The Case of Logar
The Soviet invasion disturbed Afghan society greatly. Among other things, it led to a change of political leaders at the local level. In the course of resistance, traditional leaders were being phased out, and new Islamic leaders were taking their place. Jehad and the efforts to purge the society of non-Islamic elements helped to bring about this transformation. Here this transformation is studied in the province of Logar.
• • •
Inhabitants
A feature of the people of Logar is their solidarity. Nowhere in Afghanistan is the leveling effect of Islam as conspicuous as it is among the people of Logar, where among the well-to-do it is a custom to give to the needy the Islamic zakat (one-fortieth of one’s property) and other donations on a regular basis. Bilingualism also influences solidarity, as does the similarity in physical appearances and clothes. Those who do not know the people may be unable to differentiate between the Dari-speaking Tajiks and the Pashto-speaking Pashtuns. The more numerous Pashtuns—Stanizays, Ahmadzays, Abdurrahimzays, Alozays, Mohmands, Gadaykhel, and Zhalozays—live in the hilly areas, and the Tajiks, Khwajas, and Sadat live in the plains together with Pashtuns, mainly in villages on both sides of the main road. In some areas of the plains the Pashtuns predominate, while in others the Tajiks predominate. Also, in Logar the Shi’ite minority and the Sunni majority are on good terms with each other. Neither the PDPA nor other leftist groups had made any significant inroads among them. The absence of disgruntled minorities has also contributed to solidarity among the people.
Before the disturbances, Logar had many madrasas (traditional religious seminaries) and mawlawiyan (religious scholars). As in the rest of the country, each of the regions’s 338 villages, which together contain more than 300,000 inhabitants, had (and still has) one or more mosques where mullas lead the Muslims in prayers and teach children the essentials of Islam. Logar also had four high schools and about one hundred secondary (through ninth grade) and primary schools.[1] Like the people of other regions, the people of Logar also cooperated with the government by volunteering labor, plots of land, and money for the construction of schools for both girls and boys. On this point the people pressured the government, but the latter was unable to meet the demand for financial reasons. Also, sons and daughters of the well-to-do studied in higher civilian and military schools in Kabul.
Because of improvements in transportation, the daily contact between Kabul and Logar had begun to change the lifestyle of the people. As in other districts around the city, the daily transport of cash crops from Logar into Kabul had brought them closer together. A number of individuals from some distinguished families from Logar had served the government in various periods as senior ministers and officers, while some had become famous as generals and leaders of the resistance movements in wars against the British.[2] Before the communist coup the people of Logar were adopting modern ways of life more rapidly than the peoples of the districts around Kabul. But the coup and the invasion changed this trend. The change was apparent in the attitude of the people in the domain of politics.
Following the coup, the people of Logar were disturbed, just as were the people of other regions. They feared the ascendance of atheists in the government. Some councils of elders and mullas decided that they should be the first to wage jehad against the communists, even if they had to oppose their own relatives. The Logari officers in the army in Kabul planned to rise against the government, but before they could do so many were executed or imprisoned.[3] Thus, the first planned but unsuccessful uprising in the army was the work of officers who were all or nearly all from the province of Logar. Then, in May 1979 the people of Logar rose and overthrew the provincial government.[4]
It was, however, the Soviet invasion and the policies of the new rulers that changed the attitude of the people. Their attitude was changed not only toward the regime but also toward modern education and local leaders. As one observer writes:
The Soviet interference and the Soviet invasion provided powerful incentives to the mullas in their opposition to modern education. The Soviets, through the Parchamis and Khalqis, deceived students in schools, and in the name of a revolutionary ideology spread atheism, a sense of obedience to foreigners [ajnabiparasti] and of treason to the fatherland [watanfiroshi]. They employed sons against fathers by sending them in tanks and warplanes to destroy their homes and villages. [Seeing this], the common people took spades and destroyed schools from the foundation. The educated persons became discredited, and the mullas became unrivaled rulers.[5]
On this point an elderly man from Zadran of the province of Paktia is more eloquent. According to him, during the reign of King Mohammad Zahir the government introduced two projects in the province of Paktia: roads and schools. At first the people of all the valleys of Zadran opposed the projects, but later they acquiesced. To continue the story in the words of the elderly man himself:
Advised by a great mulla, the people of our valley opposed the two projects of schools and roads. Thus, neither Khalqis nor Parchamis appeared among us. But from among the schools of other valleys there emerged Khalqis and Parchamis who later, as pilots, bombarded their own people and villages, while the Russian tanks, which arrived along the roads, did much the same. But the people of our valley were immune to such destruction. May God bless the great mulla. He was so right.[6]
• • •
Traditional Political Leadership
In previous resistance movements, leaders had usually been local magnates who could muster support and who had established either a feudal relationship as khans with the central government or who had served as military officers. Spiritual persons and the ’ulama provided them with religious blessing by issuing fatwas (rulings) and preaching for wars as sanctioned by Islam and tradition. The mullas incited the people. As charismatic leaders, some distinguished spiritual persons also led the faithful. But as a rule, in this combination of secular and spiritual forces the former led while the latter sanctioned, because the former had the labor and material means at its disposal, and the latter had the monopoly of spiritual power in a predominantly Sunni society, a society shaped more by traditional and conventional values than religious values. This is evident from the fact that Islamic Afghanistan had no theocracy. The anthropologist Fredrik Barth notes that “among the Afghans, Islam has never been the basis for a permanent, formal and hierarchical religious or political organization.” However, as Barth also states, in the time of resistance “Islam is needed as a unifying symbol and emotive force.”[7]
This situation changed, though, as the spread of communism, the Soviet invasion, the imposition of a client regime, and the Soviet massacres led to the rise of mullas and Islamists. These could not have risen to become leaders at the expense of traditional leaders had they not been part of the jehad organizations, supported by outside powers that provided weapons, logistics, and money. Traditional leaders did not have such support, nor was their bastion of power able to sustain them as it had in the past. With the disruption of the political system, they had also lost their influential position as intermediaries between the local government and the people. Having moved either to cities or Pakistan, they had been deprived of the produce of their land and of the support of local people, who had also moved out of most areas. It was beyond the means of traditional elders to obtain the weapons needed to oppose the army of a superpower. In the beginning a number of commanders rose from among the traditional leaders, but over time they either affiliated themselves with the jehad organizations or were forced out.[8]
Also important was the attitude of the Islamists, who disparaged traditional elders and tribal organizations. Another influence that worked against traditional leaders was the rise among their relatives of Khalqis and Parchamis, whom the mujahideen hunted down. In line with its dogma the regime issued propaganda attacking traditional elders as feudal, reactionary, and so on; nevertheless, it tried to win them over to its side. But ultimately the local leaders were reduced to insignificance because of the animosity showed them by the new leaders—the mullas, field commanders and Islamist organizations.
• • •
The Rise of Mullas as Leaders
Drawn from among the poorer elements of society, the mullas were religious functionaries with little or no education. As religious functionaries, they lived in communities away from their own localities, dependent on the believers for a living. Since they had no tribal or social standing, the mullas opposed social conventions, tribal codes, and nationalism.[9] Sayd Bahauddin Majruh states that “he [the mulla] was not involved in local socio-political affairs; he did not participate in the deliberations of the council of village elders—his only function on these occasions was to perform the opening and the concluding prayers of the jirga session. While respected, he still remained the favorite target of popular jokes.”[10]
The rise of the mullas to the position of political and military leaders in Logar is without parallel in modern Afghan history. Of the twenty-nine heads (awmer), judges, and military commanders in the Baraki Barak district (uluswali) of the Logar province, all were mullas. Of these, nineteen were members of the moderate Islamic Revolutionary Organization and six of the moderate National Islamic Front; the remaining four were members of the Islamic Party and Islamic Association. A number of other mullas and akhunds (traditional teachers, masters) also acted as “leaders of the jehad and rulers of the people.”[11]
The mullas rose to power in Logar because, as noted, many mullas rallied around Mawlawi Mohammad Nabi Mohammadi, the leader of the Islamic Revolutionary Organization, who was also from Logar. However, the Islamists who surpassed them in organization, education, weapons and in making propaganda challenged them, as well as other groups. The two were radically different, as explained in chapter 5.
The resistance in Logar assumed many other dimensions as well. In the absence of government, the commanders vied not only with those outside their group but also with those within their own group. Personal rivalry and the desire to extend control played a part in this competition. The sociological composition of the Islamist and traditionalist organizations set their members at odds with each other. The mullas competed with members of the Islamic Party, who were drawn from among the Dari-speaking educated groups such as teachers, students, and government employees.[12] By comparison, the mullas were a different social group. Untouched by secular and modern ideas, concerned with their duties as religious functionaries, and looking on themselves as custodians of traditional Islamic values, the mullas were at variance with these “modernized” persons even though both groups were fighting the same enemy in the spirit of jehad. The mullas opposed modern ideas so much that they called “infidels” those who believed the earth was round.
The Islamists who were more organized and also had an ideology and a program for the transformation of society were a threat to the mullas.[13] Although the opposition among field commanders belonging to the various groups was usually personal rather than organizational or ideological,[14] the opposition between the commanders of the Islamic Revolutionary Movement and the Islamic Party was more serious. It often led to clashes even on such matters as opposing the enemy, not only in Logar but throughout the country.[15]
The mullas adopted an authoritarian style of leadership. Nominally, they settled claims and conflicts between individuals in accord with the Shari’a, while community elders, though weakened, settled cases through jirgas. In fact, however, in Logar the mulla commanders did not rule according to the Shari’a, which requires that evidence be presented and elaborate procedures be followed; rather, they ruled as they pleased. They would single out those whom they thought were collaborating with the enemy and dub such persons infidels. Once a man was so dubbed, he seldom lived long.[16] One observer writes:
Decisions were made in the absence of the accused. In the decisions the views of the secret agents of the mullas whom they had assigned duties in villages were considered decisive. Personal considerations, distrustfulness, and animosities could influence decisions and the execution of the accused. The mujahideen who enforced the decisions wore dark glasses and covered their faces. The accused were either taken at night from their homes or seized in daylight from roads. Others were picked up from public buses running along the main road between Kabul and Gardez. To escape such an ordeal, members of the party traveled in the guise of women. Some were still recognized and executed somewhere away from the public. The executioners were not recognized, nor did any group claim responsibility.[17]
In addition to these secret executions, those who were accused of spying for the regime were publicly executed.[18]
The public was divided about the executions, particularly since the Parchamis and Khalqis had already been driven into Kabul. While some argued that those who were executed deserved the punishment, others disagreed, insisting that evidence be brought forward. The mullas combated this attitude. Their agents would spread rumors in support of the judgments, saying that the decisions had indeed been based on evidence.[19] The number of persons executed cannot be determined. In Logar alone, in the two years after the invasion it is likely that more than one hundred persons were executed. It was commonly held that revenge and personal animosity, camouflaged as jehad, were the impulse behind many executions.[20]
The executions were the result of influences connected to the jehad but rooted in society. An atmosphere of distrust and rivalry prevailed, the result of disunity among leaders of the mujahid organizations based in faraway Peshawar and among local field commanders. Through the field commanders, this ambience of distrust spread far and wide. Some leaders of the mujahid groups persuaded their commanders to clash with their rivals, and some commanders and individual mujahideen found an opportunity to settle old scores and take revenge. They disrespected the traditional leaders. Some mujahideen who had been recruited from among the uprooted groups harmed the people in pursuit of personal interest with no regard for social norms. The Islamists were more intolerant of their opponents and even of those who were not sympathetic to them, labeling them heretics. In particular, many people were denounced as Wahhabis. (The Wahhabis were followers of Mohammad bin ’Abd al-Wahhab [1703-87], whose aim was to do away with innovations later than the third century of Islam.) Former government employees were especially vulnerable to such accusations. To be safe from such accusations, they grew beards as a sign of being religious.[21] Beards thus became common throughout the country.[22]
The mujahid organizations found it difficult to get rid of the undesirable elements in the ranks of the mujahideen, particularly when they were commanders. When such mujahideen were expelled from one group, the fold of another group was open for them. Another influence that created tension was infiltration by KhAD agents and leftist elements, who worked, among other things, to prepare the groundwork for clashes. The atmosphere of distrust and disunity was also exacerbated by the inability of the organizations to set up a council composed of their representatives and of the locals to work out programs for opposing the enemy and administering the province. The tendency among the commanders to monopolize power was too strong for such a council to be set up. The mullas who had obtained power and other benefits were also unwilling to cooperate.[23] Any one group would counterbalance the activities of the others. This created a form of equilibrium,[24] a situation that checked the dominance of one organization over the rest and the region as a whole.
