How the CIA Defeated the Soviets in Afghanistan | Milton Bearden (Part 1)

Milton Bearden was the CIA officer tasked by Director William Casey in 1986 with using $1 billion and Stinger missiles to help drive Soviet forces out of Afghanistan, one of the most consequential covert operations of the Cold War.

In this first part of a remarkable conversation, Bearden takes us inside the secret machinery of Operation Cyclone. He recounts how Washington shifted from simply "bleeding" the Soviets to pursuing outright victory, how the covert war was run through Pakistan's ISI, and how weapons and money were distributed among the fractious Mujahideen factions, none of them, by his own admission, above reproach.

He describes training fighters in makeshift conditions in Rawalpindi: a white sheet, an infrared light, and a $200 room that outperformed the US Army's billion-dollar facility at Fort Bliss. He recounts the September 1986 Stinger strike outside Jalalabad that changed the course of the war overnight, and speaks candidly about his dealings with General Akhtar, a tense face-to-face with Hekmatyar, and the direct back-channel contacts with commanders that bypassed ISI oversight entirely.

Bearden also reflects on corruption among commanders, the deliberate exclusion of the Hazaras, the Saudi dollar-for-dollar funding match that doubled the war chest, and why he believes the only measure that ever truly mattered was whether the Soviets left.

They did. On February 15, 1989, General Boris Gromov crossed the Friendship Bridge and the war was won.

A rare, unfiltered account from the man who helped run one of the most consequential covert operations of the Cold War.

👍🏼 Support the show: Leave stars, comments, share with friends

📺 Watch/Subscribe on YouTube

Producer | Host: Roh Yakobi

Assistant Producer/Researcher: Sa-aadat Yakobi

Music ©: Dawood Sarkhosh

Email: hello@rohyakobi.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rohyakobi

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theafgpod

X: https://x.com/theafgpod

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Tämä jakso on lisätty Podme-palveluun avoimen RSS-syötteen kautta eikä se ole Podmen omaa tuotantoa. Siksi jakso saattaa sisältää mainontaa.

Jaksot(76)

From Kabul to Bamiyan - Afghanistan’s War, Ruin and Resilience | Jenny Matthews

In this episode, renowned British photographer Jenny Matthews reflects on nearly four decades of documenting Afghanistan, from the final years of the Soviet occupation to the return of the Taliban.She...

7 Kesä 45min

How the CIA Defeated the Soviets in Afghanistan | Milton Bearden (Part 3)

In this third and final part of a remarkable conversation, Milton Bearden reflects on the aftermath of the anti-Soviet jihad, the collapse of Afghanistan into civil war, and the decisions that helped ...

23 Touko 26min

How the CIA Defeated the Soviets in Afghanistan | Milton Bearden (Part 2)

In this second part of a remarkable conversation, Milton Bearden reflects on what came after the Soviet withdrawal and the decisions that helped shape Afghanistan’s next, far more chaotic chapter.He e...

26 Huhti 26min

Inside The Secret CIA Mission that Toppled the Taliban - Justin Sapp (Part 3)

Former U.S. Army Special Forces (Green Beret) and Team Alpha member Justin Sapp recounts his role in the clandestine CIA mission that landed behind Taliban lines immediately after 9/11. He describes w...

8 Maalis 40min

Mark Urban: I Marched Into Kabul with Ahmad Shah Massoud (E34)

Mark Urban is a British journalist, broadcaster, and best-selling author of many books, including War in Afghanistan and The Skripal Files. He has covered Afghanistan extensively since the late 1980s,...

20 Helmi 1h 5min