Location of Soviet troops in Afghanistan map. Medical care and insurance
Soviet war in Afghanistan e lasted 9 years 1 month and 18 days.
The date: 979-1989
Place: Afghanistan
Outcome: The overthrow of H. Amin, the withdrawal of Soviet troops
Enemies: USSR, DRA against - Afghan Mujahideen, Foreign Mujahideen
With the support of : Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, UAE, USA, UK, Iran
Side forces
USSR: 80-104 thousand military personnel
DRA: 50-130 thousand military personnel According to the NVO, no more than 300 thousand
From 25 thousand (1980) to more than 140 thousand (1988)
Afghan war 1979-1989 - a prolonged political and armed confrontation between the parties: the ruling pro-Soviet regime of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan (DRA) with the military support of the Limited Contingent of Soviet Forces in Afghanistan (OKSVA) - on the one hand, and the Mujahideen ("dushmans"), with a part of the Afghan society sympathizing with them, with political and financial support of foreign countries and a number of states of the Islamic world - on the other.
The decision to send troops of the USSR Armed Forces to Afghanistan was made on December 12, 1979 at a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU, in accordance with the secret resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU No. friendly regime in Afghanistan. The decision was made by a narrow circle of members of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU (Yu. V. Andropov, D. F. Ustinov, A. A. Gromyko and L. I. Brezhnev).
To achieve these goals, the USSR sent a group of troops into Afghanistan, and a detachment of special forces from among the emerging special unit of the KGB "Vympel" killed the incumbent President H. Amin and everyone who was with him in the palace. By decision of Moscow, the protege of the USSR, the former Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Afghanistan in Prague, B. Karmal, became the new leader of Afghanistan, whose regime received significant and versatile - military, financial and humanitarian - support from the Soviet Union.
Chronology of the Soviet war in Afghanistan
1979
December 25 - Columns of the Soviet 40th Army cross the Afghan border on a pontoon bridge across the Amu Darya River. H. Amin expressed gratitude to the Soviet leadership and ordered the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the DRA to assist the troops being brought in.
1980
January 10-11 - an attempt at an anti-government rebellion by artillery regiments of the 20th Afghan division in Kabul. During the battle, about 100 rebels were killed; Soviet troops lost two killed and two more were wounded.
February 23 - tragedy in the tunnel at the Salang pass. During the movement of oncoming columns in the middle of the tunnel, a collision occurred, a traffic jam formed. As a result, 16 Soviet servicemen suffocated.
March - the first major offensive operation of the OKSV units against the Mujahideen - the Kunar Offensive.
April 20-24 - Massive anti-government demonstrations in Kabul are dispersed by low-flying jets.
April - The US Congress authorizes $15 million in "direct and open assistance" to the Afghan opposition. The first military operation in Panjshir.
June 19 - decision of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU on the withdrawal of some tank, missile and anti-aircraft missile units from Afghanistan.
1981
September - fighting in the Lurkoh mountain range in the province of Farah; the death of Major General Khakhalov.
October 29 - the introduction of the second "Muslim battalion" (177 OSSN) under the command of Major Kerimbaev ("Kara Major").
December - the defeat of the base point of the opposition in the Darzab region (Dzauzjan province).
1982
November 3 - Tragedy at the Salang pass. More than 176 people died as a result of the explosion of a fuel tanker. (Already during the years of the civil war between the Northern Alliance and the Taliban, Salang became a natural barrier and in 1997 the tunnel was blown up on the orders of Ahmad Shah Massoud to prevent the Taliban from advancing to the north. In 2002, after the unification of the country, the tunnel was reopened).
November 15 - meeting of Y. Andropov and Ziyaul-Khak in Moscow. The Secretary General had a private conversation with the Pakistani leader, during which he informed him about the "new flexible policy of the Soviet side and understanding of the need for a speedy resolution of the crisis." The meeting also discussed the question of the expediency of the war and the presence of Soviet troops in Afghanistan and the prospects for the participation of the Soviet Union in the war. In exchange for the withdrawal of troops from Pakistan, it was required to refuse assistance to the rebels.
1983
January 2 - in Mazar-i-Sharif, dushmans abducted a group of Soviet civilian specialists numbering 16 people. They were released only a month later, while six of them died.
