WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.419 Welcome back to the Deep Dive. It is so great 00:00:02.419 --> 00:00:05.240 to have you joining us today. We spend a lot 00:00:05.240 --> 00:00:08.039 of time looking at histories, massive sweeping 00:00:08.039 --> 00:00:11.560 events, but sometimes the most profound shifts 00:00:11.560 --> 00:00:14.580 in the world really just come down to a single 00:00:14.580 --> 00:00:18.140 deeply complicated human life. And today, our 00:00:18.140 --> 00:00:20.660 mission is to explore the extraordinary, turbulent, 00:00:20.859 --> 00:00:24.420 and ultimately tragic life of Nur Muhammad Taraki. 00:00:25.039 --> 00:00:27.760 He's a figure whose extremely brief stint in 00:00:27.760 --> 00:00:30.019 power forever altered the course of the Cold 00:00:30.019 --> 00:00:32.340 War. It really is a staggering story when you 00:00:32.340 --> 00:00:34.640 lay the whole timeline out. I mean, we're tracing 00:00:34.640 --> 00:00:37.340 an arc from a peasant writer to the absolute 00:00:37.340 --> 00:00:40.939 ruler of a nation, right up to a genuinely shocking 00:00:40.939 --> 00:00:43.340 betrayal. Yeah, to do that, we're drawing on 00:00:43.340 --> 00:00:45.600 a highly detailed biographical article on Nur 00:00:45.600 --> 00:00:47.899 Muhammad Taraki that covers that entire trajectory. 00:00:48.259 --> 00:00:50.979 But because of the nature of his rule and the 00:00:50.979 --> 00:00:53.060 era he operated in, we do need to set some ground 00:00:53.060 --> 00:00:54.700 rules for you before we get into the details. 00:00:54.859 --> 00:00:56.899 The source material we are working with today 00:00:56.899 --> 00:00:59.280 contains heavily politically charged content. 00:00:59.520 --> 00:01:01.679 We're talking about radical Marxist policies, 00:01:02.020 --> 00:01:05.079 violent government purges and mass executions. 00:01:05.359 --> 00:01:08.329 So before we jump in. We want to make it clear 00:01:08.329 --> 00:01:11.150 that we are simply imparting the factual content 00:01:11.150 --> 00:01:14.209 from our source material. We are not endorsing 00:01:14.209 --> 00:01:16.849 any of the political viewpoints, ideologies or 00:01:16.849 --> 00:01:19.670 actions described here. We're impartially reporting 00:01:19.670 --> 00:01:23.010 the history as our source presents it. So you 00:01:23.010 --> 00:01:25.230 can understand the ideas that shaped this era. 00:01:25.599 --> 00:01:27.400 It's entirely about understanding the mechanics 00:01:27.400 --> 00:01:30.359 of history, you know, not taking sides. Right. 00:01:30.420 --> 00:01:32.219 I get that we need to stay objective. But when 00:01:32.219 --> 00:01:34.219 you look at the sheer scale of mechanics here, 00:01:34.319 --> 00:01:36.599 it's hard not to be shocked by the irony of it 00:01:36.599 --> 00:01:39.239 all. We're looking at a man who once worked as 00:01:39.239 --> 00:01:41.920 a translator for the U .S. Embassy. Yeah. And 00:01:41.920 --> 00:01:43.500 he would go on to lead a communist revolution, 00:01:43.879 --> 00:01:46.980 establish a brutal regime, and then ultimately 00:01:46.980 --> 00:01:50.629 be overthrown by his own protege. an event that 00:01:50.629 --> 00:01:53.049 directly sparked a decade -long Soviet invasion. 00:01:53.269 --> 00:01:55.609 It's the kind of narrative arc a fiction writer 00:01:55.609 --> 00:01:58.010 would hesitate to pitch, honestly, because it 00:01:58.010 --> 00:02:00.329 sounds almost too perfectly engineered. Okay, 00:02:00.390 --> 00:02:03.010 let's unpack this. To understand The Ruler, we 00:02:03.010 --> 00:02:05.370 really have to start with the young man. Nur 00:02:05.370 --> 00:02:09.370 Muhammad Taraki was born in 1917 to a Gilgi Pashtun 00:02:09.370 --> 00:02:11.770 peasant family. This was in the Nawa district 00:02:11.770 --> 00:02:15.289 of Ghazni province in what was then the Emirate 00:02:15.289 --> 00:02:18.009 of Afghanistan. He was the oldest of three children, 00:02:18.150 --> 00:02:20.729 attended a village school, but his life took 00:02:20.729 --> 00:02:24.509 a massive turn very early on. At just 15 years 00:02:24.509 --> 00:02:28.650 old in 1932, he leaves his rural home and travels 00:02:28.650 --> 00:02:31.229 to the port city of Bombay, India to work as 00:02:31.229 --> 00:02:33.780 a clerk for a trading company. What's fascinating 00:02:33.780 --> 00:02:37.400 here is how that specific move to Bombay acted 00:02:37.400 --> 00:02:39.819 as the absolute catalyst for his political awakening. 