Mujahideen Tactics in the Soviet-Afghan War - Bennett Park Raiders

VIGNETTE 13
AMBUSH AT THE SADRE AZAM HILL
by Doctor Mohammad Wakil
It was August 1984. We had information that a Soviet supply
column would come to Kabul from the north. There is a small hill
on the highway south of Qala-e Morad Beg. (Map 14 - Morad) It is
the Sadre Azam hill. It is an excellent site for an ambush and
we set up our ambush on the hill to the east of the highway. 8
had 30 Mujahideen and four RPG-7s. This area was closely
watched by the enemy and so we could not spread our force out.
Therefore, I concentrated the force on the hill with the rifles
forward and the RPGs higher up on the hill. We thought that the
convoy would arrive at 1600 hours and were in place before that
time. At 1600 hours, the convoy came. It was led by a BMP. Soviet
soldiers were sitting on top of the BMP. Usually we would not
attack the head of the column, but since the lead vehicle was such
a good target, we opened fire on it and destroyed it. We took the
column by surprise. The column stopped and the enemy dismounted
some soldiers who took up positions and fired back at us. We
fired at each other for about an hour until a relief column arrived
from nearby Kabul to help the ambushed column. We pulled out.
The enemy lost one BMP, four gasoline tankers and probably about
ten killed and wounded. We lost Malek Mohammad from Karez-e
Mir who was killed.
COMMENTARY: This is typical of the small-scale ambushes that the
Mujahideen regularly conducted. The losses on both sides were minor,
yet over time they added up. The Soviet soldiers customarily rode on
top of their APCs since it is safer if the APC hit a mine. A powerful
antitank mine blast might merely hurl the the soldiers off the APC
whereas it would almost certainly kill everyone inside. Furthermore,
the inside of an APC is crowded, is hard to see out of and, in August, is
unbearably warm.
Doctor Mohammad Wakil is from Shakardara District north of Kabul. He graduated from
high school before the war. He joined the resistance and received medical training in
Pakistan. [Map sheet 2886, vie grid 0734].
^ Author Ali Jalali has conducted tactical classes on this very terrain while teaching Afghan
Army officers at the Higher Education School. It truly is an excellent ambush site.
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