February 2 - The village of Vakhshak in northern Afghanistan was destroyed by bombs in retaliation for the hostage-taking in Mazar-i-Sharif.
March 28 - meeting of the UN delegation headed by Perez de Cuellar and D. Cordoves with Y. Andropov. He thanks the UN for "understanding the problem" and assures the mediators that he is ready to take "certain steps", but doubts that Pakistan and the US will support the UN proposal regarding their non-intervention in the conflict.
April - an operation to defeat opposition groups in the Nijrab Gorge, Kapisa province. Soviet units lost 14 people killed and 63 wounded.
May 19 - Soviet Ambassador to Pakistan V. Smirnov officially confirmed the desire of the USSR and Afghanistan "to set a date for the withdrawal of the contingent of Soviet troops."
July - Dushman offensive on Khost. An attempt to blockade the city was unsuccessful.
August - the hard work of D. Cordoves' mission to prepare agreements on a peaceful settlement of the war in Afghanistan is almost completed: an 8-month program for the withdrawal of troops from the country has been developed, but after Andropov's illness, the issue of the conflict was removed from the agenda of Politburo meetings. Now it was only about "dialogue with the UN".
Winter - fighting intensified in the Sarobi region and the Jalalabad valley (in reports, Laghman province is most often mentioned). For the first time, armed opposition detachments remain on the territory of Afghanistan for the entire winter period. The creation of fortified areas and resistance bases directly in the country began.
1984
January 16 - Dushmans shot down a Su-25 aircraft from the Strela-2M MANPADS. This is the first case of successful use of MANPADS in Afghanistan.
April 30 - During a major operation in the Panjshir Gorge, the 1st Battalion of the 682nd Motorized Rifle Regiment was ambushed and suffered heavy losses.
October - over Kabul from the Strela MANPADS, dushmans shoot down an Il-76 transport aircraft.
1985
April 26 - Soviet and Afghan prisoners of war revolt in the Badaber prison in Pakistan.
June - army operation in Panjshir.
Summer is a new course of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU for a political solution to the "Afghan problem".
Autumn - The functions of the 40th Army are reduced to covering the southern borders of the USSR, for which new motorized rifle units are involved. The creation of basic base areas in hard-to-reach places of the country has begun.
1986
February - at the XXVII Congress of the CPSU, M. Gorbachev makes a statement about the beginning of the development of a plan for a phased withdrawal of troops.
March - the decision of the R. Reagan administration to start deliveries to Afghanistan to support the Mujahiddins with the Stinger ground-to-air MANPADS, which makes the combat aviation of the 40th Army vulnerable to ground attack.
April 4-20 - an operation to defeat the Javar base: a major defeat for the dushmans. Unsuccessful attempts by Ismail Khan's detachments to break through the "security zone" around Herat.
May 4 - at the XVIII Plenum of the Central Committee of the PDPA, instead of B. Karmal, M. Najibullah, who previously headed the Afghan counterintelligence service KhAD, was elected to the post of Secretary General. The plenum proclaimed the policy of solving the problems of Afghanistan by political means.
July 28 - M. Gorbachev defiantly announced the imminent withdrawal of six regiments of the 40th Army from Afghanistan (about 7 thousand people). The withdrawal date will be rescheduled at a later date. In Moscow, there are disputes about whether to withdraw troops completely.
August - Massoud defeated the base of government troops in Farkhar, Takhar province.
Autumn - Major Belov's reconnaissance group from the 173rd detachment of the 16th special forces brigade captures the first batch of three Stinger portable anti-aircraft missile systems in the Kandahar region.
October 15-31 - tank, motorized rifle, anti-aircraft regiments were withdrawn from Shindand, motorized rifle and anti-aircraft regiments were withdrawn from Kunduz, and anti-aircraft regiments were withdrawn from Kabul.
November 13 - The Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU sets the task of withdrawing all troops from Afghanistan within two years.
December — an emergency plenum of the Central Committee of the PDPA proclaims a course towards a policy of national reconciliation and advocates an early end to the fratricidal war.
1987
January 2 - An operational group of the USSR Ministry of Defense headed by First Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the USSR Armed Forces General of the Army V. I. Varennikov was sent to Kabul.