00:02:40.080 --> 00:02:42.039 You have a young teenager from a traditional 00:02:42.039 --> 00:02:44.979 Afghan village suddenly thrust into a massive, 00:02:45.020 --> 00:02:47.819 bustling urban center in the 1930s. Right. A 00:02:47.819 --> 00:02:50.259 total culture shock. Completely. And he's confronted 00:02:50.259 --> 00:02:53.759 with vast, visible wealth inequality. So he starts 00:02:53.759 --> 00:02:55.639 taking night courses, and that is where he first 00:02:55.639 --> 00:02:57.539 encounters communism. He met several members 00:02:57.539 --> 00:03:00.000 of the Communist Party of India, and he was deeply 00:03:00.000 --> 00:03:02.319 impressed by their discussions on social justice. 00:03:02.439 --> 00:03:05.500 So it's the extreme contrast of his new environment 00:03:05.500 --> 00:03:08.770 that made him so receptive to those ideas. Precisely. 00:03:08.909 --> 00:03:11.930 And another huge influence during this time was 00:03:11.930 --> 00:03:14.650 his encounter with Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan. He 00:03:14.650 --> 00:03:17.030 was a prominent Pashtun nationalist leader in 00:03:17.030 --> 00:03:19.909 neighboring India and crucially an admirer of 00:03:19.909 --> 00:03:22.569 the works of Vladimir Lenin. You can really see 00:03:22.569 --> 00:03:25.189 these seeds of radicalism taking root in Taraki's 00:03:25.189 --> 00:03:28.250 mind, fueled by the staggering urban poverty 00:03:28.250 --> 00:03:30.389 he was witnessing firsthand. Yeah, and he eventually 00:03:30.389 --> 00:03:33.629 takes those seeds back home to Afghanistan. By 00:03:33.629 --> 00:03:36.110 1937, he's working for the Minister of Economics, 00:03:36.310 --> 00:03:38.750 meeting Russian officials, and eventually becomes 00:03:38.750 --> 00:03:40.990 the deputy head of the state news agency. Yeah, 00:03:41.050 --> 00:03:43.789 he's moving up quickly. But he doesn't just stick 00:03:43.789 --> 00:03:47.189 to journalism. He becomes a literary star. Taraki 00:03:47.189 --> 00:03:49.030 becomes known across the country as an author 00:03:49.030 --> 00:03:51.710 and a poet. He writes a novel called Da Bang 00:03:51.710 --> 00:03:54.250 Mo Safari, which translates to The Journey of 00:03:54.250 --> 00:03:56.849 Bang. It's a novel that specifically highlights 00:03:56.849 --> 00:03:59.069 the socioeconomic difficulties and struggles 00:03:59.069 --> 00:04:02.280 of Afghan workers and peasants. And that literary 00:04:02.280 --> 00:04:04.879 work is what puts him on the international map, 00:04:05.120 --> 00:04:08.580 specifically the Soviet map. The Soviet government 00:04:08.580 --> 00:04:10.879 loved his writing because it embodied socialist 00:04:10.879 --> 00:04:14.340 realism, which is basically art and literature 00:04:14.340 --> 00:04:16.579 designed to glorify the struggles of the working 00:04:16.579 --> 00:04:20.279 class and promote communist ideals. The Soviets 00:04:20.279 --> 00:04:22.860 translated his work into Russian and hailed him 00:04:22.860 --> 00:04:26.870 as Afghanistan's Maxim Gorky. I mean, to be compared 00:04:26.870 --> 00:04:29.910 to Maxim Gorky in the Soviet literary world is 00:04:29.910 --> 00:04:33.050 a monumental level of recognition. Gorky essentially 00:04:33.050 --> 00:04:35.410 created the socialist realism method. Right. 00:04:35.769 --> 00:04:38.129 Taraki is writing so high he even visits the 00:04:38.129 --> 00:04:40.170 Soviet Union and is greeted by the head of the 00:04:40.170 --> 00:04:41.670 International Department of the Communist Party. 00:04:41.990 --> 00:04:44.790 His success as a novelist literally handed him 00:04:44.790 --> 00:04:46.769 the high -level international connections that 00:04:46.769 --> 00:04:48.850 would later fuel his political ambitions. It 00:04:48.850 --> 00:04:51.250 is a classic case of the pen opening doors for 00:04:51.250 --> 00:04:53.389 the sword. Which brings us to one of the strangest 00:04:53.389 --> 00:04:56.029 career twists in this history. In the 1950s, 00:04:56.029 --> 00:04:57.990 the Afghan Prime Minister, Mohammad Daoud Khan, 00:04:58.209 --> 00:05:01.050 was heavily suppressing radicals. But Taraki 00:05:01.050 --> 00:05:03.589 had incredible language skills. So where does 00:05:03.589 --> 00:05:06.129 the government send this emerging communist thinker? 