Chapter 57: Rescuing Amin (Part 1) (Three updates, seeking fresh flowers, recommendations and collections)

  Lin Feng never forgot that China's greatest enemy was in the north, and even after the Sino-Vietnamese War ended in victory, while China was busy digesting the fruits of its victory, he did not give up on gathering intelligence on the Soviet Union.

  After learning that the Soviet Union had made preparations to invade Afghanistan, Lin Feng began to deploy a plan to rescue Afghan leaders. Before the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the highest leader of the Afghan government, Amin, was placed under house arrest and killed, along with several ministers of the Afghan government. This event directly led to the fact that before the Soviet invasion, the Afghan government army almost completely abandoned resistance or surrendered to the Soviet-backed puppet government.

  Lin Feng had to rescue Amin in order to increase the difficulty of the Soviet invasion and to consume the Soviet national strength. In early December 1979, more than 200 special warfare personnel from Taiwan's "Nine-tailed Fox" Special Warfare Brigade secretly arrived at the Kashgar Air Force Base in Xinjiang Military Region by air force transport plane. The commander of this operation was Colonel Wang Jie, the brigade commander of the "Nine-tailed Fox" Special Warfare Brigade.

  Amin, who took power in Afghanistan on September 16, 1979, may not have thought that the presidency he risked his life to seize would only last 104 days, earning him the nickname "100-day president". However, despite being in office for just over a hundred days, his "achievements" were truly "extraordinary".

  Amin's rule was marked by brutality on domestic issues. Due to the "illegitimacy" of his presidency, Amin seemed somewhat insecure. Therefore, after seizing power, Amin naturally thought of purging Taraki's supporters first. According to Soviet sources, more than 500 members of the People's Democratic Party were killed during Amin's rule, and many others fled to neighboring Iran or Pakistan. Later, these people began organizing anti-government movements with Soviet support.

  After the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, these groups turned to organize activities in Peshawar, Pakistan and later became known as Afghan "freedom fighters" in Western media. Amin's Great Purge caused anti-government armed groups to spread rapidly from rural areas to cities, extending to 23 out of 28 provinces nationwide, putting the Amin regime in crisis.

  To give the rebels a "profound" lesson, in mid-November 1979, Amin launched a large-scale military offensive against the rebels in Sayd Karam District of Paktia Province. As most anti-government guerrilla members were unemployed vagrants lacking military training, they quickly collapsed in the face of the onslaught by Amin's government forces. The unusually smooth offensive made Amin feel particularly good psychologically, allowing him to show off his "masculinity" during his days as the "100-day president".

  In this battle, the government forces eliminated more than a thousand people, including rebels and their families and supporters, thoroughly flattening the rebel base in Saidkaram to the ground, forcing most of the surviving rebel forces to flee to Pakistan, where they became homeless.

  Amin's brutal methods meant that during his 104 days in power, there were no further large-scale revolts apart from a failed military coup. Of course, to consolidate his rule, Amin also did not forget to implement certain "benevolent policies" towards the people. Amin was well aware that he had made too many enemies and it was necessary to appease the angry mood of the people, thereby expanding his support base among the masses.

  To this end, Amin carefully executed a sleight of hand - releasing over 10,000 prisoners who had been sentenced to death during the Taraki government. These people also did not forget to "thank" Amin after they came out and became a loyal force for maintaining his dictatorship. Amin's move was intended to declare to the people that his government was a "democratic and just" government, and those who were sentenced to death were innocent and had been framed by the corrupt and cruel Taraki government, which should take full responsibility for this.

  In addition, this rebellious "student" Amin really made the Soviet Union angry. In the early years, the Soviet Union was very dissatisfied with Amin's arrogance and unruliness, but because he was not the number one in Afghanistan and did not pose a great threat to the Soviet Union's interests, they pretended to ignore him.

  However, in the "September Event", Amin got rid of Taraki, who had always been very obedient to the Soviet Union, which increased the Soviet Union's dissatisfaction and vigilance towards Amin. But the change of ownership in Afghanistan was already a done deal, and for the Soviet Union, it didn't matter who was in power in Afghanistan, as long as he was willing to be a "little partner" and a "good colleague" of the Soviet Union.

  So, no matter how much the Soviet Union dislikes Amin now, it's a done deal. In consideration of strategic interests in all of Asia, they must insincerely offer "warm congratulations" to "Amin being elected as General Secretary of the People's Democratic Party and Chairman of the Revolutionary Council of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan", and hypocritically call him "a loyal friend of the Soviet Union".

  At the same time, the Soviet Union was worried that its interests in Afghanistan were in danger and increased its military advisers in Afghanistan. Of course, Amin was not stupid either. After dealing with the Soviet Union for so many years, he could see at a glance that this was "a weasel paying New Year's greetings to a chicken". Especially after the "September Incident", Amin's contradictions with the Soviet Union deepened, and he accused the Soviet Union of instigating Taraki to assassinate him behind his back and interfering in Afghanistan's internal affairs.