February - Operation "Strike" in the province of Kunduz.
February-March - Operation Flurry in Kandahar province.
March - Operation Thunderstorm in the province of Ghazni. Operation Circle in the provinces of Kabul and Logar.
May - operation "Volley" in the provinces of Logar, Paktia, Kabul. Operation "South-87" in the province of Kandahar.
Spring - Soviet troops begin to use the Barrier system to cover the eastern and southeastern sections of the border.
1988
Soviet spetsnaz group preparing for operation in Afghanistan
April 14 - Through the mediation of the UN in Switzerland, the Foreign Ministers of Afghanistan and Pakistan signed the Geneva Agreements on a political settlement of the situation around the situation in the DRA. The USSR and the USA became the guarantors of the agreements. The Soviet Union undertook to withdraw its contingent within 9 months, starting on May 15; The US and Pakistan, for their part, had to stop supporting the Mujahideen.
June 24 - Opposition detachments captured the center of the province of Wardak - the city of Maidanshahr.
1989
February 15 - Soviet troops are completely withdrawn from Afghanistan. The withdrawal of the troops of the 40th Army was led by the last commander of the Limited Contingent, Lieutenant-General B.V. Gromov, who, allegedly, was the last to cross the border river Amu-Darya (the city of Termez).
War in Afghanistan - results
Colonel General Gromov, the last commander of the 40th Army (led the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan), in his book "Limited Contingent" expressed this opinion regarding the victory or defeat of the Soviet Army in the war in Afghanistan:
I am deeply convinced that there is no basis for asserting that the 40th Army was defeated, nor that we won a military victory in Afghanistan. At the end of 1979, Soviet troops entered the country without hindrance, completed their tasks, unlike the Americans in Vietnam, and returned to their homeland in an organized manner. If we consider armed opposition detachments as the main enemy of the Limited Contingent, then the difference between us lies in the fact that the 40th Army did what it considered necessary, and the dushmans only what they could. 
The 40th Army had several main tasks. First of all, we had to assist the government of Afghanistan in resolving the internal political situation. Basically, this assistance consisted in the fight against armed opposition groups. In addition, the presence of a significant military contingent in Afghanistan was supposed to prevent aggression from outside. These tasks were fully completed by the personnel of the 40th Army.
The Mujahideen, before the start of the withdrawal of OKSVA in May 1988, never managed to carry out a single major operation and failed to occupy a single large city.
Military casualties in Afghanistan
USSR: 15,031 dead, 53,753 wounded, 417 missing
1979 - 86 people
1980 - 1,484 people
1981 - 1,298 people
1982 - 1,948 people
1983 - 1,448 people
1984 - 2,343 people
1985 - 1,868 people
1986 - 1,333 people
1987 - 1,215 people
1988 - 759 people
1989 - 53 people
By rank:
Generals, officers: 2,129
Ensigns: 632
Sergeants and soldiers: 11,549
Workers and employees: 139
Out of 11,294 people 10,751 people discharged from military service for health reasons remained disabled, of which - 1st group - 672, 2nd group - 4216, 3rd group - 5863 people
Afghan Mujahideen: 56,000-90,000 ( civilians from 600 thousand to 2 million people)
Losses in technology
According to official data, there were 147 tanks, 1314 armored vehicles (armored personnel carriers, infantry fighting vehicles, infantry fighting vehicles, armored personnel carriers), 510 engineering vehicles, 11,369 trucks and fuel trucks, 433 artillery systems, 118 aircraft, 333 helicopters. At the same time, these figures were not specified in any way - in particular, no information was published on the number of combat and non-combat losses of aviation, on the losses of aircraft and helicopters by type, etc.
Economic losses of the USSR
About 800 million US dollars were spent annually from the USSR budget to support the Kabul government.
Afghanistan is a country in the Middle East. satellite map Afghanistan shows that the country is bordered by Iran, China, Pakistan, India, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan. The area of the country is 652,864 sq. km. Most of the territory is occupied by mountains and valleys.
The state is divided into 34 provinces. The largest cities in Afghanistan are Kabul (the capital), Herat, Kandahar, Mazar-i-Sharif and Jalalabad. The national languages are Pashto and Dari. The national currency is the afghani.