00:05:06.170 --> 00:05:08.329 Oh, this part is amazing. To the Afghan embassy 00:05:08.329 --> 00:05:11.209 in the United States. Sending a Soviet -praised 00:05:11.209 --> 00:05:13.569 Marxist to Washington during the Cold War is 00:05:13.569 --> 00:05:15.870 quite the administrative choice. And it goes 00:05:15.870 --> 00:05:17.970 exactly as you'd expect. He was in the U .S. 00:05:17.970 --> 00:05:21.290 in 1952, and within months he gets fired. He 00:05:21.290 --> 00:05:23.569 starts publicly denouncing the royal Afghan government 00:05:23.569 --> 00:05:27.529 under King Zahir, calling it autocratic and dictatorial. 00:05:27.730 --> 00:05:29.750 Naturally. This gets him pressed in the U .S., 00:05:29.750 --> 00:05:33.209 but gets him sent packing. Back to Kabul. And 00:05:33.209 --> 00:05:35.709 after a brief stint of unemployment, he starts 00:05:35.709 --> 00:05:37.889 working as an interpreter for the United States 00:05:37.889 --> 00:05:41.189 overseas mission in Kabul. He later sets up his 00:05:41.189 --> 00:05:43.670 own translation bureau and actually works for 00:05:43.670 --> 00:05:46.870 the U .S. embassy in Kabul until 1963. It perfectly 00:05:46.870 --> 00:05:49.730 illustrates the strange, tangled web of Cold 00:05:49.730 --> 00:05:52.990 War politics. But 1963 is the turning point. 00:05:53.110 --> 00:05:55.449 He quits his translation work to focus entirely 00:05:55.449 --> 00:05:59.860 on politics. On January 1st, 1965, a monumental 00:05:59.860 --> 00:06:02.800 event happens literally in Taraki's own living 00:06:02.800 --> 00:06:05.399 room in Kabul. In his living room. Yeah. He holds 00:06:05.399 --> 00:06:06.939 the founding Congress of the People's Democratic 00:06:06.939 --> 00:06:09.759 Party of Afghanistan, the PDPA. A living room 00:06:09.759 --> 00:06:12.560 revolution. But right away, there is political 00:06:12.560 --> 00:06:15.500 maneuvering. Taraki wins a competitive election 00:06:15.500 --> 00:06:17.899 for the role of general secretary against his 00:06:17.899 --> 00:06:21.160 rival, Babrak Karmal, who becomes second secretary. 00:06:21.600 --> 00:06:25.519 And less than two years later, in 1967, the party 00:06:25.519 --> 00:06:28.160 fractures completely. It was a deep ideological 00:06:28.160 --> 00:06:31.220 split. Taraki's faction, known as Kulk or the 00:06:31.220 --> 00:06:34.360 masses, wanted a strict Leninist -style state. 00:06:34.720 --> 00:06:37.319 Basically, they wanted a rigid, top -down system 00:06:37.319 --> 00:06:40.160 governed entirely by a vanguard communist party 00:06:40.160 --> 00:06:43.139 implementing rapid revolution. In Carmel's side. 00:06:43.449 --> 00:06:45.730 On the other side, Carmel's faction, Partium 00:06:45.730 --> 00:06:48.050 or the Banner, favored a broad democratic front. 00:06:48.250 --> 00:06:50.949 They preferred to build alliances and move towards 00:06:50.949 --> 00:06:53.629 socialism gradually. This divide between Kalk 00:06:53.629 --> 00:06:56.009 and Partium is going to define all the bloodshed 00:06:56.009 --> 00:06:58.189 that follows. There's a massive gap here that 00:06:58.189 --> 00:06:59.810 we need to bridge, though. They fracture in a 00:06:59.810 --> 00:07:03.149 living room in 1967. But we know they eventually 00:07:03.149 --> 00:07:06.509 seize power. How does a divided underground book 00:07:06.509 --> 00:07:08.829 club gain the muscle to actually overthrow a 00:07:08.829 --> 00:07:11.259 government 13 years later? That is the crucial 00:07:11.259 --> 00:07:15.040 context. During that 13 -year gap, the PDPA didn't 00:07:15.040 --> 00:07:17.540 just sit around debating theory. The Kelk faction, 00:07:17.740 --> 00:07:20.399 in particular, recognized that they lacked broad 00:07:20.399 --> 00:07:22.939 popular support in the rural, deeply religious 00:07:22.939 --> 00:07:25.639 countryside, so they systematically targeted 00:07:25.639 --> 00:07:27.860 the one institution that could give them hard 00:07:27.860 --> 00:07:31.139 power. The Afghan military. Wow. They heavily 00:07:31.139 --> 00:07:33.579 recruited military officers, many of whom had 00:07:33.579 --> 00:07:35.579 been sent to the Soviet Union for training and 00:07:35.579 --> 00:07:38.319 came back sympathetic to Marxist ideas. They 00:07:38.319 --> 00:07:40.660 built a shadow network within the armed forces 00:07:40.660 --> 00:07:42.939 preparing for the right moment. So they were 00:07:42.939 --> 00:07:45.639 quietly loading a spring. And that spring finally 00:07:45.639 --> 00:07:49.540 snaps in April 1978. The tipping point arrives 00:07:49.540 --> 00:07:52.709 when a prominent leftist is assassinated. Massive 00:07:52.709 --> 00:07:55.269 protests break out in Kabul. The Afghan president, 00:07:55.410 --> 00:07:57.589 Mohammad Dawood Khan, panics and orders the arrest 00:07:57.589 --> 00:08:00.110 of PDPA leaders, including Taraki and Carmel. 