Afghanistan Waiting for the End

By EDWARD W. DESMOND KABUL

The front is just outside Kabul. From the center of the city, it is easy to spot a series of outposts -- small, mud-walled fortresses -- on the snowy mountaintops that ring the capital. Soviet and Afghan troops man the redoubts around the clock, watching for guerrilla movement in the valleys beyond. As soon as mujahedin activity is spotted, Soviet artillery goes into action, and the boom of outgoing fire echoes through the city.

The defense of Kabul, however, is undergoing its biggest change since the Soviets invaded Afghanistan a decade ago. Having already withdrawn most of its 115,000-strong invasion force, Moscow has now begun pulling out the last of the estimated 15,000 troops who form the Kabul garrison and defend the corridor north to the Soviet border. By Feb. 15, the last Soviet soldier is scheduled to be gone from Afghanistan, and the Afghan military will bear sole responsibility for the security of the capital as well as the rest of the country.

Then the question will be when, not if, the Soviet-backed regime of President Najibullah will fall. Though all the country's major cities are still under government control, Kandahar and Jalalabad, two of the five largest, have seen their defenses crumble under mujahedin attacks. Moscow insists it is determined to ensure the survival of Najibullah's government, but nearly all diplomats in Kabul believe the regime will collapse within months, perhaps even weeks, of Feb. 15. As the prospect of a bloody siege grew last week, U.S. Secretary of State James Baker ordered the closing of the American embassy in Kabul and told the eight U.S. diplomats still in Afghanistan to leave the country. The British, French, Italians and Japanese * decided to follow suit and announced that they would be withdrawing their diplomats from Afghanistan.

Though Kabul has not yet come under consistent, heavy military barrage, the city is vulnerable to attacks that may cut the Salang Highway, the 264-mile road that climbs the towering Hindu Kush and crosses long stretches of mujahedin-controlled territory to the Soviet border. In a move to push the guerrilla forces back from the highway, Soviet and Afghan troops last week shelled villages south of the Salang Tunnel, killing hundreds of civilians and refugees.

The Soviet pullback from the capital began about three weeks ago, even as Yuli Vorontsov, the Soviet Ambassador to Afghanistan and a Deputy Foreign Minister, threatened that Moscow would halt the withdrawal if the mujahedin leadership did not accept some participation by Najibullah's People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (P.D.P.A.) in a shura, or council of leaders, that would choose a new government. The mujahedin, smelling a bluff, would not budge, and the pullout from Kabul continued.

Ilyushin-76 transport flights in and out of the capital are running at a dozen a day, many carrying Soviet soldiers home. Two large Soviet bases north of the city are deserted. The main Soviet hospital has been turned over to Afghans, and Moscow has reduced its embassy staff by two-thirds, to about 100 people. Soviet infantrymen still patrol Kabul's streets, but they expect to be home within days. "It was a mistake to come here," says a trooper in the central shopping area. "And we are never coming back. It is up to the Afghan people to find a solution to their problems."

Political solutions are not uppermost in the minds of most of the 2.2 million residents of Kabul. They are worrying about day-to-day survival. The winter has been unusually harsh. With the exception of the Salang Highway, roads into the city are cut, resulting in shortages of bread, diesel fuel, sugar, kerosene and other basics; electricity is available only part of the time. The Kabul grain silo, which usually holds a stock of 20,000 tons, has been empty at several points in the past few weeks. The poor are especially vulnerable because they cannot afford to shop at relatively well-stocked black-market outlets where bread is sold for more than a dollar a loaf, ten times the official price.

Two weeks ago, hundreds of people, many with no more than a cotton wrap to protect them against sub-zero cold, queued up outside stores and gas stations to try to buy food, as well as fuel for their space heaters. As early as 3 a.m., young children were out in the freezing night, waiting outside bakeries that would not open for several hours and then might have only a few undersize loaves for sale. In Khair Khana, a residential area, a thousand women and children pushed and shoved for flour and fuel provided by the Soviets. Afghan soldiers thrashed the crowd with blankets and sticks to keep order. Last week an emergency Soviet airlift, along with the arrival of large convoys on the Salang, greatly alleviated the food shortages, but despite Moscow's promises, it was unclear how long that aid could continue.