Afghanistan is one of the poorest countries in the world. The country has huge reserves of minerals, but their extraction is not developed. The economy of the state is based on agriculture. One of the main branches of agriculture is the cultivation of opium: the country is considered one of the largest drug exporters in the world.
Landscapes of Afghanistan
A Brief History of Afghanistan
6th century BC. - Afghanistan became part of the Persian Empire
IV-II century. BC. - was part of the empire of Alexander the Great, the state of the Selevicids and the Greco-Bactrian kingdom
VI century - Afghanistan conquered by the Arabs, the spread of Islam
XVIII century - Afghanistan is part of the Persian Empire, the emergence of the first independent Afghan principalities
The beginning of the 20th century - " Big game» between the Russian and British empires for the territory of Afghanistan.
1919 - the country gains independence from Great Britain
1919-1973 – Kingdom of Afghanistan
1973 - coup d'état and formation of the republic
1978 - revolution, formation of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan
1978-present Time - Civil War, Taliban, drug production boom
2001 - the fall of the Taliban regime, the formation of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan
War in Afghanistan
Landmarks of Afghanistan
On the detailed map Afghanistan from a satellite, you can see some of the sights: Mount Noshak (7492 m), the Paropamiz and Hindu Kush mountain systems, the Amudarya, Harirud and Helmand rivers, the Khamun lake group.
On the territory of Afghanistan, architectural monuments of different historical periods have been preserved. The round temple of Dashla, the sanctuary in Kandahar and the ancient settlement of Altyn Tapa in Balkh belong to the pagan period. From the monuments of the Buddhist period, the temple in Ghazni, the Khazar Sum cave complex, the monasteries of Bamiyan and Kunduz have been preserved.
Bamiyan Valley (cave monastery)
The monuments of the Islamic period include the Blue Mosque in Mazar-i-Sharif, cathedral mosques in Kabul and Herat, tombs and mausoleums in Herat and Kandahar. The Jam Minaret is included in the UNESCO World Heritage List.
Among the attractions of Afghanistan, it is worth highlighting the gardens of Babur and the Kabul Museum in Kabul.
Note to the tourist
Gulrypsh - holiday destination for celebrities
Is on Black Sea coast Abkhazia is an urban-type settlement Gulrypsh, the appearance of which is closely connected with the name of the Russian philanthropist Nikolai Nikolaevich Smetsky. In 1989, due to the illness of his wife, they needed to change the climate. Case decided the case.For almost 10 years - from December 1979 to February 1989, hostilities took place on the territory of the Republic of Afghanistan, called the Afghan war, but in fact it was one of the periods of civil war that has been shaking this state for more than a decade. On the one hand, pro-government forces (the Afghan army) fought, supported by a limited contingent of Soviet troops, and they were opposed by quite numerous formations of armed Afghan Muslims (mujahideen), who were provided with significant material support by NATO forces and most countries of the Muslim world. It turned out that the interests of two opposing political systems once again clashed on the territory of Afghanistan: one sought to support the pro-communist regime in this country, while others preferred the Afghan society to follow the Islamist path of development. Simply put, there was a struggle to establish absolute control over the territory of this Asian state.
Over the course of all 10 years, the permanent Soviet military contingent in Afghanistan numbered about 100 thousand soldiers and officers, and in total more than half a million Soviet military personnel passed through the Afghan war. And this war cost the Soviet Union about 75 billion dollars. In turn, the West provided financial assistance to the Mujahideen for 8.5 billion dollars.
Causes of the Afghan War
Central Asia, where the Republic of Afghanistan is located, has always been one of the key regions where for several centuries the interests of many of the strongest world powers have intersected. So in the 80s of the last century, the interests of the USSR and the USA clashed there.
When, back in 1919, Afghanistan gained independence and freed itself from British colonization, the first country to recognize this independence was the young Soviet country. All subsequent years, the USSR provided its southern neighbor with tangible material assistance and support, and Afghanistan, in turn, remained loyal in the most important political issues.