00:08:00.230 --> 00:08:03.509 Right. Another key figure, Hafizul Amin, is placed 00:08:03.509 --> 00:08:05.670 under house arrest. But because they had spent 00:08:05.670 --> 00:08:07.850 over a decade infiltrating the military, house 00:08:07.850 --> 00:08:10.620 arrest wasn't enough to stop them. Amin uses 00:08:10.620 --> 00:08:13.459 his military contacts to initiate a coup on April 00:08:13.459 --> 00:08:17.040 27, 1978. This is the Sauer Revolution. President 00:08:17.040 --> 00:08:18.980 Daoud Khan and most of his family are killed 00:08:18.980 --> 00:08:22.399 the next day. The PDPA rapidly seizes control, 00:08:22.600 --> 00:08:25.920 and by May 1st, our former living room revolutionary... 00:08:26.029 --> 00:08:29.170 Nur Muhammad Taraki becomes chairman of the Revolutionary 00:08:29.170 --> 00:08:31.649 Council. He essentially holds the sweeping powers 00:08:31.649 --> 00:08:34.009 of both president and prime minister. And this 00:08:34.009 --> 00:08:36.549 is where the theory of his novels meets the brutal 00:08:36.549 --> 00:08:39.370 reality of governance. Taraki and his government 00:08:39.370 --> 00:08:42.090 immediately launch a massive radical transformation 00:08:42.090 --> 00:08:46.190 of a deeply traditional rural society. They didn't 00:08:46.190 --> 00:08:48.429 tiptoe into it either. I know they tried to overhaul 00:08:48.429 --> 00:08:51.210 everything overnight, passing laws to ban traditional 00:08:51.210 --> 00:08:53.789 practices like bride prices, usury and forced 00:08:53.789 --> 00:08:56.169 marriage. But how did they tackle something as 00:08:56.169 --> 00:08:58.370 foundational as the economy and land ownership? 00:08:59.169 --> 00:09:01.809 Disastrously. They implemented a sweeping land 00:09:01.809 --> 00:09:05.429 reform on January 1st, 1979. They put a hard 00:09:05.429 --> 00:09:08.090 cap on how much land a family could own. If a 00:09:08.090 --> 00:09:09.889 family owned more than that limit, the government 00:09:09.889 --> 00:09:12.110 just seized the surface without paying a single 00:09:12.110 --> 00:09:14.669 cent of compensation, intending to redistribute 00:09:14.669 --> 00:09:16.570 it to poor peasants. Just took it. Just took 00:09:16.570 --> 00:09:18.789 it. The idea was to break the power of the traditional 00:09:18.789 --> 00:09:21.370 land -owning middle class, the bourgeoisie, and 00:09:21.370 --> 00:09:23.889 win over the rural poor. That sounds like it 00:09:23.889 --> 00:09:27.149 would cause absolute chaos in an agrarian society. 00:09:27.529 --> 00:09:30.210 It caused an agricultural collapse. Seizing land 00:09:30.210 --> 00:09:32.990 without providing the necessary seed, water rights, 00:09:33.070 --> 00:09:35.190 or credit that the traditional landlords used 00:09:35.190 --> 00:09:37.570 to provide meant the peasants couldn't actually 00:09:37.570 --> 00:09:40.210 farm the land they were given. Harvests absolutely 00:09:40.210 --> 00:09:43.649 plummeted. It backfired. Massively. Instead of 00:09:43.649 --> 00:09:45.429 winning over the peasants he used to write about, 00:09:45.649 --> 00:09:48.549 the reform led to rising widespread discontent. 00:09:49.000 --> 00:09:51.340 Taraki eventually had to quietly abandon the 00:09:51.340 --> 00:09:53.799 policy when he realized the scale of the anger. 00:09:54.000 --> 00:09:55.879 There is another reform attempt that stands out. 00:09:55.980 --> 00:09:58.519 I understand the previous government had a literacy 00:09:58.519 --> 00:10:01.679 program created by UNESCO designed to eliminate 00:10:01.679 --> 00:10:05.100 illiteracy over a realistic 20 -year time frame. 00:10:05.639 --> 00:10:07.940 Taraki decided 20 years was too long and tried 00:10:07.940 --> 00:10:10.139 to shrink the entire program down to just four 00:10:10.139 --> 00:10:12.860 years. Why would he think that was even structurally 00:10:12.860 --> 00:10:15.399 possible? This is a classic historical blind 00:10:15.399 --> 00:10:18.669 spot. Leaders who operate purely on ideology 00:10:18.669 --> 00:10:21.809 often mistake a rural population's poverty for 00:10:21.809 --> 00:10:24.750 a desire for Marxist revolution. It was pure 00:10:24.750 --> 00:10:27.549 Marxist accelerationism, the hubris of thinking 00:10:27.549 --> 00:10:30.330 you can force historical progress through sheer 00:10:30.330 --> 00:10:33.809 political will. They completely lacked the teachers 00:10:33.809 --> 00:10:35.669 and the infrastructure. Right. You can't just 00:10:35.669 --> 00:10:39.009 mandate teachers into existence. But the real 00:10:39.009 --> 00:10:42.090 misstep was ideological. They threw out the cultural 00:10:42.090 --> 00:10:44.769 focus of the UNESCO program and replaced basic 00:10:44.769 --> 00:10:47.409 reading materials with left -wing Marxist pamphlets. 