The Saur Revolution of 3 August 1998 and its aftermath

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Afghanistan: A Forgotten Chapter
By John Ryan, Canadian Dimension,, November/December 2001. On April 27, 1978, to prevent the police from attacking a huge demonstration in front of the presidential palace, the army intervened, and after firing a single shot, the government resigned. The military officers then invited the Marxist party to form the government, under the leadership of Noor Mohammed Taraki. This is how a Marxist government came into office—it was an entirely indigenous event.
Soviet Report on Afghanistan
By Yu. Andropov, et al, Russian News Network, 31 December 1979. After a coup d'etat and the murder of the CC PDPA General Secretary and Chairman of the Revolutionary Council of Afghanistan N.M. Taraki, committed by Amin in September of this year, the situation in Afghanistan has been sharply exacerbated and taken on crisis proportions.
Afghan pamphlet: Emine Engin the ‘revolution’ that never was
Reviewed by the Alliance for Workers& Liberty, n.d. [ca. 1980]. In 1982 the Turkish Communist Party published a small book by Emine Engin on the Stalinist revolution in Afghanistan. It was actually a putsch that did not engage the popular masses in the civil war that along can wrest power (77Kb).
Afghanistan: 20 years of bloodshed
BBC News, Monday 3 August 1998. Afghanistan marked the 20th anniversary of the Saur revolution (the take over by the Taraki Khalq or People's faction, named after the Afghan month in which it took place) in April 1998, which was the catalyst for bloodshed in the country ever since. The legacy of the Saur revolution.
Afghanistan: Some overlooked history
By Marilyn Bechtel, People's Weekly World, 6 October 2001. The role of the Soviet Union in the years from 1978 to 1989; the role of the U.S. in building up the Mujahadeen forces, including the Taliban.
Questions and Answers
By Tariq Ali, 8 October 2001. The PDPA (—the Peoples Democratic Party of Afghanistan—Afghan Communist Party) with a strong base in the army and air force, carried out a coup d'etat in 1978, toppling the corrupt regime of Daoud. The Taliban is influenced by Saudi Wahhabism. Throughout the Cold War the U.S. used Islam as a bulwark against communism and revolution.
Revolution and counterrevolution
By Mark Fischer, Weekly Worker, Thursday 11 October 2001. Wide sections of the left dismissed the April 1978 revolution in Afghanistan—led by the Peoples Democratic Party of Afghanistan—as a putsch. Long extract from Emine Engin.
The murder of Haji Qadir
By Eric S. Margolis, DAWN, Monday 05 August 2002. Recollections of Qadir in the early 1990s, when civil war was raging following the Soviet pullout. Haji Qadir, one of southern Afghanistan's most important warlords.
Corporate Media Ignores US Hypocrisy on War Crimes
By Peter Phillips, Sociology Department/Project Censored, Sonoma State University, 9 December 2003. General Abdul Rashid Dostum fought alongside the Russians in the 1980s. He switched sides in 1992 and joined the Mujahidin. For over a decade, Dostum was a regional warlord in charge of six northern provinces, which he ran like a private fiefdom, making millions. Forced into exile in Turkey by the Taliban in 1998, he came back into power as a military proxy of the US during the invasion of Afghanistan.
Afghanistan 1979-1992
Extract from Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II, By William Blum (2003). The US government supported the Islamic in order to fight against the Soviet-supported government of Afghanistan. For decades Washington and the Shah of Iran tried to pressure and bribe Afghanistan in order to roll back Russian influence in the country.
Communism in Afghanistan
Afghanland, n.d. The split in the PDPA government between Nur Muhammad Taraki of the Khalq faction and Hafizullah Amin of the Parchamis faction. Soviet intervention [hostile to the USSR].