• • •
The Force of Jehad
That the Afghans were in a state of jehad was obvious. Not only the Muslim Afghans but even the Hindu and Sikh minorities contributed to it. The tradition of jehad in Muslim Afghanistan has always been strong. The defense of country, of honor (namoas), and of cultural values—among which the demonstration of valor in a spirit of rivalry was conspicuous—turned jehad into a mighty force.[25] Added to this was the marksmanship of the Afghans, who, even in time of peace, led the world in numbers of rifles per person. When the state of jehad was believed to exist, the Muslim Afghans, in particular the patriotic believers, felt duty bound either to take part in person or to contribute otherwise. In times of jehad the number of combatant Afghans was higher than normal in proportion to the population. In such times the noncombatant Afghans, including widows, supported those fighting the invaders. The defense of the country and the faith was not the responsibility of the armed forces alone but of every adult Afghan capable of carrying weapons. Every time the country has been invaded, the regular army has disintegrated and the ranks of the irregulars strengthened in the spirit of jehad.
The jehad against the Russians was more comprehensive than any other in Afghan history. “What was at first an uncertainty about the new [Khalqi] regime became anger and frustration as unrealistic, insensitive, and oppressive policies were introduced. When the Sovi-ets invaded, these feelings turned into widespread outrage, amongtraditionalists and progressives alike.”[26] The combatant Afghans were determined to defend their values, while the noncombatant Afghans felt duty bound to support them. This meant that the noncombatant Afghans felt it to be their religious and patriotic duty to shelter, clothe, and feed the mujahideen, to meet their expenses for weapons, and to assist them in the problems that resulted from clashes with the enemy. The flight of the locals to Pakistan thinned this basis of support of the mujahideen.
True to their patriotic and Islamic duties, the Afghans supported the mujahideen despite the odds in fighting the army of a superpower. They paid the Islamic tithe (’ushr) on the produce of land and a number of other taxes to the mujahid commanders. But because of inexperience and the necessity of asserting their newly won power and of meeting the harsh requirements of jehad, the commanders often treated the locals in an authoritarian manner. Not all were harsh; some ruled in consultation with others. Nevertheless, authoritarianism generally marked their rule. There then began to develop between the commanders and the people the sour relationship that exists between the ruler and the ruled.