00:10:47.669 --> 00:10:50.549 They were basically using literacy as a forced 00:10:50.549 --> 00:10:53.950 political indoctrination tool, completely underestimating 00:10:53.950 --> 00:10:56.309 the binding power of the local religion and traditions. 00:10:56.730 --> 00:10:58.769 Here's where it gets really interesting. When 00:10:58.769 --> 00:11:00.610 these reforms failed to catch on and resentment 00:11:00.610 --> 00:11:03.690 started surging into open rebellion, Taraki regime 00:11:03.690 --> 00:11:06.370 didn't back down or try to build consensus. They 00:11:06.370 --> 00:11:09.289 doubled down with brutal repression. First, they 00:11:09.289 --> 00:11:11.429 purged the rival Parchim faction from the government. 00:11:11.950 --> 00:11:13.889 Karmal and others were exiled by being assigned 00:11:13.889 --> 00:11:16.769 as overseas ambassadors. Right. Karmal was sent 00:11:16.769 --> 00:11:18.850 to Czechoslovakia, but he ended up going into 00:11:18.850 --> 00:11:21.250 hiding because he feared he'd be executed if 00:11:21.250 --> 00:11:23.909 he returned to Afghanistan. And his fears were 00:11:23.909 --> 00:11:26.149 entirely justified. The historical estimates 00:11:26.149 --> 00:11:28.629 here are harrowing. And again, just reporting 00:11:28.629 --> 00:11:30.769 the facts from our source here, the government 00:11:30.769 --> 00:11:33.529 launched a massive campaign of oppression against 00:11:33.529 --> 00:11:36.779 anyone opposing the Tsar Revolution. They locked 00:11:36.779 --> 00:11:39.419 up dissidents and oversaw massacres of villagers. 00:11:39.759 --> 00:11:42.799 Yeah. Taraki explicitly cited the necessity of 00:11:42.799 --> 00:11:44.879 the Red Terror used by the Bolsheviks in Soviet 00:11:44.879 --> 00:11:47.360 Russia, arguing that opponents to the revolution 00:11:47.360 --> 00:11:50.820 simply had to be eliminated. Yeah. Up to 27 ,000 00:11:50.820 --> 00:11:52.940 people were executed at the Policharki prison 00:11:52.940 --> 00:11:57.360 alone between April 1978 and December 1979. It 00:11:57.360 --> 00:12:00.019 wasn't just a political purge. It was a bloodbath. 00:12:00.299 --> 00:12:02.919 And it was this exact brutality, the sweeping, 00:12:03.139 --> 00:12:05.440 violent repression against deeply religious and 00:12:05.440 --> 00:12:07.659 traditional people that triggered the massive 00:12:07.659 --> 00:12:10.440 popular backlash. It ignited the rebellions that 00:12:10.440 --> 00:12:12.399 would ultimately spiral into the Afghan civil 00:12:12.399 --> 00:12:14.620 war. As these uprisings start spreading across 00:12:14.620 --> 00:12:17.220 the country, Taraki gets desperate. His rapid 00:12:17.220 --> 00:12:19.320 progress is collapsing. His people are revolting. 00:12:19.320 --> 00:12:21.899 So he looks north. He literally contacts the 00:12:21.899 --> 00:12:24.580 Soviets asking for practical and technical assistance 00:12:24.580 --> 00:12:27.679 with men and armament. But the Soviets, the very 00:12:27.679 --> 00:12:29.980 people who loved his novels and built his ideology, 00:12:30.259 --> 00:12:32.720 turned him down. Why would they refuse to help 00:12:32.720 --> 00:12:34.929 a newly established communist state? Because 00:12:34.929 --> 00:12:38.610 the geopolitical stakes in 1978 and 1979 were 00:12:38.610 --> 00:12:41.470 incredibly delicate, the Soviet Union was in 00:12:41.470 --> 00:12:43.750 the middle of a fragile period of détente with 00:12:43.750 --> 00:12:46.750 the United States, negotiating the SALT II nuclear 00:12:46.750 --> 00:12:49.769 arms treaty. They did not want to provoke Washington. 00:12:50.110 --> 00:12:52.429 Furthermore, the region was volatile. The Soviets 00:12:52.429 --> 00:12:54.830 were terrified of a pan -Islamic uprising right 00:12:54.830 --> 00:12:56.610 on their southern border that could spill over 00:12:56.610 --> 00:12:59.190 into Soviet republics like Uzbekistan or Tajikistan. 