History of Afghanistan

Nearly three-quarter of Afghanistan is mountainous comprising most of the Hindu Kush and its foothills, with several peaks over 6,400 m [21,000ft], and much of the rest is desert or semi desert. However, the restoration of the Helmand canals has brought fertility to far southwest, and the sweet waters of the hamun support fish and cattle; the plains of the north, near the borders with Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan yield most of the country’s limited agriculture.

The most profitable crop may well be opium, from poppies grown in the hills of the Pashtuns adjoining Pakistan’s North-West frontier province.

With the Islamic revolution in Iran and the crack down in the ‘Golden Triangle’ of Laos, Burma and Thailand, Pakistan became the world’s biggest source of heroin (the derivative drug); but while US pressure saw the Pakistani government start to control production on its side of the border, it could do little to stem the flow from Afghanistan – a prime source of revenue for the Mujaheddin’s fight against occupying Soviet forces in the 1980s.

History and Politics

Landlocked Afghanistan has always been in a critical position in Asia: the Khyber Pass was both the gate way to India and the back door to Russia. Since earliest times it has been invaded by Persians, Greeks, Arabs, Mongols, Tartars and the British, who finally failed in their attempts to create a buffer state between India and Russia and bowed to Afghan independence after the Third Afghan War in 1921.

The latest invaders, entering the country on Christmas Day 1979, were 80,000 men of the Soviet army.

    The soviet forces were sent in support of a Kremlin-inspired coup that removed a revolutionary council set up after the ousting of the pro-Soviet government of Mohammad Daud Khan. Killed in that 1978 coup – the Saur Revolution – Daud Khan had been in power since 1953, first as prime minister and then, after he toppled the monarchy in 1972, as a founder, president and prime minister of a fiercely pro-Soviet single-party republic.

    The saur Revolution and subsequent soviet occupation let to a bitter and protracted civil war, the disparate Muslims tribes uniting behind the banner of the Mujaheddin           (‘holy warriors’) to wage an unrelenting guerrilla war financed by the US and oiled with the co-operation of Pakistan. Despite their vastly superior weaponry and resources, the Soviet forces found it impossible to control the mountain based rebels in a country the size of Texas, and Afghanistan quickly threatened to turn into an un winnable war – Moscow’s ‘Vietnam’.

    President Gorbachev began moves to end the conflict soon after coming to power in 1985, and in 1988 a cease-fire was agreed involving both Afghanistan and Pakistan, its main overt ally. In February 1989 the Soviet troops withdrew, leaving the cities in the hands of the pro-Moscow government and the countryside under the control of the Mujaheddin; the civil war intensified, however, fuelled by internecine and traditional feuds.

     The war, which cost over a million Afghanis their lives, left what was an already impoverished state almost totally crippled. Before the Soviet invasion Afghanistan had one of the world’s poorest records for infant mortality, literacy, women’s rights and a host of other measurements. But the occupation reduced the economy to ruins. Before the 1978 Marxist revolution Afghanis abroad sent home remittances worth some US $125 million, and tourism brought in about US $50, million; now all that had gone. Based on natural gas, exports were not helped by the decision of the USSR to cap the wells in 1989.

     The greatest problem however was one of refugees. Some 2 million people had moved into crowded cities and towns to avoid the Russian shelling, but for more – somewhere between 3 million and 5, million by most accounts, but nearer 6 million according to the UN Commissioner – fled the country altogether, predominantly to Pakistan. This latter estimate, the UN stated in 1990 was around 42% of the entire world total of displaced persons.

     In the spring of 1992, after a prolonged onslaught by the Mujaheddin, the government in Kabul finally surrendered. Mujaheddin forces entered Kabul and set up an Islamic government but, by late 1996, a militant Islamic faction called ‘Taliban’ (meaning ‘students’) had occupied Kabul and was in control of most of the country, and finally Afghanistan interim administration takes office on December 22.

                                         Afghanistan Past Flags

 

COUNTRY	Islamic Republic of Afghanistan
AREA	652,090 sq km [251,772 sq mls]
POPULATION	26 million
CAPITAL	(population) Kabul (1,424,000)
GOVERNMENT	Islamic Republic
ETHNIC GROUPS	Pashtun 62.73%, Tajik 12%, Uzbek 6.1%, Hazara 9%, Imaq 2.7% , Turkmen 2.69% and minorities 4.42%.
LANGUAGES	Pashto, Dari, (Persian) – both official
RELIGION	Sunni Muslim 74%, Shiite 25%
NATIONAL DAY	27 April; Anniversary of Saur Revolution
CURRENCY	Afghani
ANNUAL INCOME PER PERSON	US$220
MAIN INDUSTRIES	Agriculture, carpets, textiles
MAIN EXPORTS	Natural gas 42%, dried fruit 26%, fresh fruit 9%, carpets and   rugs 7%
MAIN EXPORT PARTNERS	CIS nations 55%, Pakistan 16%, India 12%
MAIN IMPORTS	Wheat 5%, vegetable oil 4%, sugar 3%
MAIN IMPORT PARTNERS	CIS nations 62%, Japan 13%
POPULATION DENSITY	30 per sq km [77 per sq ml]