Afghanistan- Central Asian revolt in Red Army

[Melvin Loh]

How would the Red Army's war effort in Afghanistan during the 1980s have been undermined had there been some sorta widespread disturbances on the part of disillusioned, anti-Russian Central Asian conscripts ? In 1980, there was IIRC an incident where a Central Asian unit from the Turkestman Military Region expressed dissatisfaction at being deployed to Afghanistan, and was replaced by a more 'politically reliable' unit. Similarly, thruout the Soviet war in Afghanistan, there were significant ethnic differences between Slavs and Central Asians within the Red Army, in such ways as the officer corps being 90% Slavic (with no Muslim higher than the rank of Col.), and Central Asian conscripts largely being confined to noncombat manual labour/construction units while the cutting-edge elite combat units such as the airborne forces and SPETSNAZ were comprised nearly exclusively of Slavs, and Russian and other 'white' Soviet soldiers largely perceived their 'yellow' Central Asian counterparts as unmotivated inferiors who had greater cause with the MUJAHIDEEN than the Motherland. There were also instances of Slavic Red Army troops abusing and assaulting Central Asian conscripts, in both Afghanistan and East Germany. Hence, 1 can see parallels with the African-American experience within the US armed forces from the 2 World Wars and Vietnam, which led to significant racial unrest.

Now, WI the racial disturbances within the Red Army of the 1980s reached the same level as occurred within the US Army during the 1960s ? What about a potential POD of say such Central Asian disillusionment and resentment leading to widespread unrest within the Red Army, coinciding with the 1986 anti-Soviet demonstrations in IIRC Alma Ata (Kazakhstan), Dushanbe and Tashkent (Uzbekistan) ? Could the CIA have used such an intra-Soviet ethnic clash to their advantage while prosecuting their secret war in Afghanistan ? Would the Soviets have perhaps been compelled to withdraw from Afghanistan earlier ?

 

[aktarian]

In initial phase of attack RA used Tadjik and Uzbeks from their respective stans in order not to apear too colonial to Afghans. This backfired badly when Pashtuns saw them as new overlords and there was resntment in similar groups in Afghanistan. That's why they weren't much used later.

IMO revolt in RA is unlikely in early/mid 1980s. Later it doesn't really matter.

 

[MerryPrankster]

I think there were many cases of Central Asian troops defecting to the guerrillas with their weapons. That doesn't really count as a "rebellion," but it shows that there was a lot of dissatisfaction with fighting the Russian colonial master's wars.

A large-scale mutiny might just need a "spark." Perhaps a largely Central Asian unit is ordered to commit some sort of atrocity and they balk. An attempt to punish them is resisted and you've got a mutiny on your hands. The Red Army will probably crush the revolt quickly, unless the mutineers can escape into the mountains and go guerrilla; this ATL probably won't diverge from OTL too much unless a truly large-scale Central Asian revolt is triggered (maybe the mutineers slip back into the USSR to make trouble).