Like people of other areas, the Logaris were compelled to pay taxes to the financial heads not of one mujahid organization, but of all of them. Armed mujahideen would appear at the doors of the people and demand money.[27] Although the Islamic tithe was lighter than what landowners had formerly paid the government, now they paid more than before and, in addition, they paid under the threat of Kalashnikovs. Also, supported by bands of armed mujahideen, the new rulers imposed heavy fines on both sides of disputes without investigating them as required by Islamic laws.[28] Not surprisingly, the number of disputes and criminal cases dropped.[29]
• • •
Suppression of National Culture
Another set of measures adopted by the mujahideen were intended to suppress or replace customs, traditions, and social conventions with the injunctions of the Islamic Shari’a. Among other things, the new measures suppressed the tradition of singing and dancing at weddings and many other similar ceremonies; traditional games, entertainments, and racing events, including those that were militarily significant; and the custom of reciting not only lyric but also epic and mystic poetry from the classic literature in which Afghanistan is so rich, substituting for these the recitation of passages from the Quran. The measures also confined to their homes women who formerly labored in the fields, assisting their men. In addition, community elders, those who embodied traditional and social wisdom, were replaced by scholars of religion and Shari’a.[30]
These measures showed that the mujahideen’s program was intended to change and Islamize those aspects of the rural society that were considered to be un-Islamic. The new local rulers set for themselves a provocative task, since the many different groups composing the Afghan society were (and are) rich in alternative mores. Indeed, the Afghans are much attached to this legacy from the civilizations of their long history. The mores constituted the main ingredients of their identity. The efforts of the new rulers were a reminder of the unsuccessful efforts of the communists, who tried to reorganize the society along Marxist-Leninist lines. Never before had the Afghan national culture been under so much pressure: on the one hand, from the internationalist culture of communism; on the other, from the universalist culture of Islam. Recent developments are probably best explained in terms of the encounter among these three types of cultures. In particular, the implementation of the two hostile sets of measures—those of the communist rulers in the urban areas and those of the religiously oriented rulers in the countryside—widened still further the existing gaps between the cities and the countryside.
• • •
The Political Significance of Weapons
The new religious leaders set themselves above the locals and acted in an authoritarian manner because they had the ability to acquire weapons and thus to enforce their wills. The possession of weapons was, of course, necessary for waging jehad. The matter of weaponry was especially critical in this conflict. At no time before had the gap been so wide between the Afghans and the invaders in the quality, quantity, and range of weapons. In contrast with the past, when the Afghans provided large numbers of high-quality weapons to their combatants, they could now provide very few weapons, and those of poor quality. But to wage jehad the mujahideen must have weapons. They obtained weapons from two sources: from the army of the Kabul regime and through their own Peshawar-based organizations.
To acquire weapons, the mulla commanders of Logar, particularly of the Mohammad Agha front, would ambush enemy forces when they were in their locality. In addition, troops from the Kabul regime sometimes assisted them by defecting, bringing their advanced weapons with them. The commanders would submit such weapons to their headquarters as spoils, in contrast to the tribes of Paktia (Gurbuz, Tanay, Zadran, Mangal, and Zazay), who either quarreled over weapons or received some concessions from the regime in return for weapons.[31] The Logaris were successful in acquiring weapons from the regime forces. During the twenty months following the Soviet invasion the Kabul regime lost 25,000 Kalashnikovs to the mujahideen in Logar.[32]
The other source of weapons was beyond the border. From there weapons were sent to the mujahideen from two places: from the Darra-e-Adam Khel in the Afriday land where the Peshawar-based organizations made the purchase, and from Peshawar itself, to which the governments that supported the Afghan cause sent weapons. Jan Goodwin donned a disguised to visit this first place, a town forbidden to foreigners: “Of the 250 or so arms dealers in Darra, half that number are engaged in copying any kind of weapon from anywhere in the world you require.…In this dusty maze-like town, where the sound of gunfire is continuous as guns are tested and demonstrated for customers, it is possible to purchase light and heavy machine guns, mortars and rocket launchers in addition to ordinary rifles, all of which have been skillfully copied.”[33]
Of the foreign sources of weapons, the United States and Egypt were the major ones during the first two years of the invasion. The United States and some Muslim countries began to support the mujahideen, “cautiously channeling limited amounts of small arms and other military equipment to them.”[34] In January 1980, after the Soviets invaded Afghanistan, the Carter administration appropriated about $30 million to supply the resistance. In December 1982 President Reagan’s administration reportedly ordered the Central Intelligence Agency “to provide the Afghan insurgents for the first time with bazookas, mortars, grenade launchers, mines and recoilless rifles of Soviet origin, and possibly also shoulder-fired antiaircraft missiles.”[35] But not all the aid reached the mujahideen: published estimates said between one-third and one-half of the aid was diverted by Pakistan or sold by representatives of the mujahid groups in Peshawar. Edward Girardet, who visited the mujahideen territory, wrote in September 1984 that the American military aid that was “seeping through.…tend[s] to be of poor quality or insufficient quantity” and that he and other visitors had not found published accounts of “a highly effective” CIA program to be true.[36] Although for many years the mujahid commanders did not receive enough weapons to fight the enemy, they still got enough to enable them to push out traditional elders from their areas and to rule over the territories under their control in an authoritarian manner. Emboldened by the moral force of the jehad that they were conducting against an atheist invader and strengthened by weapons, the new leaders acted like independent rulers, showing little or no regard for the people whom they ruled.
