Word: afghanistan
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Soviet ships were barred from U.S. ports as a result of the 1979 Afghanistan invasion. But in Europe, saying bon voyage under a Red star is no longer a novelty. Western companies sending cargo overseas have also jumped aboard cut- rate Soviet ships. Their governments have been slow to respond to the Soviet merchants' tactics. The Japanese, the Australians and several West European nations complain that the Soviets have broken understandings on shipping policies and rates. None, however, has found a means to enforce the pacts. For now, maritime nations seem likely to find that ships flying the Hammer...
After a 16-year hiatus, the Pentagon wants to begin producing new chemical weapons again to replace its aging stockpile of existing ones. The White House contends that the Soviets have used chemical munitions in Afghanistan and Southeast Asia and claims that the Gorbachev proposal is merely a propaganda move aimed at winning support in Europe before his summit with Reagan in November. While that may be the case, the Administration continues to find itself faced with agile Soviet diplomatic gambits that could give the Kremlin a public relations advantage, particularly among America's European allies...
...message was tapped out on an old-fashioned Morse telegraph key. It came from the province of Paktia in eastern Afghanistan and was received by a guerrilla listening post on the Pakistani border. "We have been without sleep for 48 hours," the report read. "It is the biggest battle of the war. We have lost many men, but we will not lose the war." The terse communication was signed by Maulana Jalaluddin Haqani, commander of an Afghan partisan group known as Hesbi Islam, or Islamic Party...
...accuracy of that assessment is difficult to verify, but one thing was clear last week: ferocious fighting was taking place in Afghanistan, some of it within a few miles of the Pakistani border. About 20,000 Soviet paratroopers, backed by Mi-24 helicopter gunships, artillery and armor, blasted the Afghan border provinces of Paktia and Nangarhar. They were resisted, at times in bitter hand-to-hand fighting, by an estimated 5,000 Afghan rebels known as mujahedin. Hundreds, perhaps thousands, were killed on both sides. At least 300 rebel casualties were carried into refugee camps on the Pakistani side...
While the Afghan fighting waxed and waned, the latest round of talks between Pakistan and the Soviet-backed government of Afghan President Babrak Karmal ended inconclusively in Geneva. The United Nations-sponsored talks are the main hope for a political solution to the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. As the latest Soviet offensive shows, that possibility seems as far off as ever...