Conflicts within the leadership of Najibullah's P.D.P.A. are so pronounced that since last fall the Soviets have retired, jailed or shipped to Moscow three members of the Afghan Politburo and several from the Central Committee. The regime claims to have 500,000 men under arms, but the figure appears to be grossly inflated. Though the Afghan army includes some well-trained and experienced units, like the 37th Commando Brigade, it is made up mostly of conscripts, many of whom are less than eager to fight for the regime. Apparently aware that a number of units are unreliable, the President has created an elite guard drawn from various security forces.

In line with its pledge to keep the regime well armed, Moscow has in recent weeks been sending into Kabul large shipments of weapons and ammunition, including such advanced hardware as the BTR-70 armored car and the BM-22 rocket launcher. Western diplomats in Kabul believe that in the end the resupply effort will make little difference. Says one: "They can have all the fancy hardware they like, but it is the morale of the troops that's critical."

The government's most immediate military concern focuses on the Salang. The Soviets have been able to keep the route open by combining military muscle with diplomacy. Outposts dot the way. Soviet officers had an informal understanding with Ahmad Shah Massoud, the powerful mujahedin commander in the Panjshir Valley, north of Kabul: safe passage for Soviet vehicles as long as Moscow keeps up the withdrawal. After last week's offensive by Soviet and Afghan troops, that arrangement may be finished.

After Feb. 15, the Soviets will have few options. Under the U.N.-brokered peace accord signed in Geneva last year, they cannot leave troops behind to guard the Salang, and Western analysts rule out resupply exclusively by air. Still, Moscow is doing its best to counter the impression that mujahedin pressure on the Salang road amounts to checkmating Soviet moves to keep the Najibullah regime alive and well. Soviet officials, for example, have refused to rule out the possibility that aircraft based inside the U.S.S.R. may bomb targets in Afghanistan after Feb. 15.

Though the Soviets are not using the terms, they are struggling to replace an unconditional surrender with a negotiated one. The effort is not going well. Moscow's latest disappointment was the decision three weeks ago by the seven-party mujahedin alliance to break off talks with the Soviets over the issue of P.D.P.A. participation in the shura that would precede a new government. Pakistan is putting intense pressure on the mujahedin to break the deadlock by accepting at least a small P.D.P.A. representation in the shura. Convinced that a military victory is in the cards, the rebels see little point in compromising. Abdul Haq, a commander whose men are deployed outside Kabul, asks derisively, "We are supposed to sit down and share the government with people responsible for the death of so many of our countrymen?" The alternative will be continued bloodshed. As a Soviet journalist puts it, "Unless there is some agreement, thousands more will die before this war is over."

The mujahedin face problems of their own. Last week the seven parties, based in Peshawar, Pakistan, were still arguing about the composition of the proposed shura and what it should aim to do: name a new government or endorse a predominantly fundamentalist Muslim regime already designated by the alliance last July. The political infighting in Peshawar will not encourage cooperation among rebel field commanders. The mujahedin claim to have 40,000 men around Kabul, representing all the main parties. In response to U.S. pressure, the guerrillas have been lying back, allowing the Soviets to continue their withdrawal. For the past three months, the capital has suffered comparatively few rocket attacks. That may change after Feb. 15. Powerful commanders like Abdul Haq and Ahmad Massoud have drawn up plans to take the city and keep order once it is in their hands, but neither claims to have the support of the dozens of commanders in the area.

Everyone's worst fear is that Kabul will be consumed by chaos, with government troops and the mujahedin fighting it out house to house, street to street. Those who can abandon Kabul at a few hours' notice are preparing to do so. The Soviets have completed a new wall around their embassy compound and constructed bunkers for staffers staying behind. Outside the compound, work crews are cutting down trees and widening Darulaman Road, an arrow-straight three-mile stretch that diplomats believe could be used as an emergency airstrip. But most of Kabul's citizens cannot escape or even take shelter from the looming storm. Asked what the future holds, Aziza, a mother of nine, responds as many people in Kabul do. "It is in God's hands," she says.