a house divided, 1933–73ideology to the masses. The government established the country’s first
national census under Polish supervision, which alienated rural popula-
tions even more as young urban ideologues were sent into remote parts
of the country with questionnaires that demanded detailed, personal
information about family life, women, wealth and land ownership.
Taraki, encouraged by Moscow, placed heavy restrictions on the activ-
ities of Western agencies and ngos, especially north of the Hindu Kush,
and it became increasingly difficult for Americans and Europeans to obtain
visas. The government increasingly recruited expatriate experts from the
Soviet Union, Warsaw Pact countries and Cuba. As Moscow sought to
bind Afghanistan politically, economically and financially to its interests,
the Afghan government signed a series of wide-ranging treaties and agree-
ments with the ussr and its satellite countries that encompassed everything
from cultural activities to military assistance, technical cooperation and
mineral exploitation.
In August 1978 the Afghan government signed an agreement with
the ussr to construct a road bridge across the Amu Darya and in early
December a Treaty of Friendship, Good Neighbourliness and Cooperation
legitimized the ussr’s role of guaranteeing Afghanistan’s security, inde-
pendence and territorial independence, an agreement that would later be
used to justify the Soviet military intervention. Early in 1979 another series
of agreements established a permanent Soviet-Afghan Commission on
economic cooperation and direct Soviet involvement in economic plan-
ning. Following the Soviet invasion in December of the same year, the
government of President Babrak Karmal conceded administrative control
over the Wakhan Corridor and the ussr set up eavesdropping facilities to
monitor the military activity in Pakistan and China.
Even if the Taraki government had come to power on the back of a
popular uprising, the sweeping nature of the reforms would have met
with stiff resistance. Taraki, however, like Da’ud before him, had seized
power in a military coup and had no popular mandate, despite the govern-
ment constantly claiming to represent ‘the toiling masses’. The decrees
may have stripped powerful and wealthy individuals of their land and
other cap ital assets, but they antagonized powerful individuals, challenged
Islamic values, and destroyed the symbiotic relationship between land-
lord and tenant, khan and tribe. Landlords whose land had been seized
called in their tenants’ debts and refused to advance them credit, seed and
fertilizer, or allow them use of oxen, ploughs and tractors. Peasants who
accepted grants of confiscated land lost all irrigation rights and had to
either beg or buy water from their neighbours or bribe the mirab, and were