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If the Soviets Leave Afghanistan...
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12629 |
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Section : |
CURRENT ISSUES
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| Issue
Date : |
6 / 1987 |
2,418 Words |
| Author
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S.J. Masty
S.J. Masty is an editor for the Humanitarian News Service and
lives in Peshawar, Pakistan. |
The nearly eight-year-old war in Afghanistan is by no means the oldest continuing struggle - that record is most likely held by the fight in Eritrea, now well into its second generation. But none is of greater geopolitical importance than Afghanistan and no other appears to be on the brink of such sweeping change.
On face value, a good case can be made for each of the involved parties wanting to see the war concluded swiftly.
Pakistan, now hosting more than three million Afghan neighbors as refugees, has had its purse strings - and some say its patience as well - stretched to the limit. The Soviets, undoubtedly pitted against a resistance movement far more tenacious than they thought possible, now pay plenty in terms of men, materiel, and international prestige. For the United States, an acceptable peace would reduce aid and expenditure as well as be a diplomatic and geopolitical victory, with the first palpable reversal of Soviet expansionism.
For the Afghans themselves - more than five million of whom are crowded into refugee camps from Iran to the Himalayas - there is the hope of going home, a hope that grows stranger daily.
Despite the serious efforts of Pakistan, international aid groups, and allies like Saudi Arabia, the Arab Emirates, and the United States, there is widespread hunger in the camps. Unwilling to be shunted off to distant facilities in the Punjab, more than a million refugees choose to remain with their extended families and neighbors in congested border areas like Peshawar and
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