• • •
Public Concern
Logaris, like all people throughout the land, soon felt dissatisfied with the disunity of the jehad organizations, and particularly of the field commanders. This point has already been explained. People were worried about the consequences of the disunity in war against the forces of a superpower. Many people reiterated the adage that success lay in unity, but to no effect. By mid-1981 it was clear that rivalry, not cooperation, ruled the relations of the six mujahid organizations in Logar on all matters, including military operations.[37] In this atmosphere each group tried to carry on military operations separately to demonstrate its valor and acquire a heroic reputation.[38] At times the groups pursued not only separate but conflicting programs of operations, which sometimes led to clashes among them.[39] One such policy difference between the Islamic Party and the Islamic Revolutionary Movement led to the destruction of the only high school in the district of Baraki Barak.[40]
Despite complaints about the new leaders, the people of Logar cooperated with them on jehad.[41] Zahir Ghazi Alam, a native physician, writes:
Politically, every class and grade of the community was disgusted with the Kabul regime and the Russians. Among the people there was no sign of submission either to the government or the Russians. They had acquiesced into submission to the commanders and heads of various organizations, showing patience and tolerance to the mistreatment they received from some of them.…Disunity among the organizations was daily on the increase and taking root. Accusations, criticisms, and provocations had become common, and this caused concern among the people. The people were looking forward to the emergence of a leader to end this anarchic state and to save the nation from the present dilemma. Sometimes they were looking even toward the former king, Mohammad Zahir. They did so because the leaders in Peshawar had disappointed them. The people had been frustrated by the disunity of the organizations and the pressure brought to bear on them by the Russians.[42]
Notes
1. Alam, “Memoirs of Jehad,” 170. Originally from Logar, Zahir Ghazi Alam has spent about twenty months in his home province during four trips that he made there from Peshawar, where he had been a refugee. A medical physician, he made the trips to treat patients. His memoirs cover many aspects of life of the people of Logar in the period under discussion. Dr. Alam and other Afghan refugee physicians—Pashtunyar, Farouq Mairanay, Asadullah, Abdur Rahman Zamani, Ahmad Sher Zamani, Farid Safi, and others—had started the Afghan Doctors Association, which operated at one time with approximately 170 members both in Afghanistan and among the refugees in Pakistan before pressure from the resistance organizations led to its dissolution. Dr. Alam now lives in the United States. For details on the association and the role of the Afghan educated middle class in the resistance, see Farr, “Afghan Middle Class.”
2. Alam, “Memoirs of Jehad,” 168.
3. Ibid., 170. Among Zadrans of the province of Paktia even during the reign of King Mohammad Zahir the ’ulama preached that when renegades persist in “rejecting the fundamentals of Islam,” it behooves their relatives to do away with them, even if they be their own sons or close relations. Zadran, History of Afghanistan, 15.
4. Alam, “Memoirs of Jehad,” 168.
5. Ibid., 146.
6. Quoted in Alam, “Jehad of Afghanistan,” 31.
7. Barth, “Cultural Wellsprings,” 198. For patterns of local political leadership in Afghanistan, see Kakar, Government and Society.
8. Commander Mati’ullah Safi of the Pech Valley of Kunar Province is a good example in this connection. A son of the famous Sultan Mohammad Khan, Mati’ullah Safi, with the assistance of his brothers, first waged jehad independently as a member of the leading family of his community, but subsequently he had to join the Mahaz organization.
