The Main Enemy by Milton Bearden (epub e reader txt) 📕

get by at the present time! Nikolay Ivanovich,” he said, referring to Nikolay Ryzhkov, the architect of Gorbachev’s economic restructuring program, appointed to the Politburo in 1985 and soon after promoted to head of the Council of Ministers, “doesn’t have this data right now, but in the United States they think we’ll need two billion a year. And the Japanese think it’s three billion. I’m not even talking about the costs in lives.”

“We won’t talk right now about how this revolution came into being,” Gorbachev interjected, “how we reacted and how we vacillated about whether or not to deploy troops.”

“Yes, yes,” Gromyko assented, nodding in agreement.

“Right now we must address the present and determine what steps need to be taken.”

“The report of Eduard Amvrosieyevich [Shevardnadze] provides a realistic picture,” said Ryzhkov. “The previous information was not objective. The situation forces us again to approach the problem in a serious way.” He spoke of the difficulty of making progress in an illiterate society and of the misery of people’s material prospects. “It’s better to pay with money and kerosene than with men,” he said. “Our people don’t understand what we’re doing there, or why we’ve been there for seven years. It’s easy to leave, but we can’t just throw everything to the whims of fate. Many countries would forsake us. We need to leave a neutral, friendly Afghanistan behind. What steps should be taken? Why not a mercenary army? What will prevent it from deserting? Good money. It’s better to hand out arms and ammunition, and to have them fight themselves if they want. Meanwhile we can turn to a parallel political settlement. We need to use all contacts with Pakistan and the U.S.”

“We cannot bring them freedom by military means,” said Igor Ligachev, Gorbachev’s right-hand man. “We have suffered defeat in this area. And what Eduard Amvrosieyevich has said is the first objective analysis we have had. We didn’t consider the consequences when we set our hopes on the military route. I think the policy of national reconciliation is the correct one. If the question is put before the people, is it better to let our soldiers die or restrict themselves to every kind of aid, I think that every person to the last will favor the second path. And we have to work on the Pakistani avenue, with India, with China, and with America. But to leave as the Americans did from Vietnam—no, we still have not come to this, as they say.”

Marshal Sokolov added his own somber assessment. “The military situation has recently become worse,” he said. “The shelling of our garrisons has doubled. They are mainly fighting in the villages, counting on our retaliating against the population centers. It is impossible to win such a war by military means.”

“Thus we confirm our firm policy,” said Gorbachev in closing. “We will not retreat once we have started. Act in all directions. Analyze where and how our aid is best to be used, start up foreign policy mechanisms through Cordovez and Pakistan, try to do business with the Chinese and, of course, the Americans. When we went into Afghanistan we were wrapped up in ideology and calculated that we could leap ahead three stages right away—from feudalism to socialism. Now we can look at the situation openly and follow a realistic policy. We accepted everything in Poland—the church, the individual peasant farms, the ideology, and the political pluralism. Reality is reality. Comrades, let us speak correctly. It is better to pay with money than with the lives of our people.”

With his consensus almost solid in the Politburo, Gorbachev continued to press home the case for an exit from Afghanistan over the following days and weeks. A month later, on February 23, Gorbachev reinforced his case in another Politburo meeting, at which he declared, “Now we’re in, how to get out racks one’s brains. We could leave quickly, not thinking about anything and blaming everything on the previous leadership. But we can’t do that. India would be concerned, and they would be worried in Africa. They would see this as a blow to the authority of the Soviet Union and to national liberation movements. They would tell us that imperialism would go on the offensive if we leave Afghanistan. But domestic considerations are important, too. A million of our soldiers have been to Afghanistan. And all in vain, it turns out. They will say you’ve forgotten about the casualties and the authority of the nation. It creates a bitter taste—why did people die? Don’t exclude America from an agreement, even as far as making a deal with them. And we need to rub Pakistan’s nose in it—let them know the Soviet Union isn’t going anywhere. Could Zia ul-Haq possibly be invited to Tashkent to meet with me, even ‘pay’ him in some way? We need flexibility and resourcefulness, for otherwise there will be a slaughter and Najib will fall. Continue the talks, don’t let them be broken off. And possibly we’ll have to make concessions about the withdrawal periods. Are there any doubts about what I have said right now?”

The men who ran the Soviet Union answered in one voice: “No, no!”

“Then let us act accordingly.”

   7   

Islamabad, March 1987

Bill Casey died a month before the snows began to melt in the high passes, but not until after he’d been able to see the first signs of the turnaround in Afghanistan he was so certain would come. Negotiations with the Soviets in Geneva were becoming increasingly intense, and there was a growing sense they’d finally concluded they couldn’t win. But there were still few in Washington who believed they would just pack up and leave Afghanistan anytime soon. So the war went on.

I never saw the DCI again after my meeting with him in July 1986, but even with all of his luck running out at the same moment, he hadn’t forgotten that I was out there trying to carry out what he’d ordered. Just before he collapsed in