00:12:59.409 --> 00:13:01.710 They recognized that the PDPA was completely 00:13:01.710 --> 00:13:04.129 alienating the Afghan population. Because he 00:13:04.129 --> 00:13:06.970 saw the writing on the wall. Emphatically. Alexei 00:13:06.970 --> 00:13:09.590 Kosygin, the chairman of the USSR Council of 00:13:09.590 --> 00:13:12.309 Ministers, gave Taraki a chillingly prophetic 00:13:12.309 --> 00:13:15.190 warning. He told him that committing ground troops 00:13:15.190 --> 00:13:18.210 would be a fatal mistake. He warned that Soviet 00:13:18.210 --> 00:13:20.389 troops would end up fighting the Afghan people 00:13:20.389 --> 00:13:23.110 themselves and that the people would never forgive 00:13:23.110 --> 00:13:26.549 such things. Even Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev 00:13:26.549 --> 00:13:29.730 explicitly warned Taraki to ease up on his drastic 00:13:29.730 --> 00:13:32.190 social reforms and try to get broader support. 00:13:32.679 --> 00:13:34.340 When the Soviet Union is telling you that your 00:13:34.340 --> 00:13:36.299 communist revolution is moving too fast and being 00:13:36.299 --> 00:13:39.679 too harsh, you know you have lost the plot. Truly. 00:13:39.919 --> 00:13:42.379 But Taraki couldn't see it, largely because of 00:13:42.379 --> 00:13:44.740 a toxic dynamic developing in his own inner circle, 00:13:44.860 --> 00:13:47.879 specifically with Hafizullah Amin. Amin was his 00:13:47.879 --> 00:13:49.799 right -hand man, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, 00:13:49.899 --> 00:13:52.299 and the guy who really initiated the Saar revolution 00:13:52.299 --> 00:13:55.019 from house arrest. But Amin did something very 00:13:55.019 --> 00:13:57.799 calculated as the country fell apart. He deliberately 00:13:57.799 --> 00:14:00.779 built a Kim Il -sung -style personality cult 00:14:00.779 --> 00:14:03.740 around Taraki. It was a massive propaganda campaign. 00:14:04.539 --> 00:14:07.360 In meetings, Amin would refer to Taraki with 00:14:07.360 --> 00:14:10.159 grandiose titles. The great leader. The star 00:14:10.159 --> 00:14:13.129 of the East. The great thinker. He plastered 00:14:13.129 --> 00:14:15.490 Taraki's portrait all over the country while 00:14:15.490 --> 00:14:18.009 styling himself merely as the true disciple. 00:14:18.210 --> 00:14:20.350 The psychological trap snaps shut on both of 00:14:20.350 --> 00:14:23.269 them. Amin creates this cult of personality to 00:14:23.269 --> 00:14:25.490 manipulate the situation and consolidate his 00:14:25.490 --> 00:14:28.169 own operational control. But Taraki actually 00:14:28.169 --> 00:14:30.759 starts believing he is a genius. He buys into 00:14:30.759 --> 00:14:33.240 his own hype. He begins discounting Amin's advice 00:14:33.240 --> 00:14:36.299 and even accuses Amin of nepotism after Amin 00:14:36.299 --> 00:14:38.519 appointed family members to high -ranking jobs. 00:14:38.799 --> 00:14:41.139 So the two architects of the revolution turn 00:14:41.139 --> 00:14:43.779 on each other. Taraki makes a cunning move to 00:14:43.779 --> 00:14:46.840 neutralize Amin. He vacates his post as chairman 00:14:46.840 --> 00:14:49.299 of the Council of Ministers and hands that title 00:14:49.299 --> 00:14:51.639 to Amin. If we connect this to the bigger picture, 00:14:51.720 --> 00:14:54.340 you have a country in total revolt, a reluctant 00:14:54.340 --> 00:14:56.940 superpower patron in Moscow, and at the very 00:14:56.940 --> 00:14:59.879 top, two men locked in an ego -driven power struggle 00:14:59.879 --> 00:15:02.820 for control of the Afghan army. Taraki's promotion 00:15:02.820 --> 00:15:06.120 of Amin was a trap. How so? As chairman, Amin 00:15:06.120 --> 00:15:08.220 could pick the cabinet, but every single choice 00:15:08.220 --> 00:15:11.240 had to be approved by Taraki. More importantly, 00:15:11.460 --> 00:15:14.320 taking the supposedly heavy responsibility, forced 00:15:14.320 --> 00:15:16.879 Amin to relinquish his direct operational control 00:15:16.879 --> 00:15:20.279 over the Afghan army. Taraki stripped Amin of 00:15:20.279 --> 00:15:22.860 his real power base under the guise of a promotion. 00:15:23.259 --> 00:15:26.179 It's a deadly game of musical chairs. And it 00:15:26.179 --> 00:15:29.019 leads to the absolute climax of our story, the 00:15:29.019 --> 00:15:32.139 botched assassination. Taraki allies himself 00:15:32.139 --> 00:15:34.940 with four prominent army officers, known as the 00:15:34.940 --> 00:15:38.049 Gang of Four, and the Soviet ambassador. They 00:15:38.049 --> 00:15:40.690 plot to assassinate Amin to end the rivalry once 00:15:40.690 --> 00:15:42.710 and for all. But the execution of this plot is 00:15:42.710 --> 00:15:44.690 a staggering failure of operational security. 