And when, as a result of the April Revolution of 1978, supporters of the ideas of socialism came to power in this Asian country and proclaimed Afghanistan a democratic republic, the opposition (radical Islamists) declared a holy war on the newly created government. Under the pretext of providing international assistance to the fraternal Afghan people and to protect its southern borders, the leadership of the USSR decided to send its military contingent to the territory of the neighboring country, especially since the government of Afghanistan has repeatedly turned to the USSR with requests for military assistance. In fact, everything was a little different: the leadership of the Soviet Union could not allow this country to leave its sphere of influence, since the coming to power of the Afghan opposition could lead to the strengthening of the US position in this region, located very close to Soviet territory. That is, it was at this time that Afghanistan became the place where the interests of the two "superpowers" collided, and their interference in the country's domestic politics became the cause of the 10-year Afghan war.
The course of the war
On December 12, 1979, members of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU, without the consent of the Supreme Council, finally decided to provide international assistance to the fraternal people of Afghanistan. And already on December 25, units of the 40th Army began to cross the Amu Darya River to the territory of a neighboring state.
During the Afghan war, 4 periods can be conditionally distinguished:
- I period - from December 1979 to February 1980. A limited contingent was introduced into Afghanistan, which was placed in garrisons. Their task was to control the situation in major cities, protection and defense of the places of deployment of military units. During this period, no military operations were carried out, but as a result of shelling and attacks by the Mujahideen, the Soviet units suffered losses. So in 1980, 1,500 people died.
- II period - from March 1980 to April 1985. Conducting active hostilities and major military operations together with the forces of the Afghan army throughout the state. It was during this period that the Soviet military contingent suffered significant losses: in 1982, about 2,000 people died, in 1985 - more than 2,300. At this time, the Afghan opposition moved its main armed forces to mountainous areas, where it was difficult to use modern motorized equipment. The rebels switched to maneuvering in small detachments, which made it impossible to use aviation and artillery to destroy them. To defeat the enemy, it was necessary to eliminate the base areas of concentration of the Mujahideen. In 1980, a major operation was carried out in Panjshir; in December 1981, the rebels' base point was defeated in the province of Jowzjan; in June 1982, Panjshir was taken as a result of hostilities with a mass landing. In the Nijrab Gorge in April 1983, opposition detachments were defeated.
- III period - from May 1985 to December 1986. The active hostilities of the Soviet contingent are declining, military operations are more often carried out by the forces of the Afghan army, which received significant support from aviation and artillery. The delivery of weapons and ammunition from abroad for arming the Mujahideen was stopped. 6 tank, motorized rifle and anti-aircraft regiments were returned to the USSR.
- IV period - from January 1987 to February 1989.
The leadership of Afghanistan and Pakistan, with the support of the UN, began preparations for a peaceful settlement of the situation in the country. Some Soviet units, together with the Afghan army, are conducting operations to defeat militant bases in the provinces of Logar, Nangarhar, Kabul and Kandahar. This period ended on February 15, 1988 with the withdrawal of all Soviet military units from Afghanistan.
The results of the Afghan war
During the 10 years of this war in Afghanistan, almost 15 thousand Soviet soldiers died, more than 6 thousand remained disabled, and about 200 people are still considered missing.
Three years after the departure of the Soviet military contingent, radical Islamists came to power in the country, and in 1992 Afghanistan was proclaimed an Islamic state. But peace and tranquility in the country did not come.
- Boris Nikitich, what tasks did the topographic service of the 40th Army face in supporting combat operations in Afghanistan?There were many tasks: the operational provision of formations, units and individual subunits with maps, topographic and geodetic reconnaissance, the production of terrain models for command and control agencies and interaction at all levels in the preparation and planning of operations, topographic training of troops.
