Brave Struggle for Survival

The rebels' ferocity is legendary, but starvation could defeat it

Ever since the Soviets invaded Afghanistan last December, one of the most stubborn concentrations of anti-Communist Muslim resistance has been among the clannish Pushtun tribesmen of rugged Kunar province, near the Pakistan border. Six weeks ago, Soviet military commanders made the narrow river valleys and inaccessible mountains the target of their first major field offensive. Seven full combat battalions rolled into the province with the apparent mission of cutting rebel supply lines by sealing the porous border. TIME Correspondent David DeVoss managed to get across the frontier from Peshawar, Pakistan, for five days and linked up with fighting units of mujahidinthe holy warriors, as they call themselvesto assess their campaign and the scope of the Soviet offensive. His report:

High on a ridge overlooking overlooking the provincial capital of Chaghasaray, a small pine grove stands amid a series of fieldstone revetments. The mujahidin use the rocky enclosure to observe Afghan government convoys on the valley floor below; it is also a resting place for the bodies of five Soviet paratroopers killed there last January. Few of the insurgents can resist taking a ritual poke at the skulls. "This is what we do to Russians," Rebel Tribesman Shaler Seyed beams ferociously, hoisting a cranium into the air with a stick. "We will cut them all into little pieces."

With few large bridges or population centers, Kunar does not lend itself to mechanized warfare. But the fact has not deterred the Soviet juggernaut. Few towns lying near the sinuous Kunar River have escaped. Chenar and Dangam, first bombed by MiGs, were later also hit by rocket-firing helicopters. The exodus of 6,000 refugees from Kunar into Pakistan has left the area between the border and the river eerily quiet. But the hills have not been abandoned. No mountain is without its militia. After escorting their women into Pakistan, most men return, climb a few thousand feet higher and join one of the scattered rebel packs.

Kunar's embattled mujahidin clearly are on the defensive. Of the 160 rebels I saw, fewer than 10% had automatic weapons. The village commander at Baralow carries a bolt-action deer rifle. When asked how they could fight a modern army, several of the bearded elders in his 160-man force brandished curved swords. They make the most of what is available. Broken donkey harnesses are restitched into Sam Browne belts.

Tea canisters are reborn as land mines. But resourceful handicraft is limited by backwardness. In a rebel village one evening, during prayers, two dusty field radios were pulled from under a bed; the battery cavity of each was being used as a repository for prayer beads. Inadequate weaponry and supply does not seem to affect the fighting spirit. "It is all in a man's thinking," explains Guerrilla Leader Chandra Khan. "You look in that corner and see 'only three Kalashnikov rifles.' I see three Kalashnikovs and three dead Russians."

About the only time rebel spirits flag is when they hear the helicopters, for the Soviets' control of the air is total. During the day the Kunar valley echoes with the drone of Mi-8 utility choppers shuttling men and supplies from Chaghasaray up to Asmar or down to Jalalabad. The danger increases as dusk approaches. It is then, when a man's shadow is longest, that the armor-plated Mi-24 helicopter gunships come in low on their final patrols.

Next, as soon as the sun goes down, armored personnel carriers equipped with high-intensity searchlights rumble out of the mud-walled Soviet tank depot half a mile south of Chaghasaray. The APCs probe the mountains with their lights and shoot off silver-and orange-colored flares at areas of suspicious movements. On the night I stayed awake to watch, the light show came on every ten to 15 minutes. According to mujahidin, the most intense fighting is in the Pich valley, where Soviet tanks have been trying to secure the main road. As I listened for more than an hour one sunny afternoon, the roar of the bombing reverberating in the valley was unceasing.

Of the six main rebel groups, based in Peshawar, the Jamiat-i-Islami, (Islamic Society) led by Burhanuddin Rabbani, a former law professor at Kabul University, is the strongest in Kunar. Every Jamiat guerrilla I encountered said that he wanted to be fighting, but not one of them was in combat. When this inconsistency was noted to Malik Makon, a bearded, 6-ft. leader of 300 rebels from Chenar village, the swarthy warrior grabbed my sleeve and shouted: "Tell Rabbani we need bullets and something to shoot down helicopters! Even our tea is almost gone."

Starvation, in fact, may be a greater threat than Soviet firepower. Most of the fertile lowland is under military control. Rice fields by the Kunar River have been turned into helicopter landing pads. Troop convoys monopolize the Pich River bridge. In addition, ever since the Pakistan government's new policy of "strict neutrality" toward the Afghan insurgency, overland resupply across the border has become increasingly unsuccessfuland expensive, since the required bribes at border posts have risen accordingly. As a result, mujahidin in the hills have no meat, rice or corn. Above the Pich valley, they eat only stale millet bread and sairai leaves, which resemble holly in texture as well as appearance. "Because of Kunar's terrain I don't think we can be eliminated with guns," concludes Wahid, a 24-year-old former Kabul University chemistry student who serves as liaison between Jamiat units in Kunar and the headquarters in Peshawar. "But conditions are already so inhuman that I fear that many will starve."

More than once, the rebels' ferocity has proved adaptable when confronted with particular problems. About two months ago, mujahidin noticed that even on those rare occasions when they got a clear shot at a Soviet soldier, he often survived. They did not need a mullah to tell them that the Soviets had started wearing bulletproof vests. Soon after a force of paratroopers arrived at Asmar in early March, 40 Jamiat snipers in the hills around the small town claimed 300 kills. Snarls Guleb Seyed, Jamiat commander of Baragay village: "I tell my men, aim for the head."

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