00:15:44.990 --> 00:15:46.789 The leader of the gang of four selects his own 00:15:46.789 --> 00:15:49.649 nephew to be the assassin. But incredibly, he 00:15:49.649 --> 00:15:51.889 fails to tell his nephew that this is a top secret 00:15:51.889 --> 00:15:54.190 assassination mission. I cannot get over that 00:15:54.190 --> 00:15:56.330 detail. He doesn't tell the assassin it's a secret. 00:15:56.470 --> 00:15:59.210 So what does the nephew do? He blabs about it 00:15:59.210 --> 00:16:01.350 to his contacts at the Soviet embassy. Right. 00:16:01.450 --> 00:16:03.809 And the embassy personnel, perhaps not fully 00:16:03.809 --> 00:16:05.629 in the loop on their own ambassador's secret 00:16:05.629 --> 00:16:08.490 plot. Turn around and accidentally warn Amin? 00:16:08.610 --> 00:16:10.450 Yeah. They literally tipped off the target? It 00:16:10.450 --> 00:16:12.450 is a failure of communication that changes the 00:16:12.450 --> 00:16:15.450 course of world history. Amin now knows for a 00:16:15.450 --> 00:16:18.669 fact that Taraki is trying to kill him. Fast 00:16:18.669 --> 00:16:23.429 forward to September 1979. Taraki is returning 00:16:23.429 --> 00:16:26.970 to Kabul from a summit in Havana with a stop 00:16:26.970 --> 00:16:29.909 in Moscow. Amin is supposed to greet him at the 00:16:29.909 --> 00:16:32.129 airport. The flight is scheduled to land at 2 00:16:32.129 --> 00:16:34.870 .30, but Amin forces the landing to be delayed 00:16:34.870 --> 00:16:38.190 by a full hour. He deliberately leaves the chairman's 00:16:38.190 --> 00:16:41.370 plane, circling the airport, a very public, very 00:16:41.370 --> 00:16:43.409 deliberate display of who actually controlled 00:16:43.409 --> 00:16:45.590 the country at that moment. The tension is absolute. 00:16:45.830 --> 00:16:48.029 Shortly after they finally land, Taraki tries 00:16:48.029 --> 00:16:50.450 to play his hand again. He tries to dismiss Amin, 00:16:50.450 --> 00:16:52.750 telling him to step down and go be an ambassador 00:16:52.750 --> 00:16:56.070 overseas. Amin flat out refuses. The psychological 00:16:56.070 --> 00:16:58.929 break is complete. Amin shouts at Taraki, quote, 00:16:59.070 --> 00:17:01.289 You are the one who should quit. Because of drink 00:17:01.289 --> 00:17:03.009 and old age, you have taken leave of your senses. 00:17:03.580 --> 00:17:05.839 The very next day, September 14th, the showdown 00:17:05.839 --> 00:17:07.579 happens at the ARG, the presidential palace. 00:17:07.839 --> 00:17:10.160 The Soviet ambassador convinces Amin to visit 00:17:10.160 --> 00:17:12.599 the palace. Amin arrives with his chief of police. 00:17:12.740 --> 00:17:15.000 As they get inside, bodyguards open fire. An 00:17:15.000 --> 00:17:17.640 ambush. The chief of police is killed, but Amin 00:17:17.640 --> 00:17:20.359 only sustains injuries. He escapes, runs to his 00:17:20.359 --> 00:17:22.500 car, and speeds off to the Ministry of Defense. 00:17:23.130 --> 00:17:25.029 And once Amin is at the Ministry of Defense, 00:17:25.150 --> 00:17:27.190 the tables turn completely. He places the army 00:17:27.190 --> 00:17:30.309 on high alert. That evening, tanks roll into 00:17:30.309 --> 00:17:33.529 the city and surround government positions. Amin 00:17:33.529 --> 00:17:35.710 returns to the presidential palace, but this 00:17:35.710 --> 00:17:38.029 time with a contingent of army officers, and 00:17:38.029 --> 00:17:41.319 he places Taraki under arrest. The gang of four 00:17:41.319 --> 00:17:44.299 literally run away and hide in the Soviet embassy. 00:17:44.599 --> 00:17:47.160 The Soviets try to talk Amin down, but he refuses. 00:17:47.579 --> 00:17:50.740 Now Taraki is a prisoner. After arresting Taraki, 00:17:50.839 --> 00:17:53.180 Amin reportedly speaks with Soviet leader Leonid 00:17:53.180 --> 00:17:55.940 Brezhnev and asks him, Taraki is still around, 00:17:56.180 --> 00:17:58.740 what should I do with him? Brezhnev, who had 00:17:58.740 --> 00:18:01.039 just met with Taraki and vowed to protect him, 00:18:01.160 --> 00:18:04.059 replies that it is Amin's choice. Amin takes 00:18:04.059 --> 00:18:06.160 that as a green light. Believing he has Soviet 00:18:06.160 --> 00:18:08.220 support, he orders the death of his former great 00:18:08.220 --> 00:18:10.940 leader. The fate of Nur Muhammad Taraki is grim 00:18:10.940 --> 00:18:15.079 and claustrophobic. On October 9, 1979, Taraki 00:18:15.079 --> 00:18:17.440 is ordered to lie down on a bed. He doesn't resist. 