed that as the President, he had the power to run the Afghan show. This in turn was resented by the prime minister. However, the general kept himself abreast with the developments, acting as and when he felt necessary. In the final stage he interfered, but Junejo defied him intelligently.
The United States had a vigilant eye on the developments in the region and right from the start, Gen Zia had planned to act as an arbitrator. Nelson Rockefeller, the American businessman-politician visited Pakistan on April 26, 1978 and was scheduled to meet the Afghan President Mohammed Daud Khan on April 28. But on April 27, 1978, the Soviet Union engineered a coup, overthrew President Daud and established a communist government. This changed the whole situation and Rockefeller decided to leave Pakistan immediately to visit India and Nepal.
While departing, he reportedly told Gen Zia: “I see Pakistan in difficulties. We are with you.”
On April 30, 1978 Noor Mohammad Taraki was declared as the new Afghan President. The official announcement on Kabul Radio said that the country had been renamed the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. The first recognition came from (the then) Soviet Union followed by countries of the Communist bloc.
The situation in Afghanistan affected Pakistan as well. An Afghan cell established in August 1973 during the PPP rule was now reactivated. On his way to Iran, Gen Zia met the new Afghan leader Taraki, though the meeting did not augur well. On Sept 9, Gen Zia visited Kabul again, when the Pakhtun leader Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan also happened to be there.
When Prime Minister Junejo took charge of Afghan affairs, Gen Zia was not very pleased. He believed that as the President, he had the power to run the Afghan show. This in turn was resented
by the prime minister.
In September 1979, in fighting broke out in Kabul and this time Hafizullah Amin, who was disliked by Moscow, emerged with the upper hand. On Dec 26, Soviet troops entered Kabul, killed Hafiz Amin and established a new government. Two days later the Soviet ambassador in Pakistan told Gen Zia that Soviet troops had captured Kabul at the request of Babrak Karmal, the new Communist leader.
A tug of war began. The Soviets claimed that the occupation has been made on Afghan request. However, the rest of the world condemned it. Pakistan expressed its apprehension on the destabilisation of its northern neighbour; the Soviet presence on Pakistan’s borders posed a significant danger to the country. The US President Jimmy Carter telephoned Gen Zia and said that he was watching Soviet movements carefully and in case of aggression, the US would support Pakistan. Some European countries also expressed their support to Pakistan.
The year 1980 had all eyes focussed on Pakistan and a military dictator had become the centre of world diplomacy. The Western powers urged Pakistan to support the freedom fighters, later known as the Mujahideen and the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC) expressed its concern and fully supported the Afghan freedom fighters.
As Pakistan extended support to the Afghan Mujahideen, the Soviet Union on Feb 12, 1980 accused Pakistan of waging an undeclared war, and supporting and training Mujahedeen and warned Pakistan of ‘unpredictable consequences’. It was also seen that the Soviet forces and Afghan troops violated Pakistan territory many times.
During the Afghan turmoil, the Pakistan-US ties were at an all time low. However, the Afghanistan issue became a catalyst in bringing them closer. The US immediately extended an assistance of $400 million which Pakistan refused, calling it ‘peanuts’. When Ronald Reagan became the US President in January 1981, he increased aid for the Mujahideen, routing it through Pakistan. This ultimately became the main source of funding for them.
Headed by Lt-Gen Akhtar Abdur Rahman, the role of the ISI became more important, as it trained the Mujahideen in the use of modern weaponry and guerrilla warfare. The CIA and ISI became stakeholders in the anti-Soviet struggle code-named “Operation Cyclone”, with Gen Akhtar of the ISI and William Casey of the CIA becoming partners in the operation. Gen Zia’s involvement also grew. The US increased its assistance for keeping the anti-Soviet struggle alive, which also improved the operational capability of Pakistani forces. The Soviets met with huge losses but continued to fight on.
However, all this brought a number of issues to Pakistan. Besides the large number of Afghan refugees pouring into the country, Pakistan became a narcotics and arms market which proved disastrous for the nation. Pakistan could not plug the porous border which allowed free travel.
When Mohammad Khan Junejo took over in 1985, things were moving slowly. The pro-Soviet bloc had set many hurdles, but talks continued and the world waited for some concrete development.
For Junejo, it was a rocky road as he confronted many difficulties: both political and strategic. Except for Gen Zia and Gen Akhtar Abdur Rahman, nobody in Pakistan had any information regarding funding, arms supply and their distribution and the guerrilla training of the mujahideen. Junejo knew that Gen Zia was giving the impression to the US and other supporters that he was the only one who could expel the Soviets from Afghanistan. He also promoted the idea that there could be no peaceful situation until a stable government was formed in Afghanistan after the Soviets were pushed out, and that too could be achieved only by Gen Zia. The Western allies were not interested in any result except ensuring the defeat and withdrawal of the Soviet Union from Afghanistan.
At this point, Gen Zia and PM Junejo’s views diverged. Junejo wanted a quicker settlement and the return of millions of refugees, while Zia wanted the formation of a right-wing government before the exodus as a condition for reaching an accord. In this race for power, Zain Noorani, the minister of state for external affairs, became confused and could hardly satisfy the donor governments or justify the delay. However, he was sure of an amicable solution.
Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine,March 8th, 2015
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