  After coming to power, Amin began to turn against the Soviet Union. However, even the toughest Amin was not foolish enough to openly challenge the Soviet "big brother" and be beaten to death by the Soviets. In fact, before taking this step, Amin had already thought of a move, which was his cleverness: Amin skillfully used the special background of the Cold War to play the Sino-American card to gain survival space for himself.

  Following the kidnapping and murder of US Ambassador Adolph Dubs by Afghan terrorists, almost all diplomatic contact between the two countries was severed. Amin had been waiting for an opportunity to make contact with the United States. The opportunity finally came when the Iranian Revolution led by Khomeini severely damaged American influence in the region, and Amin immediately saw his potential value in soothing America's wounds.

  As expected, in September 1979, after Amin's coup, the United States extended an "olive branch" to Kabul. Bruce Amstutz, then deputy chief of the US special mission to Afghanistan, had a friendly conversation with Amin. He gave Amin a "tranquilizer", reassuring him that as long as the United States maintained a strong presence in Afghanistan, he did not have to worry about the Soviet attitude that displeased him.

  The US, accustomed to employing psychological tactics, also worked on Amin. In late September, Amin specially summoned Amstutz and expressed his willingness to improve relations with the United States. Two days after this meeting, Afghan Foreign Minister Wali quietly expressed the same intention and request to a US State Department official in New York.

  Amin's tendency to betray the Soviet Union became more and more apparent, and he was also inclined to lean towards the West, throwing himself into the arms of his arch-enemy, the United States. The mere thought of this made the Soviet government furious, feeling more and more that Amin was a "Tito-type" figure, and Afghanistan seemed to be becoming a potentially Romania-style danger.

  Could Moscow tolerate Amin's centrifugal tendencies of independent nationalism? The Soviet Union's long-prepared invasion was about to unfold, and after the "100-day president" Amin had finally succumbed to his own rebellion.

  Between August and October 1979, the Soviet Union sent troops to Afghanistan under the pretext of assisting in the fight against certain guerrilla groups. They took control of important strategic locations such as Kabul and Mazar-i-Sharif, and used the excuse of exchanging equipment and inspecting and repairing weapons to seal off the army's light weapons, dismantling its main heavy weapons and rendering it unable to respond quickly in an emergency.

  During this period, the Soviet Union sent a high-level military delegation led by General Pavlovsky, Commander-in-Chief of the Army, to Afghanistan for on-the-spot investigations. After gaining a detailed understanding of the situation, they finally determined the invasion plan. Subsequently, a forward command post was established at Termez on the Soviet-Afghan border.

  On December 8, 1979, Brezhnev convened a "narrow" Politburo meeting, at which it was decided to replace Amin with Karmal and send a certain number of troops to Afghanistan, and instructions were given to the relevant departments to implement this.

  On December 12, Brezhnev again chaired a plenary meeting of the Central Political Bureau, at which a resolution to send troops to Afghanistan was formally adopted, with Marshal Sokolov, Deputy Minister of Defense, as the commander-in-chief.

  After the resolution was passed, the Soviet army began to transport large numbers of advance troops to Afghanistan. On December 14 and 15, the Soviet Union, under the guise of a long-range airborne exercise, transferred the 103rd Airborne Division from the Belorussian Military District and the 104th Airborne Division from the North Caucasus Military District to Central Asia, while secretly advancing the 105th Airborne Division from the Central Asian Military District to Termez.

  In the next few days, the Soviet army successively transported 2 airborne divisions and 1 airborne regiment to Kabul Airport and Bagram Air Force Base. At the same time, a special force of the Soviet army with the name of "assisting in suppressing bandits" secretly entered Bagram Air Force Base, occupying and controlling the strategic location there.

  In 10 days, the preparations for the invasion were basically completed, and everything was ready to be launched. The invading Soviet army had about 120,000 people, including 2 airborne divisions, 6 motorized infantry divisions, 2 transport helicopter regiments, and 3 armed helicopter regiments. Equipment included more than 2,000 tanks, 1,000 armored vehicles, 25,000 cars, 200 fixed-wing aircraft of various types, 2,000 artillery pieces of various types, and 150 helicopters.

  The Soviet Union had made preparations for a full-scale invasion of Afghanistan, and by this time the Soviet leadership had decided to get rid of Amin. On October 10, 1979, Andropov brought Karmal from Czechoslovakia to Moscow, where he began plotting to take over the presidency from Amin.

  On the last evening of the month, Brezhnev held a special discussion with Politburo members in a secret room on how to dispose of Amin. The meeting fell into silence, and Brezhnev suddenly cleared his throat and said seriously: "I have decided to get rid of him!" The attending members also expressed unanimous agreement. In order to get rid of Amin, the Soviet Union specially formed the 154th Independent Special Forces Brigade, whose main task was to eliminate Amin before the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.