Other socialist nations involvement in the Soviet-Afghan war.

by Nodeo-Franvier

Did other socialist countries like East German,Czechoslovakia and Vietnam support Soviet Union and Communist Afghanistan in anyway?

Jon_Beveryman

This has actually been pretty hard to find information on in the English literature, and the Russians don't make much mention of it in their own assessments of the war. I suspect that there is more in the Bulgarian, German, Czech, Polish, and Romanian literatures, but that is simply not accessible to me. Much of this response is based, unfortunately, on one American article from 1983 and is therefore incredibly incomplete.^(1) The other Warsaw Pact nations seem to have generally taken the "party line" diplomatically and in their internal and external-facing press; for instance the Czech press apparently ran a barrage of articles criticizing the US for engaging in a "secret war" against the Afghan people. There's an editorial in Pravda in April of 1980 where Gen. Alexei Yespishev, chief of the Soviet Army's political directorate, seems to have suggested that the Afghan situation was a matter for the whole Warsaw Pact to intervene in, but I don't have access to the database where the full article is stored so I'm not sure what all he says. There's a bit of reporting in Bulgarian media that they sent truck drivers to help with logistics convoys, but I can't find anything else on this.

The largest source of Warsaw Pact assistance seems to have been "solidarity payments" to the tune of 75m marks from East Germany, in addition to various civilian supplies like pharmaceuticals and education supplies. This is attested in contemporary GDR press articles as well as some post-reunification archival work, all of which is helpfully summarized (completely open-access) here. Not itself a peer-reviewed source, it's just a collation of journalism pieces, so - read critically, of course. There is also some West German documentary evidence that the GDR advised and trained the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan's military, and provided medical assistance to the Soviet forces:

MP Dr. Herbert Hupka (CDU) to the West German government on August 3rd 1981:
"What information can the Federal Government give about the participation of military and technical units of the GDR in the Soviet invasion and occupation army in Afghanistan?"

Answer from Secretary of State Dr. Hildegard Hamm-BrĂ¼cher (FDP):
"According to the information available to the Federal Government, the GDR is supporting the Soviet troops in Afghanistan by providing staff and facilities for the troop medical service. The GDR is also sending experts for the reorganization of the Afghan intelligence and security service undertaken under Soviet leadership. As far as is known here, they have also deployed advisors and trainers for the Afghan police. The Federal Government has no information on the extent of the GDR's personal commitment in these areas."

-http://dip21.bundestag.de/dip21/btd/09/007/0900725.pdf (Google translate)

Turning at last to even less rigorous sources: A deep but by no means complete survey of Afghan veterans' experiences on various Russian-language forums turns up approximately zilch. Possibly none of the old soldiers on these forums saw anything, perhaps they didn't see a reason to bring it up in their forum postings, but it's certainly suggestive. A modern Russian Forces chap I have spoken with says he heard rumors from the "old guys" that a company of paratroopers from the East German LStR-40 had been sent in secret, but he chalked it up to soldiers' mythmaking. I haven't seen anything else about this, myself.

So, in conclusion: There is very little reporting on it in either of the source languages I have any familiarity with, and I suspect that there was little involvement by non-Soviet Warsaw Pact forces, but this is admittedly an educated hunch based on the lack of any mention by Russian sources, and I would love someone with a better handle on Bulgarian, Polish, etc literature to kick more info in.

  1. Burger, Ethan S. "The East European Response to the Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan," American Intelligence Journal, Vol. 5, No. 1 (February, 1983), pp. 14-25