Word: pullout
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...believed, the 115,000 Soviet troops in Afghanistan could start coming home May 1. The Soviets still insist, however, that the U.S. first halt support for the mujahedin rebel groups -- something the Reagan Administration has refused to do until Moscow agrees on a definite timetable for its pullout. Said a skeptical U.S. official: "We're waiting for that crucial missing link, which is a Soviet decision on withdrawal...
...should be "front-end loaded," meaning that large numbers of the 115,000 Soviet troops in Afghanistan should pull out quickly "so that once it starts, there's a certain inevitability to it." Shultz added a new demand, insisting that all Soviet military aid to Afghanistan cease after the pullout. On a conciliatory note, he reiterated that the U.S. would similarly cut off arms supplies for the mujahedin, Afghanistan's rebels. The U.S., he said, might taper off its arms shipments to the rebels as the Soviets retreated...
...Fitzwater expressed disappointment that the Soviets had launched an offensive instead of beginning a troop withdrawal. In a White House statement, President Reagan congratulated Mikhail Gorbachev on being named TIME's Man of the Year, but he also called on the Soviet leader to announce firm plans for a pullout. The State Department, though, speculated that Moscow may be planning to withdraw even as the fighting intensifies. Said one official: "It's entirely possible that the Soviets are planning to shorten the withdrawal timetable while the military people in Kabul are plugging away at the war. That's what they...
...effort to coax rebels back into the fold with offers of amnesty has failed. His army has become a demoralized shambles. Soldiers often refuse to fight and are deserting to the rebels in large numbers. Now he must face the most daunting prospect of all: a possible pullout of Soviet troops...
Though it is by no means certain that a Soviet pullout is imminent, Najibullah was hard at work last week trying to legitimize his regime in the eyes of his overwhelmingly Islamic countrymen. He billed the National Assembly meeting as a loya jirgah, an Afghan Muslim tradition in which village elders and religious leaders gather to consult in times of national crisis. Though the Afghan leader, who joined the Communist Party in 1965, has never been notably religious, he opened all his speeches with the Islamic preamble, "In the name of Allah, the beneficent and merciful . . ." To downplay his connections...