00:18:17.720 --> 00:18:19.940 He doesn't say a word. The history describes 00:18:19.940 --> 00:18:22.460 how he is quietly suffocated with pillows by 00:18:22.460 --> 00:18:25.319 three men acting on Amin's orders. He is secretly 00:18:25.319 --> 00:18:28.119 buried at night. Two days later, the Afghan media 00:18:28.119 --> 00:18:30.140 tells the public that their chairman died of, 00:18:30.180 --> 00:18:33.529 quote, serious illness. The aftermath of that 00:18:33.529 --> 00:18:35.869 quiet murder is deafening. The news completely 00:18:35.869 --> 00:18:38.650 shocked Brezhnev. Despite what he told a man 00:18:38.650 --> 00:18:40.569 on the phone, the outright assassination of a 00:18:40.569 --> 00:18:42.549 leader the Soviets had backed was a bridge too 00:18:42.549 --> 00:18:45.230 far. Taraki's death was a major factor in the 00:18:45.230 --> 00:18:47.069 Soviet Union's fateful decision to intervene 00:18:47.069 --> 00:18:49.329 in Afghanistan just two months later, in December 00:18:49.329 --> 00:18:52.430 1979, overriding all their previous geopolitical 00:18:52.430 --> 00:18:54.569 fears. So what does this all mean? When you look 00:18:54.569 --> 00:18:57.150 at the life of Nurmuhammed Taraki, you're looking 00:18:57.150 --> 00:18:59.609 at a deeply cautionary tale for you, for anyone 00:18:59.609 --> 00:19:02.819 studying history. It shows how easily a genuine 00:19:02.819 --> 00:19:05.960 thirst for rapid progress, when it gets mixed 00:19:05.960 --> 00:19:09.440 with unchecked ego, a refusal to listen to reality 00:19:09.440 --> 00:19:12.359 and immense brutality can spiral entirely out 00:19:12.359 --> 00:19:14.880 of control. He wanted to leapfrog his country 00:19:14.880 --> 00:19:17.559 into the future, but his methods dragged it into 00:19:17.559 --> 00:19:20.470 a nightmare. To synthesize it, Taraki was a man 00:19:20.470 --> 00:19:22.849 caught between the pen and the sword. He could 00:19:22.849 --> 00:19:24.829 write eloquently about the struggles of the Afghan 00:19:24.829 --> 00:19:27.289 peasant, but when he took power, he fundamentally 00:19:27.289 --> 00:19:30.549 failed to understand those same people. His story 00:19:30.549 --> 00:19:32.809 is a masterclass in the hubris of believing your 00:19:32.809 --> 00:19:35.329 own propaganda. He let the great leader myth 00:19:35.329 --> 00:19:37.970 obscure the reality that his country was fracturing 00:19:37.970 --> 00:19:40.369 beneath his feet. It's a tragic paradox. And 00:19:40.369 --> 00:19:42.190 this raises an important question, something 00:19:42.190 --> 00:19:44.069 for you to really think about as we wrap up. 00:19:44.130 --> 00:19:47.190 Consider the immense, tragic irony of the Soviet 00:19:47.190 --> 00:19:50.529 Union's role here. For months, Moscow desperately 00:19:50.529 --> 00:19:53.170 tried to avoid a military quagmire in Afghanistan. 00:19:53.730 --> 00:19:56.349 You heard Kosygin warning Taraki that intervention 00:19:56.349 --> 00:19:58.910 would be a fatal mistake. They knew the risks 00:19:58.910 --> 00:20:01.190 to their own empire. Yet it was the internal 00:20:01.190 --> 00:20:03.809 betrayal, the botched assassination, the bruised 00:20:03.809 --> 00:20:06.650 egos, and the suffocation of this one man by 00:20:06.650 --> 00:20:09.390 his own protege that finally tipped the scale. 00:20:09.549 --> 00:20:13.450 It drew the USSR into a grueling, decade -long 00:20:13.450 --> 00:20:15.670 conflict that would ultimately contribute to 00:20:15.670 --> 00:20:18.289 the collapse of the Soviet Union itself. How 00:20:18.289 --> 00:20:20.710 often does history pivot not on grand, overarching 00:20:20.710 --> 00:20:23.829 strategies, but on a botched assassination and 00:20:23.829 --> 00:20:26.109 the fragile egos of the men in power? That is 00:20:26.109 --> 00:20:28.190 a fascinating thought to end on. Thank you so 00:20:28.190 --> 00:20:29.890 much for joining us on this custom -tailored 00:20:29.890 --> 00:20:32.329 deep dive into the life of Nur Muhammad Taraki. 00:20:32.549 --> 00:20:34.650 Keep asking questions, keep looking past the 00:20:34.650 --> 00:20:36.670 headlines, and keep exploring the forces that 00:20:36.670 --> 00:20:38.349 shape our world. We'll catch you next time.