One of the main tasks of the topographic service was to provide maps of the combat operations of the troops on the territory of Afghanistan and to create stocks of maps for the planned directions of the theater of operations. At the initial stage, the troops did not have large-scale maps of the entire territory of this country. The largest was a 1:200,000 scale map - for conducting reconnaissance and organizing road marches, but it did not display specific objects, did not have precise landmarks, and therefore did not allow solving many tasks in the interests of the troops. Therefore, initially in 1982-1983 they began to urgently make maps at a scale of 1: 100,000, and then on their basis, satellite images and the results of topographic and geodetic reconnaissance, from 1983-1984 they began to create maps at a scale of 1: 50,000 for work in the most operationally important areas Afghanistan, which already allowed artillery to fire at target coordinates. Then there was an increase in the "fifty" cards: with the change in the situation as a result of hostilities, with the clarification of some natural features, operational corrections were made to them. And when we covered the entire area of Afghanistan with maps at a scale of 1:50,000, we also created special maps of geodetic data due to this. This is how the geodetic basis appeared - the exact coordinates of some objects, points, so necessary for the firing of missile troops and artillery, for linking the combat formations of troops to the terrain.
By 1985, by 1985, troops of the 40th Army were provided with maps of a scale of 1: 100,000 by 70-75 percent, by 1986 - by almost all 100. And maps of a scale of 1: 50,000 were completely provided somewhere by 1986-1987 .
How was the topographic survey carried out?
Topographers of all formations and units of the 40th Army were involved in conducting topographic reconnaissance of the area during the period of the advancement of troops and in the course of hostilities. Probably 60 percent of all topographic reconnaissance fell on aerial photography. Especially before major military operations. There was a squadron of aircraft near Kabul, among them an An-30 aircraft with equipment for photographing from the air - it flew to the most important areas. Photographing in this case was carried out by the pilots themselves, since they were more prepared to work with this technique, and the topographers who flew with them only clarified the task for them. The aviators had their own photo laboratory, and when we processed the captured information together with them on the ground, such work bore good fruit. Although the An-30 flew under the cover of helicopters, topographic reconnaissance from the air was still quite a risky business - at any moment these aircraft could be knocked out. But, thank God, this never happened.
On the ground, all the necessary information was collected in the course of natural everyday observations. The specificity of Afghanistan was that no one sent any special topographic and geodetic expeditions anywhere, topographers moved throughout the territory only as part of the troops during certain operations. Everything was noted. For example, convoys, as a rule, were driven by army, divisional, brigade topographers, and before any march they reminded drivers and senior vehicles: "Guys, you see something suspicious somewhere - report right away." What was noticed? Where there was no vegetation before, a bush suddenly appeared - which means that this is a landmark for someone. A triangle of stones appeared by the road, clearly laid out by human hands - also a landmark. Similar information was given to us by intelligence units, special forces. Later, after the topographers determined the coordinates of the discovered landmarks, the artillerymen gave harassing fire there, and sometimes this was effective.
All the obtained topographic information flowed to the heads of the topographic services of divisions, brigades, and from them to me, the head of the topographic service of the 40th Army. We summarized this information and transferred it to the topographic service of the Turkestan military district, which at that time worked according to the wartime staff - the number of officers was increased. From there, the information for further processing was distributed among the topographic and geodetic detachments of the Topographic Service of the USSR Armed Forces, which had to make appropriate corrections to the maps within the specified time frame. In stationary conditions, four topographic and geodetic detachments of central subordination worked simultaneously - Noginsk, Golitsyn, Irkutsk, Ivanovo and Tashkent Cartographic Factory. In addition to them, in each military district there were two or three field topographic and geodetic detachments, which were also engaged in the operational correction of maps. Each of the detachments worked on a certain region of Afghanistan according to the order of the Military Topographic Directorate of the General Staff of the USSR Armed Forces.
Already corrected and supplemented maps again entered our topographic service, which was stationed in the vicinity of Kabul near the headquarters of the 40th Army, in the Darulaman region. The sorting soldiers of the army topographic unit, which was located there, quickly typed these maps, loaded them into special AShT vehicles (army headquarters topographic vehicle based on ZIL-131) and transported them piece by piece. When it was necessary to deliver maps more quickly, we were given helicopters.
For inserts from a personal file
| PRIVATE BUSSINESS PAVLOV Boris Nikitich
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- During your trip, did the troops experience a shortage of maps?
There were enough cards and there were no problems, because the machine prints one sheet, ten thousand - the difference is in an extra half an hour of time. The cards were printed for us by the Irkutsk, Kyiv, Minsk factories and the Dunaev Moscow factory. But basically the Tashkent factory - until the very withdrawal of troops. In addition, marching cartographic units were printed: structural units that, both in the field and in stationary conditions, ensured the publication of the required number of maps.
We made special maps and combat graphic documents on our own. In the army topographic unit there were printing presses of the type OP-3, OP-4, "Romayor", "Dominant". The last two are imported, and OP-3, OP-4 are domestic vehicles, which were installed both permanently and in the traveling version on Ural vehicles. They were served by soldier-specialists: laboratory assistants, photographic laboratory assistants and directly printers, who were trained at the request of the districts by the Zvenigorod training topogeodesic detachment - the only educational institution of its kind.
Special maps included maps of mountain passes and passes, maps of overcoming water lines, snow avalanches, maps of geodetic data. With more big cards we took coordinates and transferred them to small-scale ones. Maps of geodetic data were indispensable especially for gunners. When we urgently needed more than usual number of special cards, we sent the originals by plane to Tashkent and after 2-3 days they brought us the already published edition.
And why was it necessary to make mock-ups, why couldn’t it be limited to just cards?
On the map, not everything reached the consciousness of the commanders. After all, there are only mountains and rocks, and one had to have a good imagination and an ideal visual memory in order to understand everything with the help of a single map. And everything was immediately visible on the layout: where is which mountain, where does the gorge lead, which parts follow which, how do they move forward and from where. The layout is an ideal practice for future actions. All operations required the production of separate layouts for working out interaction issues, so this was another main type of our activity - the production of layouts of the terrain at the level of the army headquarters. Similar mock-ups were made at the headquarters of divisions, brigades and regiments - their own mock-up workers worked everywhere. And in general, planning operations, working out the actions of troops and setting tasks on these mock-ups is a common practice for all formations and units of the 40th Army in Afghanistan.
We made layouts of the area almost 2-3 times a month directly in front of the army headquarters. Especially for these purposes, a site was allocated, closed with a camouflage net, so that no outsiders could see the mock-ups. Only strictly defined persons entered this site. For the manufacture of models, as a rule, earth, sand, cement, paints and figures were used, which were cut and sawn by our soldiers. Their actions were led by intelligent officers. It was a very laborious, serious and painstaking work. It happened that the team was given to us at 10 pm, and by 6 am the model had to be ready. And the dimensions of each of these models were considerable - about 6x10 meters. Not only the command of the army headquarters, but also all the chiefs of the military branches and services have always given this work of topographers the highest rating.
Were the Afghans allowed to these models at the army headquarters?
There were persons who were admitted with the permission of the army commander. Because commands were sent down from Moscow from above - to teach them to fight, and we allegedly only supported them. However, as soon as they were allowed to our models, the operations were not so successful.
How did you assess the topographic training of Soviet officers?
In general, the topographic training of troops was weak at all stages from 1979 to 1989. And what is characteristic: lieutenants, the same platoon commanders who came from schools, or senior officers more or less knew the topography, but between these categories, as it were, some kind of gap formed: the company commanders thoroughly forgot everything that they once taught, behaved as if they were seeing the map for the first time. In addition, maps of mountainous areas are more difficult to read than maps of the plains, because there were no clearings, swamps, forests, lakes in Afghanistan. The inability to read maps sometimes led to the fact that commanders, mostly motorized riflemen or tankers, led their units to the wrong place. I had only 112-118 people in the army topographic unit, deployed in wartime staff, of which about 18 officers, including lieutenants, who conducted topography classes directly in the troops with officers of any rank up to colonel. They were informed in detail about some innovations, corrections or additions on the maps that appeared, so that they could read the map correctly and set tasks for their subordinates without errors. It got to the point that as soon as we arrived at some units, the leadership tried to seat all the officers who were possible in topographic training classes - they felt a vital need. And our topographers once again began to explain everything to them, starting with conventional signs: where what means.
The Afghans had their own maps, did you somehow use them in your work?
Of course, we studied them, but they did not find application for us. These maps were in Farsi or English and very old editions. In addition, literally in a single quantity, they displayed only separate pieces of the terrain. The Afghans did not have a solid map of the whole of Afghanistan. Even maps at a scale of 1:50,000 are sheets of 30x30 cm, that is, if you measure them, they are only 15x15 km. What good did they do to us? Therefore, there was no reason to resort to the help of translators - our maps were better: visual, easy to read, understandable to any Soviet officer. From the military counterintelligence officers, such information reached us that the dushmans were looking for opportunities to get exactly Soviet maps by exchange or ransom.
