The Road to Afghanistan - George Washington University

ascent. One plane, flying low above the Rishkor district, was hit by a surface-to- air missilefired from an infantry division based there. The pilot parachuted.Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the USSR to the Republic ofAfghanistan, Alexander Mikhailovich Puzanov, was an experienced diplomat andbureaucrat. As a young man, Puzanov had been promoted by Stalin himself to assume theposition of head of the Communist Party organization of the Kuibyshev region. He, alongwith Brezhnev, became a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party at theNineteenth Congress of the CPSU. He remained a member of the Central Committee whenserving as the Soviet ambassador in Kabul. In short, Puzanov had been a member of theSoviet political elite for three decades.Puzanov enjoyed telling stories of the old days to his entourage: “Sometimes LeonidIlyich Brezhnev would receive me. Well, I would report what I was supposed to reportwithin my allotted time and then I would get up to leave. But Brezhnev wouldn’t let me go.He would say, ‘Where are you rushing off to? Stay some more, let’s talk.’”It appeared that the general secretary recognized a purebred bureaucrat of theStalin school in Puzanov. He was a truly loyal and dedicated apparatchik who served hisparty in all positions entrusted to him. From time to time, with and without reason, hewould send packages from Kabul to Brezhnev and other high-ranking Soviet leaders: sweetgrapes, giant pomegranates from Kandahar, tender, thin-skinned mandarins, and all sortsof organic vegetables.Alexander Mikhailovich had occupied many important positions in his life. He hadeven been the chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Russian Federation for sometime. After that he had been appointed to lead the diplomatic missions to North Korea,30