9. ’Izzatullah Safi, personal communication, Chak Darra refugee camp, Deer, Northwest Frontier Province, 4 November 1988. For a general description of religious groups in Afghanistan, see Kakar, Government and Society. The term mulla or molla is derived from the Arabic term mawla, which may mean “master,” “trustee,” or “helper.” Mawla frequently appears in titles—for instance, mawlawi and mulla—in several parts of the Muslim world, especially India, and in connection with scholars and saints (Encyclopedia of Islam 3:417).
10. Majruh, “Past and Present Education,” 79.
11. Alam, “Memoirs of Jehad,” 148. Akhund, a title given to scholars, has been current since the Timurid times in the sense of “schoolmaster” and “tutor.” The word derives from Persian khwand, from khudawand (Encyclopedia of Islam 3:331).
12. Alam, “Memoirs of Jehad,” 136.
13. Ibid., 147.
14. Ibid., 175.
15. In places the intergroup clashes were so bloody that a group would disarm and kill followers of the rival group. When victorious, a group would massacre followers of the rival group. Sometimes the groups robbed people on roads (Zadran, History of Afghanistan, 817). The district of Maidan to the west of Kabul provides us with an extreme example of intergroup clashes. According to one source, up to 1988 Commander Amanullah had lost about forty thousand men in intergroup clashes; by contrast, only forty men had been lost fighting the common enemy, the Soviets and the regime. Although clashes were frequent, this figure is surely an exaggeration.
16. Alam, “Memoirs of Jehad,” 173. It was not only in Logar that people were executed on a suspicion of being Khalqis or collaborators; such killing was common throughout the land. In reply to an accusation that some people executed by his orders were not Khalqis, Mawlawi Abd al-Hay said: “I again reiterate that if I order that 150 Khalqis be executed, the act is permissible even though 50 among them be non-Khalqis.” The mawlawi was general amir (amir-e ’umomi) of the Harakat-e-Inqilab-e-Islami of the provinces of Takhar, Badakhshan, Kunduz, Baghlan, Samangan, Joazjan, Faryab, and Badghis. (See Nasrat, “Bitter Facts,” 37, 38, 39.) A commander-mulla in Wardak claimed that he recognized Khalqis from their smell. From among the suspicious passengers who were picked up from buses along the Kabul-Kandahar road, some were executed on that account. Another commander of Char Asia, south of Kabul city, instructed his followers in Peshawar to do away with any suspicious person found in their locality: if he were a Muslim he would go to heaven, and if not he would have been accorded the punishment he deserved (Alam, “Violation of Human Rights,” 7).
17. Alam, “Memoirs of Jehad,” 135.
18. Ibid., 161.
19. Ibid., 136.
20. Ibid., 141.
21. Ibid., 147.
22. On the religious impact of jehad on the society, see Cultural Council of Afghanistan Resistance, Future of Islamic Afghanistan.
23. Alam, “Memoirs of Jehad,” 141-44; personal communication with a commander, Germany, August 1988. For a general description of the commanders, see Kakar, Afghans in the Spring of 1987.
24. Alam, “Memoirs of Jehad,” 139.
25. For institutionalized forces behind the Afghan resistance movement, see Barth, “Cultural Wellsprings,” 187; Canfield, “Ethnic, Regional, and Sectarian Alignments.”
26. Canfield, “Islamic Sources,” 69.
27. Alam, “Memoirs of Jehad,” 139.
28. Z. G. Alam, personal communication, San Diego, December 1990.
29. Alam, “Memoirs of Jehad,” 174.
30. Emad, “Impact of Jehad.”
31. Alam, “Memoirs of Jehad,” 153.
32. Kakar, Afghans in the Spring of 1987, 37.
33. Goodwin, Caught in the Crossfire, 46.
34. Bradsher, Afghanistan, 205.
35. Ibid., 272.
36. Quoted in ibid., 278.
37. Alam, “Memoirs of Jehad,” 183.
38. Ibid., 182.
39. Ibid., 175.
40. Ibid., 139.
41. Ibid., 172.
42. Ibid., 175.
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