Were there cases when military personnel lost their cards during military operations or due to negligence?
There were such cases, but it was not regarded as an emergency. Because a 1:200,000 scale map - "two hundred" was not considered secret. "Sotka" was marked "For Official Use". Yes, a 1:50,000 scale map was secret, but "fifty" or, as they were also called, "half-kilometer" officers of regiments, brigades and divisions, as a rule, were not issued - they were available only to staff officers within the operational control of the army. The officers of the field units received only “hundredths” cards with some partial information.
And what cards did we leave to the Afghan government troops before the withdrawal?
We left them full maps at a scale of up to 1:100,000. And "fifty" maps were left only for certain areas - the points of deployment of their military units. This was due to precautionary measures so that the card data would not then get into other countries. All other 1:50,000 scale maps I exported completely back to the territory of the USSR.
Was the topographical part of the army often subjected to attacks or shelling at the point of permanent deployment near Kabul?
There were a lot of shelling. In these cases, we had shelters dug in the ground, the barracks were lined with sandbags. The shelling was carried out with rockets mainly in the evening. Dushmans launched RS from a distance, maybe 5-6 km. As a rule, 2, 3, 4 shells, no more, because almost immediately our battery returned fire. During my business trip from 1987 to 1989, there was not a single dead among topographers. One soldier was wounded by a fragment from the RS on the territory of the unit, and one truck - "ZIL-131" ASHT was blown up by a mine - it turned out all over, but due to the maps, people remained alive, they were not even injured.
Another danger is mines. And not only on the roads, when we moved with the columns. From our topography there was a path directly to the headquarters of the 40th Army. We walk, we walk, everything seems to be fine, suddenly: broads - someone was blown up by an anti-personnel mine.
How is it that the territory was protected?
Guarded. But there were also many Afghan service workers there. And sometimes, solid dust rose from the wind - many different people in camouflage and without walked with their half-covered faces tied up. It seems that none of the Afghans should have been strangers, but they penetrated. They were paid money for it. They crawled in somehow, put mines anywhere. It happened that not only ours, but they themselves were undermined. Somehow, at about 4 p.m., I was walking with Colonel Nikolai Elovik, deputy head of the engineering troops of the 40th Army, from headquarters to my unit, suddenly at some point there was an explosion and everything went flying. Squeal, groan. They approached: a 15-year-old Afghan boy is lying, his eyes are open, without arms, without legs. Whether he breathes is unclear. We looked: "Kolya, what are we going to do?". I had a raincoat with me - they dropped it, put the guy there, intestines and everything else, and carried it to the clinic, which was nearby.
When did they themselves leave Afghanistan?
I was among the last to go out in mid-January 1989, since the cards were needed until the very end. Fierce battles were already going on outside our town between the dushmans themselves: they divided the territory among themselves, and just during this period I was instructed to withdraw a column - about 70 pieces of equipment. The column was mixed: our topographic part on trucks with equipment, special equipment and materials; units of the security battalion of the army headquarters; divisions of the Special Department; some rear units. We were given 2 tanks and 3 infantry fighting vehicles. Air cover - "turntables" Mi-24, which appeared in pairs with an interval of half an hour. On the road from Kabul to Termez there were outposts from the 103rd Airborne Division and the 108th Motorized Rifle Division. We were given a day to march. On January 14, our convoy concentrated near the bridge across the Amu Darya River and only at the beginning of February crossed the river and settled in the Termez region. The columns went in a day - so we went out in stages.
Your convoy was not fired upon?
It passed without incident, and before us there were cases of shelling of columns, there were both wounded and losses. What happened after us, we no longer knew. Then we lived for another month in tents in a training center near Termez on the border, immediately across the river, where our servicemen were once trained before being transferred to Afghanistan. Because the command of the army set the task: to be in full combat readiness with all the technical support in case of returning back - this was envisaged. A month later, on February 15, we were given the command to leave for the points of permanent deployment.
