Bajaur Campaign

The Bajaur Campaign was an armed conflict between Afghanistan and Pakistan that began in September 1960 and ended in September 1961. It primarily took place in and around Bajaur District in Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas.

Hostilities broke out after Afghan prime minister Mohammad Daoud Khan, who was a vocal opponent of the Durand Line, sent in the Royal Afghan Army to occupy strategic regions in what is now Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which is considered to be an essential part of the Pashtun homeland. Ultimately, the Afghan invasion was brought to a halt following Pakistani airstrikes in Afghanistan's Kunar Province. The Bajaur Campaign may have been a proxy conflict of the Cold War, as it has been alleged that the Afghans and the Pakistanis were actively receiving support from the Soviet Union and the United States, respectively.

As a result of the Bajaur Campaign, Afghanistan–Pakistan relations deteriorated to an all-time low; their relationship had already been marred by tensions immediately after the creation of Pakistan in August 1947, as the Afghan government had been contesting the Durand Line, which Pakistan had inherited from British India. The two countries severed their diplomatic ties with each other and bilateral trade ceased for 18 months. Following Khan's forced resignation from the Afghan prime ministerial position, Afghanistan and Pakistan began talks for rapprochement in an effort that was jointly supervised by American president John F. Kennedy and Iranian King Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. Khan later returned to power as Afghanistan's president through the 1973 coup d'état, marking the beginning of the ongoing Afghan conflict.

Background

Afghanistan and British India

Relations between the two states of Afghanistan and Pakistan have been strained ever since the latter gained independence from the United Kingdom following the Partition of British India in August 1947. Following partition, the Kingdom of Afghanistan was the only country to vote against the Dominion of Pakistan's admission into the United Nations as a recognized sovereign state. After the independence of Pakistan, Afghanistan operated agents who operated in north-western Pakistan, distributing large amounts of money, ammunition and even transistor radios in an effort to sway loyalties from locals Pakistanis to Afghanistan.

Durand Line dispute

Moreover, Afghanistan did not recognize the Durand Line that is the Pakistan–Afghanistan border (which Pakistan inherited from British India and which Afghanistan marked itself). Due to these large, illicit territorial claims over the western regions of Pakistan—roughly corresponding with the modern-day Pakistani provinces of Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa—relations between the two countries soured, and Afghanistan started funding proxies and initiated regular skirmishes with Pakistan along the border.

After the creation of Pakistan

By 1948, Afghanistan was providing armaments and funding to proxies inside the Tirah and Razmak regions of northwest Pakistan. After talks between the two nations, Pakistan reportedly escalated the border clashes to put Shah Mahmud, the Prime Minister of Afghanistan, and the Afghan government into a “defensive position”. In 1949, Pakistan launched a military raid against fighters who advocated for Pashtunistan, subjecting their villages to an aerial bombardment. Subsequently, the Pakistan Air Force crossed the border into Afghanistan and bombarded part of Paktia Province.

In the late 1950s, the Royal Afghan Army, with artillery support, attacked the Pakistani village of Dobandi and subsequently crossed the border and occupied a strategically vital railway link in Chaman− Quetta. The incursion prompted a large Pakistani offensive, following which the Pakistan Army retook the pass and pushed Afghan troops back to the border after a week of heavy fighting.

Relations between the two states severely deteriorated in 1951, when Saad Akbar Babrak, an Afghan national, assassinated the then Prime Minister of Pakistan, Liaquat Ali Khan, in Rawalpindi during a public rally. On 30 March 1955, Afghan demonstrators attacked and torched the Pakistani embassy in Kabul and consulates in Kandahar and Jalalabad, following which diplomatic relations were severed by Pakistan. The areas surrounding Bajaur and other parts of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border saw extensive armed border skirmishes between Afghanistan and Pakistan from 1949 to 1971.

Afghan invasion of Pakistan

Between 1960 and 1961, Royal Afghan Army troops along with thousands of Pashtun tribesmen from Afghanistan crossed the extremely porous Pakistan–Afghanistan border and entered the semi-autonomous Bajaur Agency of Pakistan in an effort to annex the region. During this time, Afghanistan also deployed thousands of troops with tanks and artillery along the Afghanistan–Pakistan border and frequently attacked locally stationed soldiers from mountainous posts.

Infiltrations into Bajaur

In September 1960 Afghan irregulars and regular military troops in civilian clothing crossed into Bajaur. Two other raids took place in May and fall of 1961. They engaged with local tribesmen led by Nawab of Khar and retreated after suffering heavy casualties. Pakistan bombed Afghan force using its air force but instead of escalating the conflict, this de-escalated the situation for some time. The newly formed Bajaur Scouts also engaged in combat against the Afghan troops.

Infiltration into Dir

In September 1960, Afghan tribesmen and some regular troops under civilian cover entered the area of Dir as part of the wider Bajaur Campaign to help Nawab Jahan Khan against the Pakistan-backed opposition. The Afghan lashkars were forced to withdraw and this proved to be the ''casus belli'' for the Pakistani government to launch the operation for the overthrow of Nawab.

Batmalai raid

In March 1961, Afghanistan reportedly provided weapons and ammunition to proxies under the leadership of Fazl Akbar, to incite an uprising in the Batmalai district of Bajaur. Pacha Gul was advised to go before an aerial counteroffensive could be triggered against his forces for serving as an agent for Afghanistan and providing resources worth of 170 million Afghanis, cash, and arms to the Bajaur tribesmen which were to incite a uprising against Pakistan. The Pakistan Air Force took action by bombing the area where the ammunition dump was stored, claiming to have destroyed it during the aerial bombardment. The assault was likely undertaken without the Afghan government’s knowledge, reportedly leading to the Royal Afghan Army officers in charge being dishonourably discharged.

After the raid, Pakistan increased the presence of security forces present along the Durand Line. The local tribes did not accept the presence of Pakistan armed forces other than those of locally raised units such as Bajaur scouts. The locals protested to the government troops by ambushing them on the very first night and caused casualties among the units, which convinced the government to withdraw the units.

Skirmishes near Khyber pass

In May 1961 skirmishes took place in the area of the Khyber Pass. Pakistani government announced that regular Afghan troops had struck Pakistani border posts. The Pakistani air force bombed Afghan positions in retaliation. On 22 May, Pakistani warplanes bombed a base of raiding Afghan troops in Baganandail.

Pakistani aerial offensive

The Pakistan Air Force sent F-86 Sabre jets in order to support the Pakistani Forces and local Pashtun tribesmen of Pakistan who were fighting the Afghan infiltrators. The F-86 Sabre jets also executed bombing runs on Royal Afghan Army positions in Kunar, Afghanistan, thus leading Afghan forces to fall back to the international border. The airstrikes destroyed machine guns and mortar nests in Kunar that were used to attack Pakistani border posts. Pakistan Air Force also bombed Baganandail and Afghan intruders in Bajaur, Dir and near the Khyber pass. Although the Royal Afghan Air Force had seven MiG-17 squadrons and another MiG-21 squadron being operationalized, no known dogfight has been recorded between the two sides.

See also

* Durand Line
** Afghanistan–Pakistan border skirmishes

References

Sources

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* {{cite book, last=Riedel , first=Bruce , title=What We Won: America's Secret War in Afghanistan, 1979-89 , publisher=Brookings , url=https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Chapter-1-3.pdf, date=2014 “Chapter 1: The Afghan Communists”

Military campaigns involving Afghanistan
Military campaigns involving Pakistan
Airstrikes conducted by Pakistan
Conflicts in 1960
Conflicts in 1961
Campaign
20th century in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
Military history of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa